#hollins university

[agirlnamedbone]

The act of imaginative writing (and the act of imaginative reading) is, I assure you, at one and the same time, rational, irrational, intuitive, exploratory, exciting, enlightening, seldom comforting, often dangerous, always adventurous, and absolutely nuts. It makes you leap up from your chair, ruffling your hair, a divine frenzy whirling in your eyes, and it possesses you of an extraordinary calm that is beyond mere understanding.

R.H.W Dillard, “Going Out Into the Crazy” at Blackbird Review

[transguyathollinsuniversity]

THE FUCKING CATS CAN MARRY EACH OTHER?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

[goosewizard]

TAZ HOLLINS MENTION!!!! AS WE ALL KNOW ITS 1842!!! TAZ HOLLINS MENTION!!

[echidna-auxiliatrix]

[katotak54]

my roommate and i painted a recycling bin bc college, and i have to share. it’s primarily mcu themed 🫶

[crownomancer]

Hollin.

-

I give a lot of men in the Temeraire universe ponytails.

[ukrfeminism]

Though British farming is arguably at the most precarious point in its long history – thanks to changes caused by Brexit and food industry subsidies, lack of clear food production policies and increased concern over environmental issues – more women than ever are choosing a career in agriculture and, more importantly, moving into leadership roles.

Back in the 1970s, Holly Collins was studying for her A-levels in Sussex. While her friends sent off their university applications, she wrote to the Royal Agricultural College asking for an entry form, hoping to follow her dream of becoming a farmer.

“They wrote back with the following answer: ��Dear Miss Collins, we do not admit women.’”

Undeterred, she worked on a farm the following summer: “A lot of the tasks then were manual labour, so I’d just turn up at the farm gate and ask for a job. I was paid much less than the male students I worked with because I was female. The farmer’s father told him that, because I was the hardest worker, he should pay me the same as them – but he didn’t.”

Things, says the 64-year-old who now has her own upland farm, Hollin Bank, at the head of Coniston Water in the Lake District, have improved a lot for women in agriculture since then.

Though British farming is arguably at the most precarious point in its long history – thanks to changes caused by Brexit and food industry subsidies, lack of clear food production policies and increased concern over environmental issues – more women than ever are choosing a career in agriculture and, more importantly, moving into leadership roles.

Minette Batters, the first ever female president of the National Farmers’ Union of England and Wales (NFU), may have stepped down this spring after six years in office, but women are still well represented in the union, with Rachel Hallos, a South Pennines farmer, installed as NFU vice-president and Abi Reader as deputy president for NFU Cymru. The Great Yorkshire Show has just got its first female show director in its 186-year history – dairy farmer Rachel Coates takes over after this year’s show in July. In the field of specialist skills, the UK has also just appointed its first female wool grader. Amy-Jo Barton, 22, is based at British Wool (formerly the British Wool Marketing Board) in Bradford where she sorts wool by hand based on style and characteristics; a job she finds “very therapeutic”.

While women comprised 17% of farmers in 2019, data from the Office for National Statistics for 2023 shows that of the 104,700 registered farmers, 22% are female. In the broader category of managers in agricultural services, women make up 32% of the workforce. According to recent figures from the Higher Education Statistics Agency, 64% of agricultural students are women. For an industry that historically relies on father-to-son succession to pass on land and which used to exclude women from many of its educational establishments, farming has come a long way.

Coates, incoming director of the Great Yorkshire Show, says: “Women have always been the backbone of a farm. Now they’re no longer in the kitchen tied to the Aga, they’re at the forefront of the industry. It’s good to see this take-up of leadership roles.”

Louisa Dines, principal lecturer in agronomy at Harper Adams University in Shropshire, thinks farming has lagged behind in terms of gender diversity but is finally catching up with other industries.

“Farmers’ wives and daughters were always important – farms are typically family businesses and intertwined with home life – but women used to operate below the radar,” she says. “Historically local meetings were in the pub or village hall. Wives often weren’t invited or had to look after the children. Even if they did go, it can be intimidating walking into a room full of men, but new communication platforms – such as social media and video conferencing – have made it easier for women to take part.”

There are more than 14,000 members of the Facebook group Ladies Who Lamb and farmers such as the Yorkshire Shepherdess and the Red Shepherdess have huge followings on TikTok and Instagram. Dines says she recently attended an agritech conference to promote links between women in farming in Poland, Ukraine and England. Previously these women had worked in isolation but not had a sense of community. “It was so interesting to see how far we’ve come.”

Traditions need to change more, though. The average age of a British farmer is 59 and the business is still typically passed down the male side of the family. A 2022 survey in Northern Ireland found that inheritance was the second biggest challenge faced by women in farming. The biggest was male dominance.

Molly Lewis, whose family have farmed sheep on 250 acres of pasture in Powys, Wales, for 350 years, says this attitude is starting to shift. The 20-year-old plans to take over when her father and his brother retire. She splits her time between working in the family business and the local agricultural market.

“In the past, sometimes men felt pressured to take on the farm even if their heart wasn’t in it, but now it goes to whoever is interested. I’ve noticed a lot more women happily getting involved. It feels natural, especially here. We have an open hill farm in the Elan Valley, and do a lot of community work with all our neighbours. You see women and girls on the hills doing the same jobs as the men and no one thinks anything of it.”

Lewis also talks of the community’s fury at the Welsh government’s sustainable farming scheme – the post-Brexit plan for funding the industry which includes ensuring 10% of farmland is under tree cover.

Collins’s farm has low densities of mixed livestock and a nice sideline in educational courses teaching traditional farming skills such as dry stone walling and coppicing. It’s currently host to two masters students researching finance and birdlife. She brought in two women – Megan Jones and Katherine Andrews – to manage Hollin Bank alongside her.

She says she has had difficulties with “a lack of respect” from male farmers. “But I am learning at a late age and from the wonderful young women who work with me that you don’t have to instil fear in others to succeed in this very male world. We try to be warm and encouraging of anyone who is interested. I’m not sure this is a ‘female’ attitude to farming but I suspect it might be.”

None of the three at Hollin Bank grew up in agricultural families, bucking the tradition of succession. While Collins had a “striking ambition” to farm her whole life, her colleagues originally worked in conservation and nature restoration.

“As 70% of the UK is farmland, I wanted to understand how conservation and agriculture intertwine,” says Andrews. “I also believe we need to localise the food economy to save food miles, create jobs and deepen our connection to the land.”

If farming is in crisis it may be this new generation who look to change the status quo who will be able to find a resolution. All of them seem keen to evolve. Coates’s big ambition for the Yorkshire Agricultural Society is to engage young people because “we need to make farming relevant – there are going to be changes in agriculture over the next few years and we need to adapt”.

Dines points to the increased importance of marketing and communication – from farm shops and crafts to environmentally friendly farming practice – “all the public-facing activities at which women excel”.

Jones, who worked in restoration before joining Hollin Bank two years ago, also points to the need for communication within the indusry as well as with the public.

“We need to strengthen food systems that value farmers’ extensive knowledge of the landscapes they work in,” she says. “I think we need to listen to farmers and figure out what works financially and ecologically. How can we build resilient ecosystems?”

The reason so many more women have moved into farming is perhaps best explained when Jones talks about what she enjoys most about her work.

“My favourite thing about working on a farm is the daily and seasonal rhythms. Each day you adapt and respond to the environment and the animals. Days when we move the sheep or cows are always good days, walking with them is like a moving meditation. For someone who spent very little time doing practical work growing up, I find working with my hands very rewarding and empowering – especially as a woman.”

[elisabethloxx]

 It had to rain. The friends and family of Lisa Levy placed her body in the ground Tuesday, and strained to understand why a girl so young, so bright, so full of life, had to die at the hands of a murderer. THE GLOOMY gray morning only thickened the feelings of sorrow, as almost 200 persons ringed the canopied gravesite in Largo to pray and cry and rememler. "She will stay in our hearts forever, young and fresh as springtime." The words came from Rabbi Jacob Luski as he tried to comfort Lisa's grieving mother, father and brother during a crowded funeral in Pinellas Park "Tears are being shed, but memory is beginning," the soft-bearded Luski said.

"Lisa was a very determined young lady, lovable . . . determined in all ways of life." The Sunday before, as the 20-year-old Florida State University ( FSU) student slept in her Tallahassee sorority house, she was clubbed and strangled by a killer still at large. A second St.Petersburg girl was murdered, and three other young women were beaten before the attacker fled into the darkness, leaving at best a faint and scattered trail for police to follow. "IT WAS A tragedy, a stunning blow," the rabbi said. But he urged the mourners, "Do not judge your fellow man until you find yourself in his circumstances." Then he asked God to "teach us how to accept this bitter loss." Throughout the services, police, photographers and television cameramen milled in the background. The face of Lisa's mother, Henny Levy, looked blank and too numb for tears. Her divorced husband Sam, who lives in Sarasota, wore a gray suit and the traditional black yarmulke syna gogue cap.

Lisa's brother Fred, stationed in Maine with the U.S. Air Force, was gripped by emotions. As he prepared to shovel a spade of dirt on top of Lisa's pine coffin, he threatened to break a photographer's camera if he continued snapping pictures. AFTER THE BURIAL about 25 Chi Omega sisters from FSU and the University of South Florida joined hands in a circle and sang the sorority song Shades in tribute to Lisa's memory. Tear tracks glistened down the cheeks of Joanne Schultz, 20, as she and her husband walked in the drizzle after the funeral.

Both had been friends of Lisa during their high school years. "I knew her since siith grade," Mrs. Schultz said. At Dixie Hollins High School, "I was a cheerleader and she was a baton-twirling majorette. I'll always remember her smiling.

I don't want to remember any sad things. "He (the killer) just must have gone crazy. Yeah, I'm bitter. They say it happens to good people, and it happened to one of them " REPRESENTING FSl' was Stephen B. McClellan, the vice president for university relations. He also will attend funeral services at 2 p.m. today for the other murdered girl, Margaret Bowman, 21, at St. Thomas Episcopal Church. 1200Snell Isle Blvd.

[nanowrimo]

The Young Writers Initiative: Finding Your Writing Community

The Young Writers Initiative, a.k.a. TYWI, is a non-profit (founded by former NaNoWriMo intern Riya!) that provides resources for high school and college-aged writers through both their website and their on-the-ground chapters program. Today, some of the TYWI members share a little about how their programs help foster creative community:

Writing can often seem like an activity that involves sitting in your room alone, frantically typing on your computer. And yes, sometimes it is, but writing is a passion shared by millions of people around the globe. That means wherever you may be, you can find a community of writers to support you and your journey. This can include a few friends in your locality, an online server of people brought together by a love for writing, or anything in between. Being an active member of such a community means having people to keep you accountable, to bounce ideas off, and to empathize with your struggles as a writer.

Bounded by community, The Young Writers Initiative (TYWI) is dedicated to offering writing resources to help young writers develop their craft. From pre-reading and editing to mentorship opportunities with established authors, TYWI offers a multitude of free services. Volunteering at TYWI is also a great way to get more involved with the writing community! Additionally, TYWI’s Chapters Program helps students start creative writing clubs, forming tight-knit communities of young writers in their localities. 

Running a TYWI Chapter at Hollins University 

By Sophia Kunkel

It has been an honor to watch as the development of the first university chapter of TYWI unfolded on the Hollins campus. This opportunity to grow our branch has strengthened my leadership skills and helped me connect with other writers. The very act of writing is solitary, and it is amazing that The Young Writers Initiative brings together so many people all over the world, challenging the notion that we have to pursue our creative dreams on our own. 

After the founding of Hollins’ chapter, I discovered that the encouragement of a solid and reliable community is essential, regardless of majors, genres, or writing experience. We might do most of our work in our dorm rooms and the library, hunched over our laptops with headphones and sitting in quiet focus, but there is certainly so much benefit from getting together with like-minded, driven peers. Additionally, our virtual discussions with several authors—Cassie Gustafson and Kris Spisak—provided much welcomed insight and wisdom into the world of writing, editing, and publishing. The idea of networking and creating relationships between successful writers and aspiring writers continues to impact our club members as we seek to learn from our panelists and speakers. 

Running a TYWI Chapter at Wenatchee High School 

By Miranda Nayak

I drafted my first novel during the pandemic, spending my free time inside of a story. As months passed, writing’s role in my life evolved. While I had once perceived it as a trusted friend, writing began to feel more like the ghost of a companion—present but not tangible enough to hold on to. I was suddenly desperate for a connection to a writing community.

It was only through discovering The Young Writers Initiative's Summer Write-a-Thon that I realized how many other people my age were passionate about creative writing. While isolated in my home, I felt more connected to others than I had since beginning my writing journey.

The most gratifying part of starting a TYWI chapter has been feeling those connections within my high school. Spending an entire lunch period discussing craft, completing writing sprints, or talking about writing struggles together has shown me that writing does not have to be a lonely hobby. The members of my chapter inspire and motivate me to keep writing; they are invaluable partners. I can already see the beginnings of creative innovation and collaboration that will blossom in tandem with the meaningful connections that our TYWI chapter fosters.

All in all, building a writing community makes the craft even more enjoyable than it already is. If you are interested in starting a TYWI chapter at your school or library, we encourage you to apply at tywi.org/chapters. 

Yessica Jain is a high school junior from New Jersey. An avid reader, she has always been in love with the magic of words. When she started creative writing in sixth grade, she quickly discovered she could wield the same magic with passion, hard work, and time. Since then, she has written short stories in various genres and a fantasy novel titled The Prison of Magic. Learn more about Yessica and read her weekly writing blog at yessicajain.com.

Lydia Wang is someone who loves stories so much, she decided to create her own. She writes magic—plant mages singing to bluebells, silver rings laced with protective spells, paper cranes that come to life as you fold them. She has been recognized by Iowa Young Writers’ Studio (‘21 & ‘22) and published in Ice Lolly, Metaphysical Review, and more. When not starting her thirty-first story, Lydia can be found tracing shapes into the clouds.

Sophia Kunkel is a literature-lovin’ college sophomore at Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia. She loves nature walks, has endless enthusiasm for the Beatles, and adores her troublesome mini Goldendoodle, Bielka {the space dog}. Sophia writes primarily speculative fiction and fantasy. Her debut self-published novel, Starless Skies and Broken Dreams, can be found on Barnes and Noble and Amazon. Readers can find her at sophiakunkel.com or writinglife.blog. 

Miranda Nayak is a high school senior from central Washington State. In addition to being involved in robotics, she loves running her school’s Equity Club and playing the cello. She is an avid reader and adores writing fantasy and science fiction stories. You can find her on Instagram @barrybookish or on her website https://mirandanayakwritin.wixsite.com/website.

[exercise-of-trust]

(springboarding off this post: i started writing a tag essay and then a reblog essay and then partway through quoting a large section of the hobbit i began to genuinely feel bad about derailing a fun post into *gestures* this shit, but unfortunately my single brain cell decided this was the only thing we were gonna think about all day.)

i think... the original post is tapping in to an acute dissonance in property-law-intuitions between these groups, and i think the dwarves would definitely have been inclined to take the feanorians' side. but i don't think the dwarves, or at least the dwarves of the third age, would be *confused* about it - this is (allegedly) the whole issue at the heart of the nauglamir business. they've had to deal with it too. (allegedly because we only have the narrator's word for it, but whatever*)

ignoring all the extraneous description/assumptions about motives: the stated argument of the dwarves in claiming the nauglamir is that thingol has no personal claim or connection to it. the dwarves gave it to finrod, who has since died and whose kingdom is in ruins, and húrin found it there ("took it as a thief") and gave it to thingol. but it was never meant to be his! and this is a common argument in fandom today on why thingol has no right to the silmaril and should never have demanded it (and certainly should not have kept it upon receipt). the flow is exactly the same: this item has found itself in a contested state because the original owner isn't currently capable of retrieving it; someone else brings it to thingol, who considers himself entitled to keep it because it was abandoned (the nauglamir) or owed (the silmaril) (kind of**).

but all of that to say - the dwarves have been dealing with the same shit, with even more disastrous results, for nearly as long as the feanorians, and they're well aware of it. in fact the nauglamir incident is pretty clearly what's being referenced in 'flies and spiders' in the hobbit, in what's probably the most even-handed retelling: "in ancient days [the elves] had had wars with some of the dwarves, whom they accused of stealing their treasure. it is only fair to say that the dwarves gave a different account, and said that they only took what was their due, for the elf-king had bargained with them to shape his raw gold and silver, and had afterwards refused to give them their pay." a little further down: "all this was well known to every dwarf, though thorin's family had had nothing to do with the old quarrel".

so - to the dwarves, the fact that non-noldor (or non-feanorian noldor) have weird takes on stolen property isn't just an academic or theoretical issue - they're on the feanorians' side because it's their story too. (which really makes the period of collaboration in hollin, and its eventual fall, all the more tragic).

but legolas and gimli go to fangorn, and to the glittering caves, and after a long-ass time of the feanorians (and eol) being the main point of contact and alliance between elves and dwarves based on existing common ground and common interests - gimli and legolas have nothing in common at all. but they love each other and they go west together and they learn to understand each other anyway, and i'm extremely emo about it.

*on the one hand it's no fun ignoring the text entirely when you're doing meta but also, on the other, the silm does have an in-universe writer with extremely obvious personal biases? so it becomes a matter of discretion when you want to ignore the parts that seem to be a result of unfounded prejudice or wild conjecture.

**in the most generous light i can see how the silmaril could be considered forfeit due to c&c's actions against beren and lúthien. that is THE MOST generous reading and i still have issues with it, namely a) thingol was explicitly hoping the feanorians would kill beren for him even if he made it out of angband alive, b) thingol... very much also did imprison lúthien for an extended period of time, c) iirc historically a weregild was a set price codified in law, or something agreed upon/voluntarily offered by the guilty party; you didn't just... take someone's stuff and say "weregild!" when they asked for it back. yes i know isildur and the ring, whatever, that is not generally how weregilds worked and isildur's claim appears to be invalid anyway (c.f. council of elrond; frodo says "then it belongs to you, and not to me at all!" when aragorn's descent is announced; aragorn responds "it does not belong to either of us"). this is a long tangent but in conclusion FUCK THINGOL

[agheaven]

Hello, my name is Lainey and I'm a student at Hollins University working on an assignment for a class where I had to find a piece of media from my childhood and document how it is being preserved for the future. The American Girl magazines were a huge part of my childhood, but I wasn't too optimistic in finding them anywhere due the fact that something like a children's magazine is fairly ephemeral, so I was thrilled to see this project. Thank you for your work saving these for the future.

I'm glad to hear my magazine scans were able to help out with your class assignment! :>

If you want my 2 cents for your assignment, I feel like the Internet archive providing a method to easily share magazine scans with others in a way that doesn't require folks to download any extra files and just view straight from their browser goes a really long way. Scanning my entire AG magazine collection is something that has occurred to me a long time ago, but I always struggled with finding a good solution to presenting it. The internet archive providing that PDF preview where you can flip through pages like an actual magazine really gave me the encouragement that it was a worthwhile pursuit, that I could share what I have without thinking overly hard about how to share the individual pages.

[agirlnamedbone]

Let's just say that inspiration is a mysterious gift that, in the hands of a "real writer," in the deliberate and conscious exercise of craft is carefully, patiently, and lovingly developed into as complete an expression of that inspired moment as the writer is able to manage. While not averse to the promptings of logic or analysis, the "real writer" accepts the gift, opens herself or himself to that inspiration, and allows the whole mind (right and left brain alike) to recombine the world "in its very atoms." The result is a creation, that, like the larger creation (or just call it the real world, if you prefer), is complex, engaging, frightening, ambiguous, beautiful, baffling, threatening, consoling, runic, and ultimately richly and meaningfully satisfying. Rhyme and meter and the essentially rhythmical nature of all "real writing," whether in poetry or fiction, may be nothing more or less than an expression of the meaningful order inherent in the cluttered Babel of language, or perhaps the meaningful order inherent in the chaos of reality itself (what William James called the "humming-buzzing confusion" of experience).

R.H.W. Dillard, Going Out Into the Crazy, at Blackbird Review

[transguyathollinsuniversity]

I just payed my friend to play cattails.

[wallacejwriting]

February 2023 Update

February sucks. Let's put it that way. But I got some things done!

Writing:

Wrote 16,750 words this month

12,200 went into Descent. I finished chapter 6 and wrote most of chapter 7.

4,200 went into planning Rite of Stars and working out details of the Starmont Universe.

The rest got divided up into misc. idea planning, including Beurkratti stuff.

I'm fairly happy with my writing. I'm figuring out how to deal with the lulls and the stops, how to keep my creative energy flowing, how to plan and puzzle things out in ways I'm not used to. It's fun.

Reading:

Didn't finish anything this month.

Currently reading:

Borderline by Mishell Baker,

Truthwitch by Susan Dennard,

A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin,

Magic's Pawn by Mercedes Lackey,

The Smoke Thieves by Sally Green,

Fool's Gold by Jon Hollins,

How to Bite Your Neighbour and Win a Wager by D.N. Bryn,

A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness

and And the Ocean Was Our Sky by Patrick Ness.

I'm having a hard time focusing. Yeah.

Watching:

On S2E19 of Bones. VERY good. Love this show so much

Started X-Files

Started Star Trek: The Next Generation

Most recent TLOU episode watched is #6. Really excited to watch 7. Damn perfect show

On episode 4 or 5 of The Legend of Vox Machina. It's fun. I like polymachina.

Restarted The Good Doctor

Movies Watched: The Martian, Interstellar, The New Mutants, A Quiet Place, Arrival, and Godzilla (2014). Rewatched John Wick. Twice.

I have not been able to focus at all on anime. I've got like a billion I want to watch and no drive whatsoever. Welp.

Other:

Video games! Been playing a lot of modded Rimworld. Some Sims 4. Making a modded Stardew Valley to try soon.

Dog and cat and girlfriend are all A+

I'm surrounded by books at all times please god let me read.

[echidna-auxiliatrix]

[beardedmrbean]

The University of Virginia football game against Coastal Carolina set for this weekend was canceled on Wednesday following a shooting that left three players dead, the school announced.

The Cavaliers have two games remaining on the schedule. It remains unclear whether they will play their rivalry game next week against Virginia Tech in Blacksburg.

"The Virginia athletics department announced today (Nov. 16) the Cavaliers’ home football game vs. Coastal Carolina scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 19 has been canceled," the school said. "The decision was made following the shooting of five students on Grounds Sunday night. The incident resulted in the deaths of three members of the UVA team – Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis Jr. and D’Sean Perry," the school said."

Christopher Darnell Jones, Jr., the University of Virginia ex-football player accused of murdering three of his former teammates on a charter bus after returning from a class field trip, was slapped with additional charges in connection to the two surviving victims. His motive remains unknown.

Jones was initially charged with three counts of second-degree murder in connection to the deaths of active UVA football players Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis and D'Sean Perry, as well as three counts of using a handgun in commission of a felony. Two other UVA students were wounded and hospitalized.

The team has not practiced for two days.

One of the survivors is a UVA football player, Michael Hollins Jr. He was initially listed in critical condition and was intubated as of Monday night. He underwent a second surgery on Tuesday, was taken off a ventilator and said to be doing well, according to Baton Rouge-based attorney, Gordon McKernan.