Before coming to university in the South, I hadn’t really considered just how much my Northern identity meant to me. Back home, people had said I sounded “posh”, and I think they saw me as fitting right in with what we all perceived to be this imaginary “Oxford type”. When I got here, that couldn’t be further from the truth. I was suddenly the broad Yorkshire lass, who said “no” funny, and had flat “a”s, and couldn’t pronounce certain words right. People liked to speak back to me in a weird interpretation of what they felt I sounded like. It didn’t bother me though. If anything, it made me proud to be representing the working North in a place that is, and always has been, dominated by middle-class Southerners.
There is something called “Imposter Syndrome”, not strictly limited to Oxford, but felt here profoundly. As the name suggests, it’s feeling you are an imposter. It’s feeling you’re going to be “found out” at every turn, that any wrong or sudden movement will expose you as a fake, as someone who doesn’t deserve to be here. It sounds extreme, but it’s more common than you think. For me, Imposter Syndrome was crying every time I submitted an essay in first term of first year because I thought my tutor would realise he’d made a mistake in accepting me. I remember at my Freshers’ Dinner, on my very first night at university, I had no idea what all the cutlery was for. My biggest concern was the “soup spoon”; soup was served for a starter, and there were so many spoons I didn’t know what to do with them! I remember feeling anxious that I was going to use the wrong one, and people would laugh at me and immediately realise I didn’t belong.
I thought, and feared, I’d always be that Northern state-school kid. At this point, I’d failed to understand that this is exactly what made it all so special.
Oxford has an image problem, and there’s no denying it. Northern students accounted for just 15% of successful UK admissions to Oxford University in the years 2017-2019. Part of the reason is that not many Northerners apply to Oxford in comparison to those from the South of England, but there’s a problem there in itself. Do we think we don’t belong here? Do we think we can’t be an Oxford student? Do we think there’s a university-wide agenda that’s blocking Northerners from getting in?
Or is it just that Oxford feels so far away to us? Both geographically and metaphorically. Oxford, to me, was always this distant dream, a name that had been dropped into conversation with my teachers, a title for the best university in the world. It didn’t feel like I could ever get there. But I did, and here’s what I realised:
1. Oxford is open to anyone and everyone who is willing to put in the graft and get the grades.
It’s HARD, and no Oxford student, regardless of background, will ever tell you differently! It got its academic reputation for a reason, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible to get here.
2. Just because there aren’t many Northerners in Oxford doesn’t mean I’m the odd one out.
Oxford Northerner’s Society exists for a reason – to meet people who all sound alike! Who all love Greggs! Who all understand what it’s like growing up in, often, working class areas that are critically and consistently overlooked by the government. We are not alone!! Back to the soup spoon story, I caught the eye of a girl opposite me from Stoke who also looked a bit confused and we laughed about how silly it was to be fretting over a spoon! She’s now my best friend.
3. Being Northern is a badge of honour I wear with pride everywhere I go.
Some people put on “posh” accents to fit in, and that’s okay. But I love telling people where I’m from in the broadest Yorkshire accent I can summon. The amount of times I’ve been told I have a “friendly voice” far outweighs the instances when people have mocked me for my accent.
Writer and journalist Stuart Maconie wrote that, “There is no South of England... There's a bottom half of England... but there isn't a South in the same way that there's a North”. He continues:
There's no conception of the South comparable to the North. Good or bad, 'the North' means something to all English people wherever they hail from... [To Southerners] it means desolation, arctic temperatures, mushy peas, a cultural wasteland with limited shopping opportunities and populated by aggressive trolls. To Northerners it means home, truth, beauty, valour, romance, warm and characterful people, real beer and decent chip shops. And in this we are undoubtedly biased, of course.
My mum told me before my first term at Oxford that I was going to come back “posh”. But if anything, my Northern accent has just gotten stronger. Sure, there’s only 1 Greggs, no B&Ms or fish and chip shops, and the pints are so extortionate it’ll make your wallet cry, but I feel so lucky to be here.
I’m from a little town in the North that most people think is named after a bank (Halifax); for all intents and purposes, Oxford should be closed off to me, but I’m here. I made it. I was scared I’d always be the Northern state school kid at Oxford… now, I wear my Northern identity like a badge of honour.
(Picture: Evie at Matriculation)