While campus events mirrored the world's breach in normalcy this past weekend, members of the University community struggled to interpret Tuesday's events and articulate the steps necessary for Princetonians to overcome the attack.
"In the days and weeks ahead," President Tilghman said to a somber crowd on Cannon Green at yesterday's memorial service, "we have the responsibility to recognize the distinctness of each person's experience and the humanity that unites us all."
There was a pervading sense of tranquility — the powerful eloquence of professors and poets, the biblical passages and verses of song spoken and sung from a podium, interrupted only by the voices of a choir standing atop steps beneath white marble columns.
But the service was conducted as the weekend came to a close — an end to a long week leaving people searching for a way to hope. And while the service was pervaded by a plea for unity, discussions throughout the course of the weekend revealed the long and difficult path leading up to that goal.
At a discussion open to the community Saturday afternoon in the Frist Campus Center, an open debate that followed short presentations by members of the faculty led to tears and heated exits.
After several students had denounced the fervor of patriotism throughout the country, a World War II veteran, clearly offended, offered a counter viewpoint.
"You need patriotism," he said forcefully. "[Men] died so you could get up and make comments like that about racism and prejudice."
An undergraduate student then tried to command the veteran's attention, calling "Sir, sir," across the room.
"We also have a responsibility to people who are dying for us," the student said.
The veteran subsequently left the room.
The discussion, co-sponsored by religious and ethnic groups on campus, drew a cross-section of the University community. And with that diversity there came a debate, fueled not only by the attack on the World Trade Center, but by issues underlying that attack and always pervading the community.
Wilson School professor Stanley Katz, who helped organize the discussion, said he was shocked by the progression of the meeting. Not having anticipated the inflamed exchange of emotions, Katz was at a loss for how to moderate by the end.
"I found it pretty upsetting," Katz said. "But I'm glad we did it because if people are that angry it's better to talk about it."
"I hadn't stopped to think about how much anger there was," he added.
And while emotions ran rampant Saturday, a meeting hosted by the history department Friday exemplified the difficulty in assessing such a tragedy when, for many, it can only produce a lack of words.
In a packed Dickinson Hall seminar room, with students and faculty covering every inch of the floor, professor Hendrik Hartog asserted that none of the professors who set out to briefly offer their insight were experts.
While professors and students drew and refuted parallels between last week's attack and other historic events, and asserted the importance of understanding the cultural motivations of every country, history professor Theodore Rabb admitted that as a historian the event had left him completely empty-handed.
But as a community, Katz said, it will be essential for people to talk.
"Princeton students are not people who let it all hang out," he said. "[Those at the Frist discussion] were people who were letting it hang out, and that makes you vulnerable."
And vulnerability — the open exchange of thoughts and emotions — Tilghman asserted throughout her speech yesterday, is what is necessary for the University to deal with last week's tragedy.
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