Oxford – GW Blogs from Abroad

Saying Goodbye to the Literary World of England

AdminMay 28, 2018December 14, 2018

Wow, I can't believe this wonderful experience at Oxford has come to an end 🙁 As a creative writer who loves literature and history, I'm really sad to leave a place that holds so much significance. Never mind that thousands of famous faces have sat under the same ornate ceiling of the Radcliffe Camera. I walked pass the lamp-post C.S. Lewis walked by and inspired the Chronicles of Narnia, and I visited in the same pub the Inklings discussed their stories at. My friend even had the luxury of having class in J.R.R. Tolkien's old office!

During my time I enjoyed visiting the little English villages and big palaces and castles, especially places with special literary significance. My all-time favorite trip has to be to Haworth, a tiny village in Northern England by Leeds and York. It's the village where the Bronte sisters grew up and produced their great novels. I ventured there for a couple days with a friend who was a hard-core Bronte fan.

It took a while to get there. We took a train from Oxford to London, switched to another London station, took a train to Leeds, navigated through the local train system and ended up in a village called Kheighly, and then finally rode the "Bronte Bus" until we reached Haworth. I know it seems long and grueling, but I actually enjoyed the journey. We got to travel through lands that contained crumbled factories and mills - remnants of the North's Industrial past. Haworth was such a small village that it mainly consisted of one long street. And I loved its washed-out stone buildings and flower pots.

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Gaining More Confidence in My Identity

AdminMay 7, 2018December 14, 2018

By mariyaskhan

When I wrote my first blog post, I really had to give myself a hard look at who I was. Five weeks into my program, I was beginning to learn more about what made me uniquely American, Muslim, Pakistani, and Indian and how I fit in the world at large. And now, after a few months, I feel like I'm a stronger person in so many ways. I'm still pretty confident about all the different bits that make up who I am.

Interestingly, a couple of my English classes involved reading texts with references and stories that only people with strong Christian backgrounds would understand. I'm not going to lie - I did feel a little out of place every time I asked for an explanation or heard from a professor that I was at a disadvantage because I wasn't Christian. But instead of letting those kinds of things really bother me, I engrossed myself in those stories and loved analyzing things from a different perspective. I've always enjoyed looking at things in unconventional points of view.

Part of my program includes writing a giant research paper on a topic relating to Europe and its relationship to the world before the 1800s. When it came time to choose a topic, I knew that I was interested in exploring something to do with the Islamic World and Muslims during that time. I didn't exactly know what to pick, until I started exploring travel narratives. I sat through lectures going through Eurocentric ideas of the "Other" (a concept that I've always been interested in), and remembered an account of Viking customs from a Muslim travel writer. It got me thinking: How did Muslims view Christians? Are there Muslim travel narratives that have the same kind of Othering language as the Christian travel narratives? I finally decided to focus my research paper about two Muslim travel narratives from the 10th and 12th centuries. I think my Muslim faith and background gave me the unique perspective to come up with a topic like that, and I'm glad that I'm working on something that relates to my identity.

I'd also classify myself as a pretty introverted person. I'm pretty quiet and off to myself unless I'm surrounded by friends I'm really comfortable with. I've gotten pretty close to all the people in my program, and I love how we're such a tight-knit community. I feel less introverted and shy in general, which really lets me try new things and take some chances. I also love travelling and consider myself a city-gal, and I'm more confident in going off on my own and quickly figuring things out. Heck, I went to Greece alone for a few days, had a bunch of crazy problems that involved me staying in an airport for 12 hours and standing out in London at 2am waiting for a bus, and somehow managed to survive and get back to Oxford!

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My Oxford Community

AdminMarch 6, 2018December 14, 2018

By mariyaskhan

Wow, I can’t believe that this course is already halfway over! The Oxford term is winding down to its final week, and then I have to write a seminar essay and a 6,000 word research paper. We only have four hours of class a week, so I spend most of my time in the libraries working on my weekly 5-9 page essays or exploring Oxford. I’ve worked through many of the routes and shortcuts I use on the daily, and I don’t feel overwhelmed anymore with getting the layout of the city. I guess you could say that I have finally made Oxford my home. Here are the places in Oxford where I spend most of my days.

The Old Bodleian Library and the Radcliffe Camera

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The Beginnings of a Muslim-American's Journey in the UK

AdminFebruary 6, 2018

“So where are you from from?”

I’m sure almost every GW student has been asked this question at least once. Sure, everyone wants to know where you’ve grown up and where you call home. But they really care about where you’re from from. It’s like when you have to check those boxes on questionnaires to say whether you’re Caucasian, African-American, Asian, Hispanic, or Latino.

My response? “My mom’s from India and my dad’s from Pakistan. But I’m 100% Muslim.” But growing up, the answer wasn’t so simple.

Before, when someone asked me where my family's from, I’d say Pakistan. Sometimes I wanted to say India because it’s easier, but then they’d think I’m Hindu. But was I lying to people if I didn’t include every part of my identity that composes who I am?

It’s definitely been complicated to really hone in how I share my identity with other people. Though I’m just starting to find a healthy balance between my ethnic identities, my Muslim identity is the strongest. To me, my Muslim identity matters more than the country I hail from.

I’m a Muslim girl who grew up in an American suburb. I’ve lived in America my whole life, but my parents have always kept the religion and culture of my ancestral home alive. It’s a result of colonization, globalization, and diaspora. I contribute it to a sense of longing and connection to the homeland. Is my established homeland America (where I was born) or Pakistan and India (where my culture and parents’ families are from)?

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