Portal:University of Oxford/Selected college/40

Blackfriars Hall, established in 1994, is one of the Permanent Private Halls (PPHs) of the University of Oxford. Unlike the colleges, which are run by their Fellows, PPHs are run by an outside institution – in the case of Blackfriars Hall, the English Province of the Dominican friars. The hall is on the same site as the Priory of the Holy Spirit (the friars' religious house) and Blackfriars Studium, the Province's centre of theological studies. Dominicans arrived in Oxford in 1221 at the instruction of Saint Dominic himself, little more than a week after the friar's death. Like all the monastic houses in Oxford, Blackfriars came into conflict with the university authorities, and all of them were suppressed during the Reformation. Blackfriars was refounded in 1921 on St Giles', within 600 metres of the original site. One of the smaller academic communities in Oxford, it admits men and women (over the age of 21) of any faith for undergraduate degrees in theology, philosophy, and PPE and for postgraduate degrees. Former students include Anthony Fisher OP, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Sydney; Malcolm McMahon OP, Archbishop of Liverpool; and the American journalist Delia Gallagher. (Full article...)