Dr Agnes Arnold-Forster
Writer, Historian, Researcher | NHS Reform, Birth, Policy |The Health Foundation | NOSTALGIA published by Picador | Repped by Oli Munson | Views own | She/her
- GB news are calling the Fabian Society a cabal that controls the City of London hahhahahhahahah
- Someone in the comments has called them a “fanatical cult” 🫠
- Busses beginning with P are always the most choatic …I’m looking at you P5
- Americans have long sought to settle the Arctic www.historytoday.com/archive/feat... @historytoday.com
- A dangerous emotion? Heavy on the question mark this evening on The World Today www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterAgnes’ book sits high in a rich, recent library of ‘nostalgia’ texts — often poised on that etymological fulcrum of the ‘longing for’ & the ‘pain of’ *home*, which seems so apposite to our injured times
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-Forsterappropriately reflective episode of BBCFreeThinking from @drmatthewsweet.bsky.social & guests. Perennial questions of innovation & nostalgia. With Margaret Heffernan @timminshall.bsky.social @agnesjuliet.bsky.social @cjfaraday.bsky.social @nickfthilton.bsky.social www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterWe are delighted to share the programme for our upcoming conference! We will be running fourteen panels across two days in early February - all online and open to everyone 😊 please see our website for more details on speakers, panels and how to book.
- Filming for German TV feat. Sylvie the dog
- I wrote about Paddington and nostalgia for the Big Issue!
- I’ve escaped from my newborn and am en route to broadcasting house!* *shout out to the team of three making this possible: parents looking after toddler and partner parenting said newborn at home
- T-1h30! Tune your radio to BBC Radio 4, unless you’ve succumbed to the innovation of the Smart Speaker… @drmatthewsweet.bsky.social @timminshall.bsky.social @agnesjuliet.bsky.social @margaretheffernan.bsky.social
- Neither me nor my partner have nailed solo bedtime with two kiddos
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterT-1h30! Tune your radio to BBC Radio 4, unless you’ve succumbed to the innovation of the Smart Speaker… @drmatthewsweet.bsky.social @timminshall.bsky.social @agnesjuliet.bsky.social @margaretheffernan.bsky.social
- I will be live on BBC Radio 4 at 9pm tonight talking about the unexpected history of innovation. Tune in or catch us later on BBC Sounds. www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m...
- Just before Casper was born, I was filmed for the German TV programme Kulturzeit. I was chatting about nostalgia but I was heavily pregnant and it’s overdubbed in German so cant guarantee I’m saying anything sensible www.3sat.de/kultur/kultu...
- To celebrate my return to the land of the living (or something) I’ll be chatting live on Radio 4 this Friday evening about INNOVATION www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m... Tune in!
- I’m sure no one has noticed my absence from here, but I’ve been mostly gone from work + life recovering physically + emotionally from the v traumatic birth of my second son Casper in September. We spent most of the autumn in hospital but he’s now doing fantastically. Just busy being a baby.
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterJOB ALERT! 3-year postdoc at @girtoncollege.bsky.social - research anything you like in History, Archaeology or Anthropology in a wonderful, welcoming scholarly community. PLEASE SHARE! Closes 12 January www.girton.cam.ac.uk/job-vacancie...
- My partner took shared parental leave in 2024 and HR at my then place of work (a university) said that we were the first in the organisation to do so! (which meant she didn’t really know how it worked…)
- Feat. in @sarahoconnorft.ft.com’s article about ‘90s nostalgia! www.ft.com/content/9bf6...
- If only someone had written a book about this www.panmacmillan.com/authors/agne...
- Awkward but also an interesting example of what happens/will happen when Reform get into power and have to reckon with the realities of (local) government
- Some more awkwardness from Reform at local level: Six months ago, Farage described doubling council tax on second homes as “madness” North Northamptonshire, won by Reform in May, is now planning to do just that, say plans seen by @cjayanetti.bsky.social for PolHome
- My baby was finally discharged from the NICU after six weeks, we spent just over a week at home before he was readmitted with bronchiolitis, collapsed lung & suspected sepsis. He’s in the PICU and is really poorly & all I can say is that RSV is a horror and if you’re pregnant please get vaccinated
- It’s our fifth week in the NICU and I’ve had to invest in noise cancelling earphones for the sake of my sanity Anyway here’s a tiny baby
- Sanity might actually be a lost cause
- I had a terrifying placental abruption at 32 weeks and had to have a c-section under general anaesthetic. Almost a month later, my baby boy, Casper, is still in the NICU but one silver lining of this whole ordeal is that the gvt introduced new statutory NICU leave in April of this year…
- …I already have great mat leave from my place of work, but my partner was only going to get two weeks paternity. But this new leave means that he can have paid leave from work throughout our son’s stay in hospital (and then his two weeks added back on at the end)…
- …He had two weeks off when I had my first son, and it was awful. I came home from the hospital after a week, so we had barely 5 days together at home. While this time around has been hell in a whole other way, this is a great new bit of policy that more people should know about.
- More tales from the NICU: someone was vaping yesterday
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterNew season of "In the Same Vein" has launched!! My wonderful (graduated) master's student Jan and I interview @agnesjuliet.bsky.social about surgical myths and stereotypes & why a historian's perspective is vital in health policy and practice, among other topics! podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...
- Society has reached such a state of disrepair that people are watching TikToks with no headphones in the NICU As if having a very premature baby isn’t stressful enough
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterCover reveal for my forthcoming book, WE HAVE COME TO BE DESTROYED: GROWING UP IN COLD WAR BRITAIN which tells the history of Cold War Britain (c.1956-89) through the eyes of children & young people! Out with @yalebooks.bsky.social 28 April 2026 #booksky #skystorians yalebooks.co.uk/book/9780300...
- I'm speaking at the Cheltenham Literature Festival on Monday 13th October with novelist Georgi Gospodinov and psychologist Catherine Loveday! www.cheltenhamfestivals.org/events/nosta...
- And! We bought a house today! Completed on this 1970s gem in South London
- Off to do some filming for German TV about nostalgia! The German cover might - among stiff competition - be my favourite
- I love these illustrations from a 1980s pamphlet on pre-term labour so much
- It’s pouring with rain, but I just ate a ripe fig off a tree in south London
- Living temporarily with my mum while we’re between houses, and these are the kind of gems she comes home with 🌿
- KNOW YOUR CONIFERS!
- We're reading @jennycrane.bsky.social's fantastic article on the history of public consultation and health policy in our policy team's analysis/reading group at the Health Foundation this week! www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-Forster
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterThis is a really excellent, well-argued piece from @jenniferthf.bsky.social on the unresolved "dualities" which plague English health policy - and how far we (still) are from any settled view on how the NHS should be run. www.health.org.uk/features-and...
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterThere's a LOT of tragedy going on here, but can't help feeling the purest horror for poor Mrs Thackeray 🤰 Giving birth in 1818, full stop 🩺 Your Dr is widely blamed for the death of Princess Charlotte in childbirth weeks earlier 💀 Your Dr then SHOOTS HIMSELF while you are in labour
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterFollowing the decision to abolish NHS England, @agnesjuliet.bsky.social and @hughalderwick.bsky.social analyse the history of changes to NHS management, identify unresolved tensions that underpin them and set out implications for the latest round of reform. Read more ⬇️ bit.ly/4mtiZB9
- My non-history job allowed me to write some history! (and its policy implications, ofc)
- Following the decision to abolish NHS England, @agnesjuliet.bsky.social and @hughalderwick.bsky.social analyse the history of changes to NHS management, identify unresolved tensions that underpin them and set out implications for the latest round of reform. Read more ⬇️ bit.ly/4mtiZB9
- I once set out to walk from my airbnb in a Nashville suburb to a coffee shop 14 minutes away and four (4) separate (very nice, well-meaning) people in their cars stopped to ask me why I was walking and if I was okay.
- Reposted by Dr Agnes Arnold-ForsterMy first piece in the TLS — a review of a fantastic and pioneering new study of the Paris Commune’s afterlives in Britain and Ireland by @lauracforster.bsky.social www.the-tls.com/history/the-...
