Historian of Buddhism, political thought, and gender in medieval Sri Lanka. Kiwi in Heidelberg. Big fan of nice maps. He/Er/ඔහු/அவர்https://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.comhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3maxgjlaymc2k100%. If an author has either not read or not understood a source they've cited, then that would be grounds for a desk reject. A "blessing" of AI hallucinations is that this kind of author is suddenly a lot easier to spot... [contains quote post or other embedded content]27 Dec 2025 08:51 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3maxgjlaymc2khttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3maaukxyj522eWhenever our students open a PDF over two pages—in other words, every reading we assign them—Adobe tells them "this document looks long, let me summarise this for you." What message does this send to MA students about the value of actually reading the sources themselves?! [contains quote post or other embedded content]18 Dec 2025 09:31 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3maaukxyj522ehttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m7rmtmy2zs26What a delightful exemplar to come across, in the week my students have a book review due... [contains quote post or other embedded content]12 Dec 2025 08:03 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m7rmtmy2zs26https://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m7q5dcyzp22tAh, yes, my beloved archipelago in the South Pacific, that natural bastion of "the West" [contains quote post or other embedded content]11 Dec 2025 17:53 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m7q5dcyzp22thttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m7ldtlwih22lTangentially related: I cannot understand why BA students in NZ aren't *required* to study a language—especially students like me who majored in international relations. I took one semester of Japanese, it was hard and my grades sucked, of course 20yr old me didn't think it was worth continuing! [contains quote post or other embedded content]09 Dec 2025 20:06 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m7ldtlwih22lhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m72yk4mqg22dI wrote a book, it now has a cover, it's all feeling very real! Coming out (open access) in February, for all those with an interest in, well, religion, gender, and/or politics in Sri Lankan history. https://www.arc-humanities.org/9781802703092/religion-gender-and-politics-in-medieval-sri-lanka/03 Dec 2025 08:01 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m72yk4mqg22dhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m5xzh3iwbk2hIt's very "university IT department" to make it mandatory for us to use the VPN to check our emails... The same day that the VPN crashes. I'm sure that they've sent a very helpful email by now with a workaround! If only...19 Nov 2025 10:14 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m5xzh3iwbk2hhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m5edp63apk2nI shall henceforth always refer to GenAI as "the gibbering mouth froth of rabid autocomplete." (also this book and interview are both generally excellent) [contains quote post or other embedded content]11 Nov 2025 14:25 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m5edp63apk2nhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m5c674jhpk2dThe line "Señorita, feel the conga, let me see you move LIKE you come from Colombia" has never made much sense to me since Shakira actually DOES come from Colombia. Please enjoy these alternatives, with which I have been torturing my Colombian partner all day.10 Nov 2025 17:41 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m5c674jhpk2dhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m4zo7j4aj22pThis is a great read, well worth a subscription to the Examiner. A substantial preview of the article is available above the paywall too https://www.examiner.media/conclave-in-kandy-election-for-the-highest-lay-office-in-the-buddhist-world/07 Nov 2025 08:33 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m4zo7j4aj22phttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m4sz3axhzc2qThis could be my opportunity to stake out my own niche of academic Brunoism [contains quote post or other embedded content]04 Nov 2025 16:59 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m4sz3axhzc2qhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m4sgzot4yc2a#WebinAAR | On Friday 7 Nov, at 12pm ET / 6pm CET, I’ll be speaking in an AAR webinar on Buddhist feminist historiography, in conversation with Steph Balkwill and other excellent folks. Q and A follows; register now and join the discussion: https://my.aarweb.org/event-information?id=a0lVp000001htlRIAQ04 Nov 2025 11:36 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m4sgzot4yc2ahttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3m3xlonwikc27This is, with the benefit of Atlantic distance, hilarious. It is also deeply, deeply disturbing. [contains quote post or other embedded content]24 Oct 2025 19:18 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3m3xlonwikc27https://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3lzyas7w5fk2yGood copyedits need a good kittyeditor29 Sep 2025 14:45 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3lzyas7w5fk2yhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3lvvqvlxgac2zI have lived in Germany for two years now and still whenever I hear small children chatting away in public my first thought is "wow their German is so good, they must study very hard"08 Aug 2025 17:15 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3lvvqvlxgac2zhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3lt7o6voqes2vStephanie Balkwill's The Women Who Ruled China is an incredible book, with methodological takeaways for historians of gender and power in every context. Read my review for @royalstudies.bsky.social here: https://rsj.winchester.ac.uk/articles/10.21039/rsj.50105 Jul 2025 11:37 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3lt7o6voqes2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3lqmh5la2622nI've just had an article come out on a poem from medieval Sri Lanka, and what it might tell us about attitudes towards renunciation, religious paths, and the proximate goals of Buddhist practice: pwj.shin-ibs.edu/2025/7164 https://pwj.shin-ibs.edu/2025/716402 Jun 2025 09:20 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3lqmh5la2622nhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3lo6ihdvgvk2wJust days before Vesak, Sotheby's plan to auction off sacred relics of the Buddha—stolen in the colonial destruction of a stūpa, no less—to the highest bidder. https://religionnews.com/2025/04/22/auctioning-the-buddhas-relics-is-perpetuating-colonial-violence/02 May 2025 09:16 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3lo6ihdvgvk2whttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3ljs7j4h22s25A new issue of the Journal of Transcultural Studies is now available open-access! It features articles by @jaydprosser.bsky.social (Leeds), Alexander Vesey (Tokyo), Ori Sela (Tel Aviv) and Dhruv Raina (New Delhi/Pune). Great reads all; check them out here: https://heiup.uni-heidelberg.de/journals/transcultural/issue/view/245907 Mar 2025 14:23 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3ljs7j4h22s25https://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3letsnr6bt22jHistorian friends, here's a new years resolution for you: no more Google Maps screenshots in your powerpoints! Thanks to Technology™ it's easy and free to make maps from scratch that look professional (or at least professional enough), even with my level of extremely limited technical skills.03 Jan 2025 14:32 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3letsnr6bt22jhttps://bsky.app/profile/brunomshirley.com/post/3lej2ly522s2nThis is a great piece, and I love the idea of academic articles having a General Abstract for non-specialists. But let's be real: the biggest barrier to academic accessibility is paywalls. https://www.fairobserver.com/culture/all-the-light-we-cannot-see-urgency-for-understandable-academic-writing/#30 Dec 2024 07:55 +0000at://did:plc:3heugvcvugixbbvdoltrgh6e/app.bsky.feed.post/3lej2ly522s2n