| Title | : | The University of Oxford: A History |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0199243565 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780199243563 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Hardcover |
| Number of Pages | : | 871 |
| Publication | : | First published May 24, 2016 |
Laurence Brockliss sees Oxford's history as one of discontinuity as much as continuity, describing it in four distinct parts. First he explores Oxford as "The Catholic University" in the centuries before the Reformation, when it was principally a clerical studium serving the needs of the Western church. Then as "The Anglican University," in the years from 1534 to 1845 when Oxford was confessionally closed to other religions, it trained the next generation of ministers of the Church of England, and acted as a finishing school for the sons of the gentry and the well-to-do. After 1845, "The Imperial University" saw the emergence over the following century of a new Oxford -- a university which was still elitist but now non-confessional; became open to women as well as men; took students from all round the Empire; and was held together at least until 1914 by a novel concept of Christian service. The final part, "The World University," takes the story forward from 1945 to the present day and describes Oxford's development as a modern meritocratic and secular university with an ever-growing commitment to high-quality academic research. Throughout the book, Oxford's history is placed in the wider context of the history of higher education in the UK, Europe, and the world. This helps to show how singular Oxford's evolution has been: a story not of entitlement but of hard work, difficult decisions, and a creative use of limited resources and advantages to keep its destiny in its own hands.
The University of Oxford: A History Reviews
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Very readable and well-researched. Comprehensive almost to a fault, this book covers everything from medieval theology to the university's Whig/Tory leanings in the Georgian era to the arrival of the kebab vans in the 1990s. Unlike most historians of Oxford University, Brockliss is willing to offer criticism where due, with many details of Oxford's complacency and irrelevance over the centuries. But by placing Oxford in its national and international context, Brockliss shows how the university is a remarkably resilient (or as
Nassim Nicholas Taleb would put it, antifragile) institution, and has an impressive aptitude for reinvention, often at the last minute. Brockliss concludes on p.730 that Oxford needs to move into MOOCs, and at the time of writing (2015) was showing no signs of doing so. I read this on 20 Feb 2017 and checked online to see if this was still the case. It turns out that Oxford's first MOOC starts on 21 Feb 2017. -
I learned so much about the History of Oxford and European universities in general. It was nearly always engaging reading. It got a little bogged down a bit in the 20th century on discussing various proposals for structure, but it was mostly really good reading. My only personal complaint is that the Oxford Internet Institute was not mentioned at all.
