‘Can You Really Be a Queer Muslim?’: Intersectionality and the Complexity of Identity

‘Class is an Extremely Complicated Subject’: Growing Up Working-Class and Why My Upward Mobility Makes Me Not Want Children
Identity Megan Willis Identity Megan Willis

‘Class is an Extremely Complicated Subject’: Growing Up Working-Class and Why My Upward Mobility Makes Me Not Want Children

I’m not even sure if children are something I’ll want. And maybe the fact that the idea of my children having more privilege or advantage than I did does not fill me with joy is a sign that I shouldn’t have them. My socio-economic beliefs and politics are so passionate that the thought of having children who are removed from that experience, who never have to scrimp and avoid any form of waste, repels me…

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‘The Feeling of Inadequacy Doesn’t Just Disappear’: How Schooling Has Affected My Self-Esteem as a Neurodiverse Person
Identity Megan Willis Identity Megan Willis

‘The Feeling of Inadequacy Doesn’t Just Disappear’: How Schooling Has Affected My Self-Esteem as a Neurodiverse Person

What did this teach us? It taught us that academic achievement was all that mattered. And it didn’t matter how much my parents insisted that I should ‘just do my best’. These achievements could be used to barter favour, boast and compete, and I didn’t have any. I’d turned up to a sword fight with a French baguette…

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Being a Working-Class Woman at Oxford University and Why It Does Matter Where You Come From
Identity Megan Willis Identity Megan Willis

Being a Working-Class Woman at Oxford University and Why It Does Matter Where You Come From

Competition is high, and the work culture is unhealthy. All of that is difficult to deal with, but all of it is reasonably expected. The issue at hand is that, on top of the academic adjustment that all students have to undergo, working-class students, specifically working-class women, have to undergo an entire additional social and cultural scathing…

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