WOMEN AT OXFORD

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 116, 23 November 1928, Page 13

WOMEN AT OXFORD

Women students now play a very important part in Oxford life, and they make their presence felt immediately term begins, says the London "Daily Telegraph." They are seen everywhere in caps and gowns on their way to lectures, and they are heard chatting; at crowded tables in city restaurants where they can be sure of meeting their friends (for morning coffee is an institution). At night they burn the midnight' oil, of which their essays reek next day, and occasionally they appear at the University Dance Clvb —a most popular institution." Blue stockings are not so much in evidence nowadays although Vice-Chancellors refer in the course of their public oratory to the serious-minded young women who are not afraid o£ work and give tone to the University. .But they have become clever enough to hide their cleverness. They present a well-powder-ed nose to the world and a neat appearance. And this, it must be whispered, is due to the interest their male fellow^students have taken iii their- looks. University magazines have in all' seriousness suggested to the women students a reform in dregs. It hag had far-reaching effects. Women to-day may desire careers in teaching, medicine, the law, business, or the Civil.Service, or succumb so completely to the lure of clothes as to follow the axample of one woman student. who, upou "going down," became a London mannequin. Life is undoubtedly jolly and full of interests, but not so easy as it would seem to the casual observer. The vacations may be long, but they offer an opportunity for hard work. Tea parties and other festivities may while away the afternoons during term, but thero are lectures in the mornings and people study at,night. The woman' who are reading botany and geography have a very good time, according to one of their contemporaries. Such study involves plenty of motoring. But even the studious, who read in the awful hush of the Badcliffe Camera, with its countless books and occasional statuary, admit that the Eadcliffe sometimes serves as a matrimonial bureau. The October terms brings a host of freshers, and they are entertained elaborately by those wlio are anxious to make them feel at home. Cocoa parties are a popular feature of college life, and there are occasionally dances, three mixed, dances a term being allowed. Attendance at public dances is not allowed.