‘What is my favourite thing about studying at Oxford?’: a student perspective on the city
Lily Holland shares her experience living as an English student at the University of Oxford
The city!
As a joint honours History and English student, my favourite thing about Oxford is the city itself. My own village is small, and was founded only two centuries or so ago, so being immersed in Oxford’s historical and literary legacy is rather a change – but a good one!
Walking about the city, listening into the tour-guides on their rounds, and reading the little blue plaques hung on the buildings, provides the reminder that the University of Oxford has been open since the 11th century. Walking to your English lectures at the Schwarzman Building, you might pass the hospital where the poets Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen were treated during the First World War. On the high street you’ll pass the Saxon Tower, built over a millennium ago, and strangely opposite the fast-food restaurants. Different periods mingle with one another throughout the city.
A few of the colleges have parks – like the Christ Church Meadows – which I head to after a day of tutorials, or to clear my mind before heading to the library. If you go early enough, you catch the rowers propelling themselves down the river, even in December!
My college
I go to Pembroke College, which is one of the lesser-known colleges – I love how, once you go through the door, you feel detached from the hustle and bustle of the city. It’s quiet and peaceful, despite only being a few minutes away from the centre of town.
My college is where I spend most of my time: it has a 24-hour library, and a hall to eat in. Pembroke is like the city itself, in that it is a real time-capsule – each of the quadrangles was built around a century apart, so walking from the front door into Old Quad, then to the Chapel Quad, North Quad and Rokos Quad, you travel from the 17th to the 21st century! All of the colleges have their pros and cons, but no matter which one you study at, you usually end up biased towards your own. That is to say, there is no college I would rather be at!
Your college is where you attend a lot of your classes and tutorials, especially during the first year. So, you end up knowing your college tutors and your fellow coursemates well. The University of Oxford is big – with over 26,000 students – but your college will have a smaller cohort with whom you become familiar quickly. Colleges vary in size, but I have eight to ten students in both my History and English cohorts, although it’s possible to make more friends in lectures and classes across the University. Nonetheless, having a smaller community to return to, and tutors who know you well, is really helpful.
Interactive classes
When you apply to be a student of English you maybe don't expect to gain that much practical hands-on experience. Whilst it is true that the workload requires quite a lot of time spent reading, writing, and in discussion, occasionally your classes take you out of a college setting and into a library, or museum, or even a print workshop! Classes on material textuality (how the physical book effects reading) have taken me to handle and study some very early print texts from the 15th century. A lesson on the printed book took me into one of the big Bodleian libraries where we practiced typesetting and used printing presses to stamp out some middle-English prose. These classes really illuminated my understanding of reading through the ages, the experiences of students who studied centuries ago.
This is just one of the opportunities that studying at Oxford can provide; through the libraries have a unique access to texts which the Bodleian Libraries have been storing since the Middle Ages.
So, I suppose my favourite aspect of Oxford is its connection to the past, especially when it is made tangible through objects and architecture which you can really grapple with. The history of the city, the university, and of British literatures, surround you as you go about your day.
