The News From The Dark Blues

This week, Oxford became host to Worcester nude-gate. Incase you missed this, the story goes as follows: between 3pm and 4pm every Wednesday afternoon, male students from The Breakfast Club strip (tastefully, and generally not below the waist) for a ‘Half-Naked Half Hour’ in their college library. Naturally, librarians have been up in arms, and have threatened the ultimate punishment – referral to the dean.

Brasenose has featured in the news in previous weeks, with their ball almost making them go bust. News has now come out about the precise nature of the financial loss incurred from the ball, and it ain’t pretty. It amounts to over £13,000. £4,000 of this is being covered by the JCR, with college providing the remaining bullion for the Dreams of a Golden Age ball.

The Bodleian Libraries plan to launch a series of apps over the summer.

Everyone knows that bops are an integral part of Oxford life and, when short of a theme, the usual fallback option is to go for cross-dressing. However, the Student Union council has slammed this, passing a motion that gender-based themes such as: vicars and tarts, fox hunts, and pimps and hoes serve to: “stereotype men and women in highly objectified and/or sexualised roles,” and could upset students who don’t feel comfortable with such ‘traditional’ gender roles.

No one does quaint traditions quite like Oxford, and this week saw yet another at Lincoln College to mark Ascension Day. What the JCR President described as “wonderfully bizarre curiosities” saw such oddities as hitting stones with sticks, giving members of neighbouring college Brasenose (I just can’t get enough of them) ivy favoured beer flavoured, and bombarding a group of young children from a nearby primary school, with pennies in the college, at midday. Nothing too abnormal.

But, the greatest thing about Oxford is that it mixes incongruous traditions with cutting-edge developments. The Bodleian Libraries plan to launch a series of apps over the summer, to tie in with their summer exhibition ‘Manifold Greatness: Oxford and the Making of the King James Bible’. You will have to pay to use the app. While many students will be put off by this, I suspect that the hordes of tourists will not.