Competing narratives for a new university: student press at Sussex and Essex, 1960–1979

Abstract

This article explores how the student press at the New Universities of Sussex and Essex functioned as a key source of expression for the student body, revealing how students developed a sense of identity by addressing the new university community and wider society, by covering national and global politics, popular culture, and local community causes. The article demonstrates how student publications provide insight into the students’ interpretation of their time at university—its curriculum, teachers, buildings, politics, and wider issues. The article is based on original archival research on a series of student publications at the Sussex and Essex special collections. The research reveals an alternative and competing narrative of the institutions in question, it helps promote the student voice in these institutions’ histories and therefore decentres a narrative often dominated by founding academics and architects. The article presents how students were directly involved in perceiving and creating the university community and in forming the idea of the ‘student’ as an actor in the university community and as part of wider society. The article contributes to a more nuanced history of these institutions, the growing field of student histories and histories of post-war higher education more generally.