For many freshers arriving at this University, the biggest question playing on their mind is not ‘what is a collection?’ or ‘how do I pay my battels?’ but rather ‘where am I going to fit in?’. It is a natural fear. It is not new, however, to note that the fact this University is steeped in centuries of eccentric archaicism results in many students feeling switched-off, alienated and so I will spare you, dear reader, the uninspiring challenge of reading an article that you have read a thousand times before.
Instead, I am interested here in the opposite reaction to this feeling of insecurity. Having spent the best part of two years getting to grips with the various opportunities this University offers, I suggest that the bizarre insularity and cliqueness of the world of the Union, the student papers, and JCRs is the result of students desperately searching for their place here. And that, often, this insularity results not from students naturally fitting in, but rather falling victim to the same feelings of being out of place that so many of us feel.
I remember how I felt before I came up in Michaelmas of last year. I will not pretend that my feelings were especially remarkable nor especially unique – a mix of trepidation, excitement (I am sure you get the idea). I was the first in my family to attend Oxbridge (apart from a somewhat estranged uncle who read for a DPhil here) and I knew that the three years were going to fly by.
I also knew that there was going to be an immense number of opportunities confronting me. Given the most interesting thing that ever happens in the particularly sleepy corner of rural England I live in is someone’s cat going missing, I also began to feel this creeping sense of urgency, perhaps even a pressure, not to perform academically, but to (for want of a more interesting phrase) ‘get involved’. In retrospect, it seems ever clearer to me that this impulse was probably rather unhealthy, but it has taken me the best part of two years of ‘getting involved’ to see that, and this is what I am interested in exploring here. Why did I and (not to be too presumptuous) so many of my peers, feel this pressure?
Of course, I am no psychologist, and I will avoid undertaking the petrifying task of attempting to psychoanalyse the mind of the average Union hack or Cherwell geek (nor would I, for my own sanity, especially want to). However, looking at the ‘big three’ University societies (the triumvirate of the student press, the Union, and JCRs) it does not take a genius to see a remarkable overlap between those who get involved with the largest (and frequently the most toxic and cliquey) societies on offer at Oxford. You can bet that the average Union hack has tried at least once to get onto their JCR or that a solid number of student journalists take up positions after having (dis)gracefully retired from a Union career.
The overlap is clear and suggests that regardless of whether it is the Union, one of the papers, or a JCR, there is an underlying reason as to why certain people get involved.
My contention is that the overlap in those who get involved is the result of, if not an insecurity, then a somewhat unnatural desire to ‘know stuff’ in order to compensate for a general feeling of being uncertain of one’s place. And furthermore, that this desire to ‘know stuff’ stems from the same anxieties that cause other people to decide that University societies and culture is not for them. While for some the feeling of being out of place results in either isolationism or antagonism towards the largest University societies, for others it elicits some strange urge to greedily gobble up every rumour, take up every position on every committee, or dress up in black tie and swan about the halls of the Union – or better still, all three.
There are many students who will have never felt this impulse, and quite frankly, credit to them. The gossip and pressure that comes with the unhealthy overlap between the student papers and the Union is not one of Oxford’s most healthy or productive elements. And yet, in spite of so many of us who are involved in these societies knowing that we are indirectly or directly contributing to this atmosphere of pressure and rumour, we find ourselves hooked to getting involved, and crucially, staying involved (perhaps past what is good for us). We get our fixes in different ways, of course. Whether it’s hearing tid-bits of gossip about other students or (better yet) some scandalous comment made by a tutor, seeing our names in the papers or the YouTube recommended section after delivering a speech at the Union. We are addicts for involvement.
Of course, this is a generalisation, and to argue that anyone who is not involved in these societies is simply insecure (or indeed, that anyone who is involved is equally insecure) is plain wrong. However, in the opinion of this ex-Union Cherwell writer who is his college’s JCR secretary, the overlap between the student press, the Union, and JCRs, and the culture of gossip and rumour are the consequences of an insatiable desire that exists within many of us to be in the know, and to feel like we have managed to find our place at this University.
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