Her Oxford

Her Oxford: Cover

judy g. batson ISBN 978-0-8265-1610-7 Ë|xHSKIMGy516107z “Judy Batson has taken great trouble to master and interpret for a wider readership the distinctive institutions and idiosyncratic terminology of Oxford, while bringing a valuable transatlantic perspective to the process by which women, and their colleges, belatedly came to find a place within the university. Her narrative draws on a rich vein of personal recollections, and is underpinned by biographical notes which show how variously Oxford’s alumnae subsequently deployed their hard-won university education.” —Pauline Adams, Librarian and Archivist, Somerville College Oxford, author of Somerville for Women: An Oxford College, 1879–1993 “The pioneers of women’s education at Oxford and the students, faculty, and supporters (male and female) who succeeded them come alive in this book. Batson adeptly employs the writings of her very literate subjects to carry us from the founding of women’s colleges at Oxford in the 1870s through women’s attainment of equal formal status by 1960. Her vivid narrative details the varied opinions and lives of women who shared a commitment to pursue education at its highest level.” —W. Bruce Leslie, The College at Brockport, State University of New York, and Wolfson College, University of Cambridge “Judy Batson has written a meticulously researched and richly detailed account of women’s eighty-year fight (1879–1959) for access to and equality within Oxford University. Her analysis of the roles played by women administrators and scholars in the history of that fabled institution contributes significantly to the scholarly literature on both higher education and the exercise of gendered power. Readers will also enjoy the mini-biographies of prominent female graduates.” —Lynn D. Gordon, University of Rochester Vanderbilt University Press Nashville, Tennessee 37235 www.VanderbiltUniversityPress.com F or over six centuries, the University of Oxford had been an exclusively male bastion of privilege and opportunity . Few dreamed that this could change. Yet, in 1879, twenty-one pioneering women quietly entered two recently established residence halls in Oxford in the hope of attending lectures and pursuing a course of study. More women soon followed, and by 1893, there were five women’s societies, each with its own principal , staff, and identity. Only eighty years after women first appeared in Oxford, the five residential societies were granted full status as colleges of the university—selfgoverning entities with all the rights and obligations of the men’s colleges—and women students constituted 16 percent of the undergraduate population. Though still a distinct minority, women had gained full access to the rich resources, opportunities, and challenges of the university. Her Oxford looks at the people and the political and social forces that produced this dramatic transformation. Drawing on a vast array of biographies, histories, obituaries, and archives, Batson traces not only the institutional struggles over privileges and disciplinary rules for women but also the rich texture of everyday life— women’s amateur theatricals, debating societies, sports, and college escapades (Dorothy Sayers is the subject of quite a few). She tells the stories of women’s active roles in two war efforts and in the suffrage movement. An unusual feature of the book is the set of more than two hundred biographical profiles of women who attended Oxford between 1879 and 1960. They constitute a Who’s Who of women scientists, anthropologists , psychotherapists, educators , novelists, and social reformers in the English-speaking world. women’s studies / history of higher education Judy G. Batson is the author of Oxford in Fiction: An Annotated Bibliography. batson vanderbilt Front cover photograph: Female students on degree day at the University of Oxford. Copyright © Cas Oorthuys / Nederlands Fotomuseum. Jacket design: Dariel Mayer Dorothy Sayers and other Somervillians rehearsing Pied Pipings, the going-down play for 1915. Sayers is impersonating Sir Hugh Allen, conductor of Oxford’s Bach Choir. Reproduced by kind permission of the Principal and Fellows of Somerville College, Oxford. Her Oxford  JudyG.Batson Foreword by Linda Eisenmann Vanderbilt University Press nashville © 2008 by Vanderbilt University Press Nashville, Tennessee 37235 All rights reserved 12 11 10 09 08 1 2 3 4 5 This book is printed on acid-free paper made from 30% post-consumer recycled content. Manufactured in the United States of America Frontispiece: Matriculation students, St. Hilda’s College, 1921. Reproduced by kind permission of the Principal and Fellows of St. Hilda’s College, Oxford Library of...