FOtieno

M.A @SyracuseU '13, Fulbrighter @Yale '11 @KenyattaUni ‘08 "If you don't know history, you don't know anything"

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

@mohi101 @Sangodala @NyarNthenge @carole_gaita 😂🤗🤗😂🤗

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

For 22 years, I’ve never watched a football match with this peace of mind. #ThankyouArteta

[Seth Olale @SethOlale]

An estimated A Million Kenyan Arsenal Fans storm Nairobi CBD for Mock - Title Trophy Parade.

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

Hi @SafaricomPLC @Safaricom_Care , since the advent of smartphones and apps, I don’t think anything has been as terrible as the “One Safaricom App”, you almost want to pray every time just before using it, and it still fails.

[Mushtaq Bilal, PhD @MushtaqBilalPhD]

There are largely two types of academics: A and B. Their worlds are so different, so insular they don't even know the other type exists.

Type A:

> Comes from a middle, upper-middle class family
> Well-educated parents (with advanced degrees including PhDs)
> Parents map out their kid's career trajectory
> Parents teach academia's hidden curriculum: applications, admission essays, extracurriculars, and so on.
> Send the kid to a "good" school (private or private tutoring)
> Kid gets good grades
> Goes to Ivy League or Oxbridge or a similar top school for undergrad
> Decides to do a PhD
> Gets into another top program in a top school because of top undergrad school, duh
> Gets a well-connected supervisor during PhD
> Gets a tenure-track job offer from another top university in the final year of PhD even before graduation because of the supervisor, duh
> Fully understands the tenure clock
> Publishes papers, monographs on time
> Gets tenure
> Thinks PhD is easy, tenure is easy, academia is easy
> Marries a colleague in the same university
> Has kids
> The cycle repeats

Type B:

> Comes from a dysfunctional, working-class family
> Parents who barely graduate high school
> Parents with no idea what kind of education their kids need
> Goes to a no-name shit school with underqualified teachers
> Then goes to a community college or some such institution if lucky, joins the military if unlucky (KIA.exe)
> Reads a lot, become autodidact, becomes a half-decent writer
> Someone suggests, do a PhD, become a professor
> Likes the idea of academic life, starts applying to PhD programs
> Gets rejected from top programs because don't have good recommendation letters or connections
> Goes to a third tier PhD program in a university located in the middle of nowhere
> PhD stipend is not enough, has to work part-time to make ends meet
> Lives in a shitty apartment, sometimes eats at the soup kitchen
> Still works hard and publishes a bunch of papers
> Thinks I'll write my way out of poverty
> Sees a bunch of Type A PhDs in conferences, tries to "network" with them, Type A folks recognize Type B PhDs and stay away from them.
> Defends PhD where the committee says this is excellent work and imminently publishable
> Applies to tenure-track jobs left, right, and center. Gets rejected from everywhere
> Idea of being unemployed with a PhD causes desperation
> Gets a temporary teaching job, gets paid per course basis with no health benefits
> Spends a few years as adjunct with semester to semester renewal of job contract
> Barely survives, has to take up part-time jobs
> Get a one-year postdoc, decides to turn PhD dissertation into a monograph in the hopes it will get tenure-track job
> Postdoc ends, back to temporary adjunct jobs
> Monograph stays incompelete, no time to work on it
> Tries moving out of academia, is considered over-qualified
> Reads social media posts by Type A academics saying PhD is easy, academia is easy
> Thinks, what could I have done better?

[Bianca Nobilo @bianca_nobilo]

History Uncensored is coming soon to YouTube & Spotify. Nothing stays buried forever…

My Year 3 report said I wanted to be a “historian and history presenter.”
I’m still that kid (minus the orthodontics).

Now, to my continued disbelief, I get to spend my weeks buried in books, talking to world-class experts whose work I’ve loved since university, tracing the taboo, contested and long-hidden threads of the past.

Maps, myths and footnotes are my happiest place - and the BEST bit is, now I get to bring you into it.

Step into my paper-strewn study of book towers, peculiar relics and other questionable acquisitions…

[Capt. Kang'aru Karimi @mattkarimi]

ENIGMA001 #RAO001 video courtesy of Capt W.

[Kerry 🇰🇪 @kerubo_hillary]

What a love😩😩💔🕊️🕊️🕊

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

Thank you @Arsenal. Of all the weekends, for this one when Jakom is home for the last time, we needed to win this. That’s for #Baba @RailaOdinga. And how I wish you go all the way and win the league for him.

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

@AllanObare4 @africaupdates @SafaricomPLC @Safaricom_Care Pls consider converting this to a ring back tone.

[Official Kenya Airways @KenyaAirways]

Onboard tribute to the late Rt. Hon. Raila Amolo Odinga by Captain Saviemaria Ondego

[Gabriel Oguda @gabrieloguda]

Kenya Airways have released the cockpit recording you've all been waiting for. Bwana from today onwards, anyone who speaks ill of KQ will face the full wrath of all Baba supporters.

[AFTV @AFTVMedia]

Everyone at AFTV is deeply saddened by the passing of former Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga. As a passionate Arsenal supporter and a friend to our community, his warmth and commitment inspired many. His legacy will live on, not only among Arsenal fans but across Kenya, where his leadership and love for the game touched countless lives.

Rest in peace, Mr. Odinga. Thank you for being an incredible part of the Arsenal family.

#RIPRailaOdinga #AFTV #ArsenalFamily

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

The sun therefore sets on a truly consequential personality of our contemporary history @RailaOdinga 3/3

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

… and the intersection of these subjects to the wholeness of the human experience, would arguably peer him to Ibn Khaldum. @RailaOdinga 2/3

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

Ibn Khaldum, the distinguished Arab/Muslim philosopher is said to have admiringly grasped multiple subjects with equal ease. @RailaOdinga’s in-depth mastery of many subjects ; history, economics, diplomacy and international political economy, philosophy and engineering 1/3

[Bianca Nobilo @bianca_nobilo]

Thailand–Cambodia Border Clashes: Curse of Colonial Cartography (90 seconds)

The deadliest violence in over a decade has erupted.
Thai F-16s have bombed Cambodia for the first time.
Civilians are dead. Thousands have fled.

Where does this border war really begin?

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

@GerardoMunck @CUP_PoliSci This is is quite interesting!

[FOtieno @FoOtieno]

@threadreaderapp @KobeissiLetter Much appreciated