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Oxford 2011 Freshers Chat Thread

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Reply 2320

Noble.

Original post by brendan.

I did! Have you replied to the email they gave us, and if you did.. have they replied?

Yeah I emailed them, they haven't replied. :smile:

Reply 2321

brendan.

Original post by Babs12123

Sorry to butt in, but I've replied to the email and sent off the paperwork and haven't heard anything. I'm assuming it's normal :smile:

Ah, no worries! Butt in whenever you feel like it. :biggrin:

That's good then, I was beginning to think they were deciding to withdraw their offer! :grin:

Reply 2322

brendan.

Original post by Noble.

Yeah I emailed them, they haven't replied. :smile:

Okay, thanks!

Reply 2323

ilikecheesytea

Hi, has anyone on here joined the Oxford Union already? I don't know whether to join soon, do we get information in our Freshers Packs? Also, I can see that one can join the Union now on their website, is it worth doing?
Thanks

Reply 2324

dbmag9

Original post by ilikecheesytea

I was tempted, but I didn't really feel like losing that much money from my account while I'm still hanging out in Berlin spending my savings. I imagine we'll get information in the freshers' stuff too.

Reply 2325

dogmatichurricane

Original post by dbmag9

I vaguely remember reading that there's some 10% discount if you join before 2nd week. Apparently you can't join till you are 18 and I turn 18 only in 3rd week. fml, still asking for that discount.

Reply 2326

Yafoubnx

Original post by rohitronaldo

I vaguely remember reading that there's some 10% discount if you join before 2nd week. Apparently you can't join till you are 18 and I turn 18 only in 3rd week. fml, still asking for that discount.

Where did you hear that one has to be 18 to join?

Reply 2327

dogmatichurricane

Original post by Yafoubnx

Where did you hear that one has to be 18 to join?

Oh I tried signing up online here: http://www.oxford-union.org/joining/join
it required me to enter my birth date and subsequently told me to piss off till I'm an adult.

The discount is available till 20th October and I turn 18 on 21st October...................................this is very very very frustrating.

(edited 12 years ago)

Reply 2328

Yafoubnx

Original post by rohitronaldo

Oh dear! Well, that's very very bad for me as well. You're lucky though, at least you turn 18 in October.

Reply 2329

victoire

Original post by rohitronaldo

you can go down to the union in person to sign up once you get to oxford, and they might be able to do it without you being 18 yet. not 100% sure, but worth a try :smile:

Reply 2330

Incarnadine91

Original post by laura_bird88

Best choice of subject :biggrin:

Thanks for replying, you've put my mind at rest :smile:

I've only chosen my British History module and Approaches so far, and have decided on the 18th century (as it's probably the period I know the least about) and Art and History, and Anthropology and History. Very much looking forward to Art and History... Currently battling through a book on the development of the working class in the late 1700s :tongue:

Which did you study?

Nice! Yeah, I had the same sort of idea, only the area I knew least about was medieval britain (Brit II, 1042-1330). It's a good idea to get an overview of the things you don't understand in your first year, so you have a better choice in your second and third. I did Approaches too, with a focus on Anthropology and Sociology (with a little bit of Gender), it was great fun :smile:

In Hilary I did General III (1400-1650) and finally in Trinity I did Witchcraft and Witch-hunting in Early Modern Europe, which was basically the best paper ever :biggrin:

You sound like you're on track, good luck!

Original post by ilikecheesytea

There's no rush, I joined in second week and they processed my application in about five minutes at the desk. Wait until you have your fresher's pack at least, there'll be a lot of information and a copy of the form in it! :wink:

Also, it helps to take your time and decide if you really want to spend that much money...

Original post by rohitronaldo

I'm sure they will understand something like that, if you go in when you get there and tell them you might still be able to get a discount. If not, there is an option to pay £14 a month rather than all of it upfront, which might help you manage your finances if you can't get money off.

Reply 2331

dbmag9

Original post by rohitronaldo

I'm sure if you do it on paper or in person they won't make a fuss about whether you're 18 or 17.98.

Reply 2332

jenny18

Hello!!

I've not posted for a while because I have received my reading list and am, therefore, being kept very busy. I have a problem though....

On my reading list (English, Lincoln) are two books by Elizabeth Gaskell, and having read one of them I have fallen completely in love. I have also seen the BBC adaptation of another of her works, North and South, and I really want to read it. However it is not on the list. I'm already behind on the reading list, even if I now only read only the ones that the tutor told me were essential i'm not certain i'll finish them all. Now, I am a fast reader, if easily distracted (hence no student room), and I reckon I would be excited enough to devote an all nighter to North.... And I have a kindle so it would be fairly cheap and no fafffing around with the postal service. But I do worry that I should perhaps be reading from the list, which isn't a hardship for me, but I want to read more Gaskell!!! What should I do? Buy the book, claiming wider reading, or keep focused on the job in hand?

On a slightly related note, the book I am reading at the moment is by Ruskin, and is the nearest to philosophy that I have ever read. Now it's probably no Nietsche ( is there a z in there somewhere?) or plato, but it is slow reading more because I have to stop and think so much about what I am reading. Does anyone else find this? That your reading speed slows not because the words are particularly difficult or because the style is particularly dry, but because you're having to consider every sentence before carrying on. After a while my brain feels stodged with new ideas, I have to have some poetry next to me to give my brain a rest between chapters!!

How is everyone else finding the reading lists? Good luck by the way, and thanks in advance for any advice. Sorry for the long post. :colondollar:

Reply 2333

micky022

Original post by jenny18

Finish the reading list and treat yourself to North and South at the end :smile:

Nietzsche is quite difficult to read, and Plato is somewhat complex but a bit better. I've tried reading Thus Spake Zarathustra and Beyond Good and Evil, and The Republic, and The Republic is the only one with which I've made headway. I agree with the complexity of it all :/

(edited 12 years ago)

Reply 2334

deFossard

I've come to escape from the misery of the 'recent riots' forum in Current Events. It's fun trolling people, but Oxford chat is just so, SO much nicer. I'm going achingly slowly with my French translation, I'm determined not to cheat and just make notes from my Penguin translation. But it is tempting.

Reply 2335

micky022

I'm teaching myself to write English in Cyrillic, before I plunge into Russian.

Reply 2336

micky022

фор ехампле, тчис ис цыриллиц ат итс бест. и тчинк. и чопе...

Reply 2337

M'Ling

Hello offer-holders! :smile:

I currently hold an offer for English, and was wondering how far into reading lists people are? I've just come back from holiday and, basically, have read nothing since finishing A-Levels!
I haven't received a reading list from the college, although I presume (results pending) after the 18th August they might send one perhaps?!?
What sort of things are people reading to prepare themselves for first year? I know we do Victorian, although I'm not sure I have time now to read several 500+ page books :/ , and I've read things like Beowulf (translated of course!) and The Canterbury Tales (again, sadly, a modern translation) to prepare for the Old-Middle English bits of the first year.
I was going to just read some Dickens and 19th Century poets, as I've read quite a lot of Gothic and Sensation Novel anyway for my own enjoyment, but I imagine we do more than the 'obvious' writers, and I don't want to be miles behind before term even starts!

Thank you, sorry for the essay :colondollar:

Reply 2338

dbmag9

Original post by micky022

I'm teaching myself to write English in Cyrillic, before I plunge into Russian.

Original post by micky022

фор ехампле, тчис ис цыриллиц ат итс бест. и тчинк. и чопе...

Haha, that's quite amusing. Berlin sells a lot of postcards with that done for German.

Reply 2339

thurin

Original post by jenny18

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Original post by M'Ling

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I've only just received my list (History and English - History is optional [therefore none!] and English is Old English and Victorian) so I've made very little progress. Luckily, I've read some of the compulsories like Bleak House, Heart of Darkness, and Picture of Dorian Gray, but I'm way, way behind :ashamed2:

So ashamed, already struggling...

Anyway, I'm reading Eliot's Middlemarch (and making notes on themes, narrative etc.) but I'm finding that really tough, so it's going to take me about a week to read and understand it. I'm only a third of the way through. I hope I find Elizabeth Gaskell's works easier to follow - don't get me wrong, I've found Middlemarch to be entertaining ("I was not speaking in a religious sense, Harriet. I spoke as a mother." and "Not that marrying is everything. I would have you seek first the kingdom of God. But a girl should keep her heart with in her own power." being my favourite lines thus far), but her syntax is often hard to follow. Maybe that's just me.

With David Copperfield, Mary Barton and poetry anthologies, I won't be able to read any more Victorian. Old English... I'll read Hamer's translations of Anglo-Saxon poems and possible Beowulf, alongside an Introduction to Literary Studies by Bennett and Royle, as it's easy to read. I can't manage much more.

Also, I've read Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil and it's a very good read. It's split into chapters and further into aphorisms, so you can take say five at a time and go through them. Some of them are hard to follow if you're new to philosophy (which I was/still am!), but some are either witty or so fascinating that you can almost glide over them and understand it all...

As for reading extra Gaskell? Well I really wanted to read some Hardy, so I managed Tess of the D'Urbervilles and Return of the Native before I felt guilty for prevaricating, even though I don't think that they're mentioned on the list. Jude the Obscure might be. I really wanted to read Dracula and find other Victorian Gothics, but I can't ignore the list! Anyway, I can't imagine that the Oxford tutors will get made and throw a brick/any book by Dickens at you for wanting to read around the area. It's all relevant! According to the term schedule they sent me for my course/college (HENG Pembroke), Mary Barton and North and South are both in Week 3's Social Issues in the Victorian Novel.

Anyone else set an essay to write for their first tutorial?