Talk:University of Mississippi

FYI to current and former students

Please see Category:Wikipedians by alma mater: University of Mississippi (Ole Miss) and add yourself by placing the userbox on your WikiPedia page. -- ALLSTARecho 02:00, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Ole Miss/plantation owner

While the first cite I removed didn't appear to support the assertion that this was the source of the nickname, the Sesquicentennial History connects the dots fairly explicitly. I think it can stay on the article now -- other opinions?--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 13:13, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

"The University of Mississippi: A Sesquicentennial History" by Sansing (1999) does not state this is why Elma Meek chose the name. Additionally, the sentence mentioning this goes unreferenced and unsupported with any further writing. Sansing (1999) states the following, "In 1897 the Greek societies established a college yearbook, which they titled Ole Miss, a name suggested by Elma Meek, a student from Oxford. The term "Ole Miss" was a title domestic slaves in the Old South used to distinguish the mistress of the plantation house from the young misses of the family" (p. 168). This statement has been the basis of the claim "Ole Miss" was chosen due to slave connotations ever since, appearing in numerous newspaper articles and books after this one was published. To this day, there is no definitive proof Elma Meek chose this name because of this connotation. In fact, the term "ole" is a folksy term commonly used in the middle nineteenth-century to show reflective endearment, as per the New Oxford American Dictionary. The abbreviation "Miss." was the official government and postal abbreviation for the state from the mid 1800s until 1963, when the two character convention was accepted. With these facts in mind and no record of her actual opinion, it is reasonable the name had nothing to do with slavery connotations and is only an inadvertent homonym. Personally, I find it hard to believe a student would want to refer to a university as if it were her slave mistress. There is no endearment in that idea, and endearment is the university's stated purpose behind the nickname. 89.211.58.141 (talk) 23:58, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Time for "Ole Miss"

Virtually everything about the University of Mississippi, including the football helmets and even the web site (www.olemiss.edu), now front the "Ole Miss" designation. Is it now time for Wikipedia to reverse the redirection from Ole Miss to University of Mississippi so that the article is titled "Ole Miss"? This change, if it occurs, has the added advantage of obviating confusion over the names of the three doctoral-granting public universities in Mississippi--Ole Miss, University of Southern Mississippi, and Mississippi State University. Rammer (talk) 21:01, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Nah. ElKevbo (talk) 02:22, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

No, it's fifty years past time for the nickname to be gotten rid of. As the article explains it is an old slave saying of "respect" to the master's wife. We are now in the 21st century this stuff need to be wiped out. --98.211.71.137 (talk) 06:34, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Mascot and Nickname

The student-led effort to bring an on-field mascot back to Ole Miss ended on October 6, 2010, with the selection of the "Rebel Black Bear" concept. This was only a proposal to the university, who then turned the idea over to the athletics department for further development and eventual implementation 1. The final, official on-field mascot will not be presented until after this process is complete. Therefore, to place "Rebel Black Bear" concept as the school's mascot on the Wiki page is misleading and should be removed until it is official. It is very possible the final on-field mascot will have a different name or look that the initial concept. The name "Rebels" remains Ole Miss' official athletics nickname 2. This is similar to Purdue University who has a nickname and a mascot ("Boilermakers" and the "Boilermaker Special"), which are not one in the same 3. Ole Miss' Wiki should reflect a similar distinction once the on-field mascot is official. (89.211.58.138 (talk) 08:54, 16 October 2010 (UTC))

Enrollment figures for Ole Miss

The enrollment figures for Ole Miss listed include ALL Ole Miss campuses, yet the location listed is "Oxford". There are only about 15,800 students in Oxford at Ole Miss. Putting 19,500 as the enrollment of Ole Miss is deceptive. If that is the standard, then the University of Alabama's all-campus enrollment is 50,000. Nobody does this. There's no need to pad the stats. Ole Miss is unique because it is a smaller campus and tight knit community. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.204.0.83 (talk) 21:50, 11 August 2011 (UTC)