UJ culture versus UCT culture

Even though Universities differ from one to another; there is always one thing that they all have in common, culture. This can be seen in the kind of lifestyle that students from different universities live, from academic to social lives.


Students from University of Johannesburg are said to pride themselves in the diversity and variety of cultures amongst the five campuses, while University of Cape Town students are the complete opposite. Like in the movies, in every university there is always some sort of division amongst students. The classes normally range from the cool kids, the geeks, the ghetto and the losers who no one wants to hang out with. The cool kids are the ones who are from the suburbs who have the latest designs, gadgets, trust funds kids who drive and consider themselves as presidents of the university. This group hangs out in their spot and isolate themselves from others, they believe that luxury is their birth right and everyone must bow when they pass. The guys are all about fast cars and hot parties, while the girls are all about good grades and the latest Gucci wear.



The other class is the geeks, these are nerds, you find them at the library studying in advance for everything, their main focus is acing their academics, and they take studying to a whole new level. They are so easy to spot, from the way they talk to their lack of style and dullness, because they carry huge backpacks and they walk around like varsity slaves and the cool kids always make fun of them. Then we have the ghetto students, who are from the hood, they are mostly at UJ, they are loud, obnoxious, don’t care about fashion or what they eat. These kinds of students’ usually play music with their phones on loud speaker. They basically fumble through life and they are the cool kid’s worst nightmare. The losers are simply the nobodies, they are just adding to the universities population, they are like zombies, and they are the outside insiders who fall in any of the above groups.

In both universities one can find these various cultures only in different levels. It is said that UCT students live in a materialistic world where it’s all about fitting in. Here you hang out with your social class, if your parents are CEOs and you went to a good high school then you are considers as an upper eastside. A UE is a student who falls under the UCT elite group and is above everyone, not only do they walk the talk, they also talk the walk. They have egos so big and they think the world revolves around them, whatever money can buy they have it. UE’s strictly hang out with UE’s no outsiders allowed. Both universities consist of nerds whose main purpose of being at university is to get to the highest qualification possible. Then we have the third group who are the upper eastside look-alike or often called upper eastside by default, they dress the part and they get good grades, they do not hang out with the UE or the losers, they form their own little army.



It is easy to differentiate students from the two universities in the way they carry themselves, UJ students can come together whilst UCT students are all about competition. UJ culture is all about integration, students from various social classes can hang out together, and there is no division of any kind, no upper eastside or Brooklyn. If your life revolves around the next episode of Gossip Girl then UCT is your playing ground, but if you are all for club hopping in Melville then UJ is the place you want to be.