Oxford's biggest student newspaper, produced by and for members of the University of Oxford, since 1991.
Let’s be clear. The acceptance of donations from and granting of naming rights to prominent billionaires does more than just slap a relatively unknown name on a building and help some students out. It entrenches the donor as a legitimate actor, as someone to look up to, a paragon of philanthropic decency. When Stephen Schwarzman […]
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With the announcement of Stephen A. Schwarzman’s £150 million donation to set up a centre for the humanities to the University, Oxford’s status as a premier location for humanities scholarship has been cemented. This donation will allow for different humanities faculties to be located close to each other with shared facilities, allowing for much greater […]
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Imposter syndrome is an idea spoken about a lot in Oxford, especially during the start of the academic year. It’s the feeling that you don’t quite belong here – that your offer was a result of a mistake and someone else should have been accepted instead. Imposter syndrome is not unique to Oxford, but the […]
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Image description – Library books tunnel The ‘Oxford bubble’ is a concept we all know well – when in the bubble you can think of nothing but your Oxford workload. Completing your essay feels like a matter of life and death. But it is also a dangerous one. When I was in my worst place, […]
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When we think of financial markets, the image that often comes to mind is that of sharp-suited men closing deals or the cacophony of voices clambering out on a stock exchange floor. Whatever the idea, these transactions all seem to be far removed from the real world. But there is one sector of financial industry […]
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Education, education, education (but only for the rich): Private schools creates a two-tier education system and must be abolished. It’s no secret that our education system is wholly unfair, and if nationalisation of private schools will cost us money in the long term, it’s a price worth paying. In September this year, the Labour Party […]
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Image Description: Pollution being emitted from factory chimneys Last year, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that we only have 10 years to avoid irreversible damage from climate change. Last week, world leaders failed to answer UN secretary-general Guterres’ request for renewable industry plans. This inaction is the reason why six million […]
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Image Description: Photo of the Radcliffe Camera Bleary eyed and bawling, a new group of students will find themselves thrust into the confusion and terror of Oxford University this October. Having passed through the group stages and achieved their offer, they’ll realise with dismay that the real contest begins now: the relentless pursuit of relevance […]
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Having converted to a meat-free lifestyle in my first year at Oxford, I felt I could live with a level of environmental smugness – I didn’t need to feel bad about my personal contributions to climate change because I hadn’t eaten beef in a year and a half. However, deep in the depths of long […]
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In the psychodrama that is British politics, shock is a valuable commodity. We’ve been bombarded with so many dramatic resignations, scandals and eleventh-hour resolutions to impending doom that it seemed impossible to surprise us anymore. But on Wednesday this week, Boris Johnson shocked the mummified corpse of our political discourse back to life with the […]
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Exams are a stressful time for many, but for some Hong Kong students at Oxford, they have proved particularly difficult. Jessica, who studies at the University, told me that her friend had to take his papers whilst his relatives were embroiled in the pro-democracy protests back home. “His family members were in the front-line. They […]
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“I believe law should be accessible to applicants from all backgrounds”. With this awkward statement I began my unsuccessful application to the LawSoc General Committee in Michaelmas 2018. I remember toying with what to put next, how best to project my identity in the 50 words I had to impress the faceless arbiters of my […]
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Vegetarian, vegan, flexitarian, reducitarian, veggan, ‘cheegan’ (a vegan who eats cheese so I’m told). There seem to be new words cropping up to describe people’s diets every week. No longer do people hold themselves to one diet or another, but rather try to eat more ‘consciously’, considering the impacts on the environment and animal welfare […]
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As a queer person in 2019, it’s important to know your privilege. We live in a country with hugely progressive laws on same-sex relationships, and the demonstrations that were once riots for our ancestors are now parades for us. In the July 2017 National LGBT Survey, more than 50% of respondents reported feel comfortable with […]
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Image description: Monument at Chernobyl I am afraid- desperately afraid- of global warming. For a period in February, after those few days when it was hot, so hot you could walk home from the club in a t-shirt because the air was climate-change balmy, and after reading David Wallace Wells’ The Uninhabitable Earth, I became […]
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Image description: Helsinki Cathedral at sunset, 2016 This week, I came across a report by The Guardian into Helsinki’s approach to solving homelessness. The report praised the radical approach, named Housing First, taken by Helsinki’s authorities with the intent of solving the homelessness crisis that the city faced. Inevitably, I thought of our city of Oxford […]
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Image description: CAAT campaigners protest against Farnborough International arms fair, 2016 On the 2nd of October 2018, Jamal Khashoggi got assassinated by Saudi Arabian agents in Istanbul. This assassination has led to a rampant increase in scrutiny of the UK’s continued sale of armaments and military equipment to Saudi Arabia. With the pressure upon the […]
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Image Description: Former US Secretary of State Kerry delivers an address to the Oxford Union Shhh! Can you hear it? The air is abuzz with a sound, a feeling, a vibe. Phones ding with messenger message requests, coffee shops hum with various forms of hackery, imperative verbs start clogging your Facebook feed – the Union […]
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Image Description: Edinburgh students protest against university fees in London Education, education, education. The rallying cry of New Labour still echoes through political discourse today, perhaps more than ever, as students remain unsatisfied with the provision of university education. Oxford is in many ways exceptional, but in the debate around education it finds itself mired […]
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