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Are there many weird oxford things?

Like i read they ahve a dress code and i read a thread where one student who was 19 was getting belittled because he didn't know the difference between a dinner jacket and a suit. WTF.

Other than this weird dress code/snobbery are there other excentric ceremonies or standards one has to conform to whilst attending oxford and seemingly abandoning the normal world?

Edit** i wasn't citing it as stuckup, i only meant that being excluded from something because you only have a suit and not a dinner jacket seems slightly snobbish, but our definitions may be different.

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Reply 1

Cirsium

Libtolu

Haha really really no. There is no dress code apart from matriculation (the ceremony where you enter the university formally) and your exams, both of which you have to where "sub fusc" for, which basically just means black and white, although there are a few silly specific things like black tights, not nude. Most of the time Oxford students look like regular students.

There are plenty of balls and black tie dinners and things if you want to go to them for which dress code is specified, but equally practically none of those are University events, they are student events, and as such you could avoid them entirely if you wanted to.

There are a few random traditions like the Merton Time Ceremony, or the fact that people gather at 6am to listen to madrigals sung off Magdalen tower on May Day but they're really all rather random and fun.

Only things I can think of that might seem bizarre to an outsider... 'formal' hall (which can vary from very formal dinner at some colleges, once a week, to a second serving of dinner every night at others with no dress code or anything) often begins with grace; most colleges have some lawns you're not allowed to walk on (but that's fairly normal for old buildings with nice gardens) and there are some random vocabulary, which you get used to. Things like bops (cheesy student fancy dress type parties with cheap booze), quads (quadrangles - the spaces in between 4 walls that make up colleges) and tutes (tutorials, the meetings with your tutors where you go through essays etc) just become perfectly normal.

Reply 2

j_w

^^^ Pretty much covered everything.

With the exception of Sub Fusc everything else is optional, and you can either go two ways... see it as archaic 'snobbery', or embrace it as slightly eccentric but unique traditions.... why waste the opportunity to go to black tie events, often for free?! why not enjoy lazing around Oxford in your gown celebrating with everyone after matriculation? or take up the opportunity to eat a decent 3 course meal, served to you, in a centuries old dining hall which you share with some of the best minds in the world for less than £5?

Admittedly you do have to abandon the normal world, at least somewhat (most of the city is largely removed from the outside world)... but viewing it as snobbery is just ridiculous! Quite why anyone would go there for a few years and not get involved with all the ridiculous traditions because they see them as 'stuck up' is beyond me... but then again being stuck up does work both ways...

Reply 3

martin101

Libtolu

pfff, shame on he who doesnt know the difference between a dj and a suit :rolleyes:

In all seriousness, within a term at Oxford you will have used both so many times (moreso the dj would you believe) that you will be well versed in formal codes.

Reply 4

Dave_McDougall

everyone should know that difference, general knowledge.

Reply 5

Libtolu

YEs anyone who grew up in a posh area may know the difference but as im from a working class town, i can say i've wore a suit twice in my 18 years of life.

once at a wedding once at a funeral.

Reply 6

Rustlessbowl

Libtolu

YEs anyone who grew up in a posh area may know the difference but as im from a working class town, i can say i've wore a suit twice in my 18 years of life.

once at a wedding once at a funeral.

I've always said that this is the major problem with allowing the working classes into Oxford.

There's also the Woodstock Road running of the freshers, jolly good fun, what!

Reply 7

Teebs

dave_mcdougall

everyone should know that difference, general knowledge.

Libtolu

YEs anyone who grew up in a posh area may know the difference but as im from a working class town, i can say i've wore a suit twice in my 18 years of life.

once at a wedding once at a funeral.

I went to a private school and I wouldn't have been able to tell you differentiated a dinner jacket from a suit until the end of my last year when I had to get one for the leaver's prom thing.

Reply 8

Tipareth

I went to a Grammar School, in quite a nice area, but I have no idea about the suit / dinner jacket distinction really...

I think it comes down to familiarity. People from the higher classes are more likely to have had more situations that require them, but if they had never had to wear them (as many Working Class people wouldn't) then wouldn't know either.

Reply 9

Tipareth

Athena

Or anyone who could use google or look it up on wikipedia? :rolleyes:

I come from a working-class background, that doesn't make me incapable of using the internet...

You could do - you're right.

However, from my experience, it seems the issue is not the actual definition of dinner jacket vs suit, but rather do they have to be a certain type, when would you wear them etc.

Reply 10

Eric Arthur

Didn't any of you have end of school formals where everyone gets dressed up?

Reply 11

Tipareth

I did

But I am still plagued by uncertainty about everything that I haven't done a million times :wink:

I loved my Prom. I looked like a lesbian Phantom of the Opera. Which could be cool, but sadly, was not the look I was going for.

Reply 12

Teebs

Eric Arthur

Didn't any of you have end of school formals where everyone gets dressed up?

In my case that was when I learnt the difference. That being said, I think it's a dangerous assumption that everyone's school times ended with a black tie party.

Reply 13

Eric Arthur

Teebs

In my case that was when I learnt the difference. That being said, I think it's a dangerous assumption that everyone's school times ended with a black tie party.

I suppose. Where I live, every school does it though - even the crap ones!

Reply 14

Spacecam

Learn how to pass the Port...

Reply 15

Of the Standard of Taste

I feel like an idiot. I didn't know any of this:

Regulations regarding gowns differ from college to college, but gowns are commonly worn to:

Formal Hall (formal dinner, which occurs as frequently as every night in
some colleges and as rarely as once a term in others, or not at all)

Chapel

College collections (tests that take place at the start of term)

Head of house's collections (end of term academic progress reports)

College matriculation

Gowns and caps are worn to disciplinary hearings in the Proctors' Court.

In addition, gowns are worn with cap, hood (for graduates), and subfusc to:

University examinations

University matriculation

Graduation ceremonies

The annual Encaenia (Commemoration) ceremony.

Its got its own Wikipedia entry : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_dress_of_the_University_of_Oxford

"Academic dress of the University of Oxford"

Reply 16

Mathlete91

Rustlessbowl

There's also the Woodstock Road running of the freshers, jolly good fun, what!

I've heard of this... what is it? Obviously it involves running along Woodstock road but how far ish? And is it a race?

Thanks :biggrin:

P.S. Unlike OP I'm looking forward to the traditions!! It makes a nice change from normal life in this sleepy middle-class town.

Edit : Just realised OP isn't going to Oxford, but Hull.

Only in Oxford!

Jack Sparrow

I feel like an idiot. I didn't know any of this:

Regulations regarding gowns differ from college to college, but gowns are commonly worn to:

In addition, gowns are worn with cap, hood (for graduates), and subfusc to:

University examinations

University matriculation

Graduation ceremonies

The annual Encaenia (Commemoration) ceremony.

Its got its own Wikipedia entry : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_dress_of_the_University_of_Oxford

"Academic dress of the University of Oxford"

Not sure how you could wear a hood to matriculation :confused:

(genuinely confused) unless you're one of the officers - as don't you only matriculate if you come from outside? (and a lot of the uni sites seem to suggest that you need to be wearing subfusc + oxford student gown for that).

:confused:

Reply 19

Mook

Jack Sparrow

Chapel

I didn't think you had to wear gowns to chapel ... Not that I've ever been. Choral scholars have cool gowns, but I think the choir just wears strange choir robe things at Oriel. Anyone who turns up to be in the audience can wear whatever they like.

Jack Sparrow

College collections (tests that take place at the start of term)

Again, not that I'm aware of ... I've seen people roll up in their pyjamas to ours. I think Teddy Hall do some of their collections in the Exam Schools, but I've no idea if you have to wear gowns to them. That would just be silly.

Jack Sparrow

Head of house's collections (end of term academic progress reports)