Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 30/09/2026I keep thinking about how, in my imagination, since 2023, Gaza has gone from being a city with people in it into a sort of oubliette where the mental images are horror or [scene missing] 001
Reposted by Alex BakerLouise Amoore @amoorelouise.bsky.social · 27/09/2026It is the responsibility of every securely employed/tenured professor to do everything they can to challenge this academic environment. That means speaking up institutionally & taking decisions with less secure colleagues at the forefront of our minds. 1339
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 23/09/2026'A big mortgage is manageable when interest rates are low – but 🇬🇧’s homeowners, already squeezed by rising costs, are now coming off cheap fixed-rate deals just as borrowing costs hit generational high. Have no doubt, families will soon be facing repossession' www.independent.co.uk/voices/mortg...independent.co.ukI fear bailiffs will soon be back on Britain’s doorstepsA big mortgage is manageable when interest rates are low – but Britain’s homeowners, already squeezed by rising costs, are now coming off cheap fixed-rate deals just as borrowing costs hit a generatio... 000
Reposted by Alex BakerRob Kitchin @robkitchin.bsky.social · 22/09/2026Symposium: Reflecting on the evidence base for housing and planning. Oct 15th, iD8, Dublin. Includes speakers from academia, DHLGH, Housing Agency, LDA, OPR, CSO, IPI, Jacobs. Come and participate in the discussion. Details & sign-up at: www.eventbrite.ie/e/symposium-...eventbrite.ieSYMPOSIUM: REFLECTING ON THE EVIDENCE BASE FOR HOUSING AND PLANNINGExperts discuss how housing and planning evidence is produced, shared & used, & the limits to our knowledge & its implications. 032
Reposted by Alex Bakeronlycans @onlycans.bsky.social · 22/09/2026while i'm going on about ron, he was the one who told me about britain keeping spanish anti fascists in a chorley, lancashire based prisoner of war camp between 1944-46. just in case you needed reminding of how much this country loves camps. files.libcom.org/files/Spanis... 33011
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 21/09/2026These fellowships and ERCs are now one of the ONLY routes to any kind of career longevity in the UK and wider European academia - the effects of layoffs and hiring freezes in one area are cascading through and destroying other parts of the research system. 210
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 12/09/2026That's right - not only are they ALL in heaven there's TWO Che Guevaras now, god thought he was nice so he made him twice! Gotta hand it, clearly the international forces of Islamobolshevism played a blinder on the metaphysical front! 020
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 11/09/2026I remain shocked at what's happening with Universities in this country, aside from anything else the largest employers in countless northern towns and cities completely tanked in favour of the grand london-suck of regional desolation seems an incredibly poor move for The Labour Party to make. 000
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 07/09/2026I think Vaccine conspiracy has to be linked to individualism and in the US anti-communism. A vaccine is a reminder and visible mark that you share a biological community and a commonality with your fellow human beings, that you are, ultimately, the same as them 030
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 27/08/2026I've been apply - and struggling - to find academic jobs over the last 3 months and I'm considering my options outside, at least for a while. If you know me please do continue to approach me about academic work and funding possibilities, if you know of opportunities outside, I am also ears. 010
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 26/08/2026People are supposed to store this food where in their rented single bedroom in London? www.theguardian.com/politics/202...theguardian.comUK to warn citizens to stock up on food amid threat from climate crisis and hostile statesGovernment resilience campaign aims to ensure people can cope in a national disaster, in order to free resources for most vulnerable 000
Reposted by Alex BakerTim Newman @tnewmsblues.bsky.social · 23/08/2026Really cool new commentary about the “scam” under digital capitalism @ctwittekind.bsky.social @desireefields.bsky.social @jmigozzi.bsky.social @jovannarosen.bsky.social @lfalvarezleon.bsky.social doi.org/10.1177/2053... 0137
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 24/08/2026Post and replies good on demonstrating how certain disciplines - Philosophers, Theologians, and now Engineers (I would throw in economists as well) - have the 'Queen of the Sciences' Brainworm that makes some of them prone to outrageous displays of arrogance. 030
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 23/08/2026HE job adverts: "Remember to make sure you have addressed all the essential criteria, a 30 point list of subtly differently worded versions of the same five questions, divided according to vibes, in your cover letter. Cover letters that do not do this will not be progressed. You have 2 sides." 041
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 23/08/2026The problem is Cofnas *was* defended from the left, on the broad principle of defending scholarship from external pressure, the first time round. I think that mode of de-contextualised ethical thinking has now been tested in practice. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...lrb.co.ukAmia Srinivasan · If We Say Yes: Campus SpeechAn open letter is an unloved thing. Written by committee and in haste, it is a monument to compromise. In the last... 100
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 22/08/2026"Bluesky users celebrate Canadian Culture" OK THEN, that Trouble at the Henhouse, Fully Completely, Phantom Power, Day for Night run. You gotta pick one. Go on. Do it. 000
Reposted by Alex BakerRobert Heinze @rheinze.myatproto.social · 22/08/2026Alan Sokal is on this one, in case anyone still wants to bring up the Sokal affair as a legitimate objection to social science 310734
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 22/08/2026Optimist: The cup is half full Pessimist: The cup is half empty Trotskyist: Care to buy a paper about the Socialist view on the cup? 040
Reposted by Alex BakerIsaac Samuel @rhaplord.bsky.social · 20/08/2026Parchment with a homily by John Chrysostom, archbishop of Constantinople, 398- 407 AD found at the Church of Sur, Medieval Nubia, 4th Cataract region, Sudan. #randomxt 1319
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 21/08/2026Ofc a different kind of academic fraud with writing is the 'Thanks for Typing/Cooking Dinner' one where you get someone else to do your other labour while you write. Which you can just like, do however much you like, but fuels massive inequalities across the entire institution. 110
Reposted by Alex BakerAlex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 27/07/2026Been about a year since this paper on Eviction Enforcement in South Africa came out and have some new followers since then. Possibly the bit of writing I'm proudest of so far. Free to read! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...onlinelibrary.wiley.comFor a Critical Logistics of Eviction: Producing Property Through Mobility in Cape TownUnderstanding eviction as a positioning of bodies and loss in a property relation, I argue a critical logistical reading may offer a means of describing the capacity to evict within the economic, rac.... 022
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 20/08/2026Look, I've not watched it, but from everything I can see that channel 4 documentary is already giving me the jitters off the use of 'social construct' alone. All illnesses are socially constructed! It doesn't mean they aren't real! Gaaah! 020
Reposted by Alex BakerNate O @nateo.bsky.social · 16/08/2026Missed Stock saying autism, ADHD, dyslexia and dyspraxia are ‘intellectual disabilities’ (???) making people ‘unsuited’ for academia. Okay, what. But did she ever talk to any of her colleagues, or did she sprint to her car after her lectures on how we know what a text means by asking the author? 3946696
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 16/08/2026As a friend just pointed out, a 30% figure, plucked from nowhere, might lead one to the conclusion that black professors at Cambridge are in Eco's words "at the same time too strong and too weak." 020
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 16/08/2026One weakness of the Journalistic system in the UK is that people who are willing and able to pickup the phone and provide clear, narrative-building content to shape a story will always win out over people who can't answer right now but might add nuance in the moment. 100
Reposted by Alex BakerProf Katherine Schofield 🇬🇧🇦🇺🇪🇺 @katherineschof8.bsky.social · 16/08/2026For the record, the proportion of professors at Cambridge who are Black is 0.4%. The number of Black people in the UK population is 4%. So the number of Black professors at Cambridge is ONE TENTH of what you would expect in a meritocracy. 221964617
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 15/08/2026defector.com/abandoned-fi... "I would 100 percent taste the forbidden fish sauce. I would do it for science. My wife would kill me if I'm not already dead. I will. If there was a way...I would do it, and write a whole report about it because I think that would be a pinnacle achievement for me."defector.comLet Me And A Food Scientist Sample The Abandoned Fish Sauce Terrorizing A Small Canadian Town | DefectorTake capelin, a small silvery fish in the smelt family. Now add salt. Then throw those two ingredients in 110 vats, each of them about 10 feet tall, and let them sit in a defunct factory for over two ... 000
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 15/08/2026I can remember once a colleague saying something along the lines of "why do I have to be world-leading? What I research is important, no one else looks at it in our field, can't I just be...fine at doing that?". So much pain could be avoided if people were allowed to just. be. fine. 062
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 15/08/2026www.cbsnews.com/colorado/new... a sad denouement for a once-influential figurecbsnews.comWard Churchill, controversial former University of Colorado professor, dies at 78Ward Churchill, the former University of Colorado professor whose writings and outspoken political views ignited a national debate over academic freedom and free speech, has died. 000
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 15/08/2026At the risk of false nostalgia, I swear I can remember a time when the Telegraph was English Conservatism's Superego that was above this sort of thing, leave that dirty work to the tabloids, etc. 020
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 14/08/2026Worth asking questions of everyone who mined and will mine this case for 'content' as much as any of the Universities involved www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...bbc.co.ukJason Arday: Former Cambridge university professor found deadJason Arday was found "unresponsive" at an address in Battersea, south London, on Friday afternoon, officials said. 031
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 14/08/2026A guy worth clogging up the entire legal apparatus of the country for, I'm sure we all agree. 021
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 13/08/2026If anyone in the UK wants to organize one of these with me I will be bang up for it. 030
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 13/08/2026Newton, summoning the spirit of Nicolas Flamel to ask about the philosophers stone: "Ugh can't say anything these days because of woke" 100
Reposted by Alex BakerDr Rebecca Warren @drrjwarren.bsky.social · 13/08/2026It’s publication day for our book today!🥳🥳🥳 And whilst everyone is showing off their eclipse of the sun photos, I’d just like point out that there’s an ‘eclipse-like’ image (ok, it’s the moon actually) on its cover - for you to have forever😄 1011525
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 13/08/2026This is 100% leading to someone being prosecuted for the death of an ICE officer who slapped his own face by accident. 010
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 12/08/2026Isn't the problem with the recent big scandal not that a candidate was mediocre, but that the lied about a level of excellence it would be actively inhumane to expect? 120
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 12/08/2026Wish I found this funny but too many anti-capitalist parties in the UK act as functionally high-demand cults that keep members exhausted and isolated and you can see exactly that pattern here. 021
Reposted by Alex BakerJon Moses @jon-moses.bsky.social · 12/08/2026This motorcyclist is described as being "incredibly unlucky" after he died when a pheasant flew into him. In fact, it seems relatively common. There's were two other (non-fatal) cases reported just this year and have been many more in recent years.shropshirestar.comMotorcyclist, 47, hit road sign and died after pheasant flew up at him, inquest hearsWitness described “explosion of feathers” after “massive” bird flew into path of tragic rider 42111
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 12/08/2026In England, drought, a blackened sun and falling stars. Paddington Bear glimpsed loping through the rancid mires. 010
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 12/08/2026It's the 12th so I may remind you of the Countryside Alliance song, possibly the worst song that's ever been written www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv9M...youtube.comGuardians of the landYouTube video by Bodrhan64 011
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 11/08/2026I've had some doubts about this after telling a friend about it earlier today, and having looked into it - the ONLY source is the Pipeline company and there seems to be a number of reddits also questioning the veracity? 100
Alex Baker @anomiegeog.bsky.social · 11/08/2026“one team can be asked whether a Ciabatta is a soup or a sandwich”. I seriously wonder the extent to which the Irish language is presently being shaped by duolingo. 110
Reposted by Alex BakerQuinn Slobodian @quinnslobodian.com · 10/08/2026The position is reliant on a kind of scalar vertigo that is almost always rooted in biographical anecdote. 11706
Reposted by Alex BakerQuinn Slobodian @quinnslobodian.com · 10/08/2026Today's Atlantic story confirming something obviously true: most self-declared leftist "anti-woke" positions are about something that happened down the hall in their academic department. 1582597
