[BLOG] Some Tuesday links

• Anthro{dendum} features an essay examining trauma and resiliency as encountered in ethnographic fieldwork.
• Architectuul highlights a new project seeking to promote historic churches built in the United Kingdom in the 20th century.
• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait examines Ahuna Mons, a muddy and icy volcano on Ceres, and looks at the nebula Westerhout 40.
• Centauri Dreams notes the recent mass release of data from a SETI project, and notes the discovery of two vaguely Earth-like worlds orbiting the very dim Teegarden’s Star, just 12 light-years away.
• Chris Bertram at Crooked Timber notes that having universities as a safe space for trans people does not infringe upon academic freedom.
• The Crux looks at the phenomenon of microsleep.
• D-Brief notes evidence that the Milky Way Galaxy was warped a billion years ago by a collision with dark matter-heavy dwarf galaxy Antlia 2, and notes a robotic fish powered by a blood analogue.
• The Dragon’s Tales notes that India plans on building its own space station.
• Earther notes the recording of the song of the endangered North Pacific right whale.
• The Everyday Sociology Blog looks at the role of emotional labour in leisure activities.
• Far Outliers looks at how Japan prepared for the Battle of the Leyte Gulf in 1944.
• Gizmodo looks at astronomers’ analysis of B14-65666, an ancient galactic collision thirteen billion light-years away, and notes that the European Space Agency has a planned comet interception mission.
• io9 notes how the plan for Star Trek in the near future is to not only have more Star Trek, but to have many different kinds of Star Trek for different audiences.
• Joe. My. God. notes the observation of Pete Buttigieg that the US has probably already had a gay president.
• JSTOR Daily looks at the many ways in which the rhetoric of Celtic identity has been used, and notes that the archerfish uses water ejected from its eyes to hunt.
• Language Hat looks at why Chinese is such a hard language to learn for second-language learners, and looks at the Suso monastery in Spain, which played a key role in the coalescence of the Spanish language.
• Language Log looks at the complexities of katakana.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes the death of deposed Egypt president Mohammed Morsi looks like a slow-motion assassination, and notes collapse of industrial jobs in the Ohio town of Lordstown, as indicative of broader trends.
• The LRB Blog looks at the death of Mohamed Morsi.
• The Map Rom Blog shares a new British Antarctic Survey map of Greenland and the European Arctic.
• Marginal Revolution notes how non-religious people are becoming much more common in the Middle East, and makes the point that the laying of cable for the transatlantic telegraph is noteworthy technologically.
• Noah Smith at Noahpionion takes the idea of the Middle East going through its own version of the Thirty Years War seriously. What does this imply?
• The NYR Daily takes a look at a Lebanon balanced somehow on the edge, and looks at the concentration camp system of the United States.
• The Planetary Society Blog explains what people should expect from LightSail 2, noting that the LightSail 2 has launched.
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw points readers to his stories on Australian spy Harry Freame.
• Rocky Planet explains, in the year of the Apollo 50th anniversary, why the Moon matters.
• Drew Rowsome reviews, and praises, South African film Kanarie, a gay romp in the apartheid era.
• The Russian Demographics Blog links to a paper examining the relationship between childcare and fertility in Belgium, and looks at the nature of statistical data from Turkmenistan.
• The Strange Maps Blog shares a map highlighting different famous people in the United States.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains why different galaxies have different amounts of dark matter, and shares proof that the Apollo moon landings actually did happen.
• Towleroad notes the new evidence that poppers, in fact, are not addictive.
• Window on Eurasia warns about the parlous state of the Volga River.
• Arnold Zwicky takes an extended look at the mid-20th century gay poet Frank O’Hara.

[AH] Five #alternatehistory maps from r/imaginarymaps: Vinland, Finns, Caribbean, Bulgaria, Benelux

• This r/imaginarymaps creation maps the stages of an Norse expansion into North America, from the Gulf of St. Lawrence up the St. Lawrence River.
• A “Finnic Confederation” dominating the eastern Baltic, including not only Finland and Estonia but Ingria and even the lands of the Veps is, subject of this r/imaginarymaps map. How would you get this? Extended Swedish or Nordic hegemony, perhaps?
• This r/imaginarymaps creation is, I think, overoptimistic in depicting the ability of an independent Confederacy to expand into the Caribbean basin. It certainly would have been checked by rivals.
• Part of a larger alternate history scenario featuring a German victory in the First World War, this r/imaginarymaps map imagines a Greater Bulgaria that has taken territory from most of its neighbours.
• Though you might disagree with the details of this scenario, this map of a United Netherlands bringing together the Dutch with he Flemish is evocative. How could this have happened?

[DM] Some links: immigration, cities, small towns, French Canada, Eurasia, China, Brexit, music

Another links post is up over at Demography Matters!

• Skepticism about immigration in many traditional receiving countries appeared. Frances Woolley at the Worthwhile Canadian Initiative took issue with the argument of Andray Domise after an EKOS poll, that Canadians would not know much about the nature of migration flows. The Conversation observed how the rise of Vox in Spain means that country’s language on immigration is set to change towards greater skepticism. Elsewhere, the SCMP called on South Korea, facing pronounced population aging and workforce shrinkages, to become more open to immigrants and minorities.
• Cities facing challenges were a recurring theme. This Irish Examiner article, part of a series, considers how the Republic of Ireland’s second city of Cork can best break free from the dominance of Dublin to develop its own potential. Also on Ireland, the NYR Daily looked at how Brexit and a hardened border will hit the Northern Ireland city of Derry, with its Catholic majority and its location neighbouring the Republic. CityLab reported on black migration patterns in different American cities, noting gains in the South, is fascinating. As for the threat of Donald Trump to send undocumented immigrants to sanctuary cities in the United States has widely noted., at least one observer noted that sending undocumented immigrants to cities where they could connect with fellow diasporids and build secure lives might actually be a good solution.
• Declining rural settlements featured, too. The Guardian reported from the Castilian town of Sayatón, a disappearing town that has become a symbol of depopulating rural Spain. Global News, similarly, noted that the loss by the small Nova Scotia community of Blacks Harbour of its only grocery store presaged perhaps a future of decline. VICE, meanwhile, reported on the very relevant story about how resettled refugees helped revive the Italian town of Sutera, on the island of Sicily. (The Guardian, to its credit, mentioned how immigration played a role in keeping up numbers in Sayatón, though the second generation did not stay.)
• The position of Francophone minorities in Canada, meanwhile, also popped up at me.
• This TVO article about the forces facing the École secondaire Confédération in the southern Ontario city of Welland is a fascinating study of minority dynamics. A brief article touches on efforts in the Franco-Manitoban community of Winnipeg to provide temporary shelter for new Francophone immigrants. CBC reported, meanwhile, that Francophones in New Brunswick continue to face pressure, with their numbers despite overall population growth and with Francophones being much more likely to be bilingual than Anglophones. This last fact is a particularly notable issue inasmuch as New Brunswick’s Francophones constitute the second-largest Francophone community outside of Québec, and have traditionally been more resistant to language shift and assimilation than the more numerous Franco-Ontarians.
• The Eurasia-focused links blog Window on Eurasia pointed to some issues. It considered if the new Russian policy of handing out passports to residents of the Donbas republics is related to a policy of trying to bolster the population of Russia, whether fictively or actually. (I’m skeptical there will be much change, myself: There has already been quite a lot of emigration from the Donbas republics to various destinations, and I suspect that more would see the sort of wholesale migration of entire families, even communities, that would add to Russian numbers but not necessarily alter population pyramids.) Migration within Russia was also touched upon, whether on in an attempt to explain the sharp drop in the ethnic Russian population of Tuva in the 1990s or in the argument of one Muslim community leader in the northern boomtown of Norilsk that a quarter of that city’s population is of Muslim background.
• Eurasian concerns also featured. The Russian Demographics Blog observed, correctly, that one reason why Ukrainians are more prone to emigration to Europe and points beyond than Russians is that Ukraine has long been included, in whole or in part, in various European states. As well, Marginal Revolution linked to a paper that examines the positions of Jews in the economies of eastern Europe as a “rural service minority”, and observed the substantial demographic shifts occurring in Kazakhstan since independence, with Kazakh majorities appearing throughout the country.
• JSTOR Daily considered if, between the drop in fertility that developing China was likely to undergo anyway and the continuing resentments of the Chinese, the one-child policy was worth it. I’m inclined to say no, based not least on the evidence of the rapid fall in East Asian fertility outside of China.
• What will Britons living in the EU-27 do, faced with Brexit? Bloomberg noted the challenge of British immigrant workers in Luxembourg faced with Brexit, as Politico Europe did their counterparts living in Brussels.
• Finally, at the Inter Press Service, A.D. Mackenzie wrote about an interesting exhibit at the Musée de l’histoire de l’immigration in Paris on the contributions made by immigrants to popular music in Britain and France from the 1960s to the 1980s.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Montréal, New York City, Brussels, Baghdad, Hiroshima

• The National Observer notes that Montréal authorities have warned against people going to flooded areas to take selfies.
• CityLab notes the plans of Columbia University in Manhattan to become a new much denser neighbourhood, and the concerns of non-university neighbours.
• Feargus O’Sullivan notes at CityLab how congested Brussels is gradually becoming car-free.
• Ozy llooks at the underground nightclubs and music halls of the young people of Baghdad.
• Sean Marshall, reporting from his recent trip to Japan, explores post-war the streetcar system of Hiroshima with photos of his own.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Kingston, Moncton, Detroit, Brussels, Tokyo

• The reopening of the main library in Kingston is the subject of this article over at Global News.
• Moncton will host a CFL game in August, part of the league’s efforts to build up a football-watching audience in the Maritimes generally. Global News reports.
• CityLab reports on the historic Hamtranck stadium in Detroit, a key element of black history.
• Politico Europe reports on the many British immigrants in Brussels, facing an uncertain fate come Brexit.
• Beth Elderkin writes at io9 about all of the cool nerd culture attractions she saw on a recent visit to Tokyo.

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait shares Johannes Kroeger’s image of the median Earth.
• The Crux considers when human societies began to accumulate large numbers of aged people. Would there have been octogenarians in any Stone Age cultures, for instance?
• The Dragon’s Tales considers Russia’s strategy in Southeast Asia.
• Alexandra Samuel at JSTOR Daily notes that one way to fight against fake news is for people to broaden their friends networks beyond their ideological sympathizers.
• Language Log, noting a television clip from Algeria in which a person defend their native dialect versus standard Arabic, compares the language situation in the Arab world to that of China.
• Marginal Revolution’s Tyler Cowen explains how the Tervuren Central African museum in Brussels has not been decolonized.
• The Planetary Society Blog explores the ice giants, Uranus and Neptune.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel explains why, in current physics, the multiverse must exist.
• Strange Company explores the strange disappearance, in the Arizona desert in 1952, of a young couple. Their plane was found and in perfect condition, but what happened to them?
• Strange Maps reports on the tragic migration of six Californian raptors, only one of which managed to make it to its destination.
• Towleroad reports on the appearance of actor and singer Ben Platt on The Ellen Show, talking about his career and coming out.
• Window on Eurasia notes the apparently widespread mutual dislike of Chechens and Muscovites.
• Arnold Zwicky considers the French Impressionist artists Pierre Puvis de Chavannes and Suzanne Valadon, with images of their art.

[NEWS] Five links about populations: Franco-Ontarians, Acadians, American whites, Brexit, Belgium

• CBC reports from a Franco-Ontarian youth gathering, in Ontario’s easternmost and Francophone-majority Prescott-Russell, where young Francophones are responding with defiance.
• This Acadie Nouvelle opinion piece suggests that, to deal with the problems of the Acadians of the Maritimes, they should collectively seek some sort of autonomy across provincial frontiers.
• This New York Times article noting the questionable nature of the census estimate that white Americans were bound to be a minority soon, and this projection’s political consequences, is worth reading.
• Brexit is incompatible with a liberalized immigration policy in the United Kingdom; left-wing Brexiters should know better. Politics.co.uk has it.
• CBC notes how Belgium, dealing with the election of its first black mayor and a revamping of a museum devoted to Central Africa, is starting to deal with its racist past.

[NEWS] Thirteen more links about the First World War (#ww1)

• The Buzz shared a list of recommended books, from the Toronto Public Library, looking back at the First World War.
• CBC Montreal describes how the Belgian city of Mons greeted the inheritors of their Canadian liberators.
• CBC reports on how the grief of one Newfoundland family at the loss of a son in the First World War spelled the doom of the entire community of Three Arms.
• CBC Montreal describes how the city of Montréal greeted news of the armistice back in 1918.
• Crooked Timber notes the centenary of the armistice that ended the First World War. Have we forgotten the lessons, or did we ever learn them?
• L.M. Sacasas at The Frailest Thing notes how the mechanization of the First World War set it apart from other conflicts, inspiring (for instance) Tolkien.
• Global News reports on the nearly one million Muslims who served as soldiers in the First World War.
• The Guardian reports on how Islander Leo Cheverie went to France to pay respects to his two great-uncles, killed in the First World War.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money reports on Henry Gunther, the American who was the very last casualty of the First World War.
• The Russian Demographics Blog shares a map showing the casualty rates of different European combatants in the First World War.
• Adrian Phillips at Spacing Toronto uses Remembrance Day as a frame to examine monuments both permanent and temporary in Toronto.
• Katie Daubs at the Toronto Star reports on the fake news that caused Toronto to prematurely celebrate the end of the First World War.
• Window on Eurasia notes how many key elements of the modern world, from borders to ideologies, were created by the First World War.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Duisburg, Macau, San Francisco, Brussels, Rive-Sud of Montréal

• Guardian Cities notes how the German hub of Duisburg is taking on an outsized role as a linchpin in China’s overseas trade.
• The SCMP reports on the terrible level of poverty, and income inequality generally, in a Macau that is one of the richest cities in the world.
• This VICE report examining how people of normal, never mind modest, incomes can afford to live in the San Francisco area is eye-opening.
• Guardian Cities reports on the new street names being given to routes in the Belgian capital of Brussels.
• This Cyberpresse report on the transit ambitions of the municipalities of the Rive-Sud, the South Shore of Montréal, reminds me of discussions about GTA transit.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Ottawa, Markham, Moncton, Antwerp, San Francisco

• The story of how the murder of Alain Brosseau by gay-bashers in Ottawa nearly thirty years ago led to lasting change is important to remember. The Ottawa Citizen reports.
• This rather unique statue of a cow in Markham is still standing, despite neighbourhood discontent. The Toronto Star reports.
• The closure of Saint-Louis-de-France Roman Catholic Church in Moncton surprises me somewhat, since Moncton is one of the few growing centres of the Maritimes. Global News reports.
• The Belgian port city of Antwerp is looking to find some advantage from Brexit. Bloomberg reports.
• The impact of sea level rise on San Francisco and the wider Bay area may be devastating. Wired reports.