Princeton, as an educational institution, cultural symbol, and source of research and economic growth, defines and is defined by its spatialization. The University’s constructed environment—its grassy courtyards, ornate arches, and Gothic halls—influences how students interact with each other and the outside world, as well as how they view the University, their fellow students, and themselves.
In “The Political Economy of Public Space”, human geographer David Harvey analyzes the impact of Haussmann’s redevelopment of Paris in the late 19th century on class conflict and politics within the city. Haussmann, commissioned by Napoleon III, demolished ancient, crowded sections of the city to make space for elaborate gardens, upscale cafes, and wide boulevards to facilitate the transportation of people, capital, and troops. This new “spectacle,” Harvey notes, had myriad implications for the political fabric of the city—which had been the site of several violent uprisings just years before. New spaces were designed to promote imperial power and facilitate military and commercial control, and cross-class interactions were reduced, changing how Parisians of different classes viewed each other.
Like that of Paris, Princeton’s spatiality impacts how students see themselves in relation to others, including both other Princeton students and the members of the communities from which they come. For some, the University’s prestige—physically embodied in the grandeur of structures like the 125-year old Richardson Auditorium, and exhibited by the array of media figures, business leaders, and politicians that speak there—may reinforce existing biases. If a student from an affluent background views themself and others like them as somehow more suited to attend Princeton, especially if they come from a community with strong connections to the University or to elite education in general, stepping onto campus and being greeted by Blair Arch may feel like confirmation of this sense of exceptionalism. Few other universities, of course, have comparable architecture and museums, corporate recruiting, and colleges with names like “Rockefeller,” “Wilson,” and “Forbes”. Similar to how Haussmann envisioned the imposition of an extravagant capital onto a reconstructed Paris as promoting French nationalism and obscuring the city’s oppressed working class, the character of public space at Princeton nurtures both a belief in exceptionalism and a tendency towards insularity. The spectacle of campus space is central to Princeton’s exclusive mystique and promotes buy-in to this mentality among applicants, students, and the public.
For other students, especially first-generation students or those from communities where higher education is less accessible, Princeton’s public spaces can be less welcoming. The same Gothic architecture, social prestige, and orientation pageantry can contribute to imposter syndrome that is, in part, class-linked. In detailing a poor French family’s perception of a new, opulent cafe as exclusionary, Harvey describes them as “internalizing the gold that has been appropriated from them.” This phrase equally describes how some students may feel when confronted by Princeton’s concentrated wealth, which has strong historical connections to slavery, imperialism, and labor exploitation. In addition, a network of tacit traditions and expectations await students on campus, most notably Princeton’s eating clubs, with their quasi-independence from the University, various restrictions on entry via passes on different nights, and contradictory posturing as both exclusive and accessible institutions—particularly the bicker clubs. Bringing students from a greater diversity of backgrounds to campus does not necessarily ensure they are truly included. While Princeton has made some efforts to remedy the problem through new orientation programs, resolution of the conflict requires more fundamental, radical change in how we view the histories, politics, and present-day class dynamics of institutions like Princeton.
At a first-year event this September titled “Princeton, Money and Me,” University alumni discussed the challenges of being a low-income student on campus. This included the intersection of wealth with social life on campus and the strange situation some students may find themselves in of having necessities on campus provided via financial aid but knowing their family is struggling to make ends meet back home. The dialogue, however, avoided looking at the underlying class politics and causes of this conflict in favor of surface-level, feel-good remarks and a general sense that low-income students would be alright by virtue of lucrative careers that the Princeton brand would provide them in the future. One alumnus, for example, remarked that his community sees his academic journey as impossible, and that he always tries to tell them that they too can work hard and get to Princeton. The hard work of many students to overcome obstacles of class and background to obtain spots at top universities like Princeton is certainly praiseworthy, however even offhand remarks like this contribute to a culture that places the onus of accessing college on poor youth, considers difficult-to-access higher education as acceptable, and lets wealthy communities and institutions off the hook for upholding barriers to economic and educational mobility.
In addition to feelings of reinforced superiority or of not belonging, resentment or guilt can also contribute to the complex personal reactions that students have to Princeton’s spatiality. The contrast between Princeton and other spaces where students come from—and where their friends may be attending school, working, or otherwise living—can induce new examinations of oneself and where one comes from. Students may feel guilty of the resources that they have access to but other young people from their communities do not, either because they are in the workforce, at a two-year college, at a less affluent four-year college, or for some other reason. Being exposed to the wealth at Princeton, including both the school’s wealth and the personal wealth of many of its students’ families, may also prompt resentment.
In discussing the politics of public space in Paris, Harvey focuses on the blending of public and private space. Whereas pre-renovation Paris was home to significant mingling between classes, who lived in the same buildings and shared the streets, Haussmann segregated much of the city and encouraged the construction of cafes and department stores along major streets, turning much of this space over to private interests. This newly commercialized space, regulated by owners and commercial institutions, created new tensions as the lower classes saw themselves being shut out and the upper classes grew to expect class homogeneity. While the space inside a store is public, it is public in a different way than a space owned by the people is public. Much in the same way, Princeton’s campus is an example of what Harvey describes as contested public space, “where ambiguities of proprietorship, of aesthetics, of social relations… and the political economy of everyday life collide.” Only in 1991 did the Ivy Club and Tiger Inn accept women, for example; the additional cost and, in some cases, secretive application processes of the eating clubs, which serve as social hubs on campus, continue to disadvantage low-income students who attempt to join. Princeton’s timeworn structures, which primarily tell the narrow, whitewashed story of an elite, often violent ruling class, carry forward their own politics and history across the centuries, creating a sense of dissonance when these intersect with modern realities.
Space holds power. This is especially true of Princeton’s campus, which has such a long, somewhat obscured history of violence. Enslaved people were once auctioned in front of Nassau Hall. A majority of students and alumni who fought in the Civil War joined the Confederacy, and, as Richard Anderson of The Princeton Slavery Project notes, the University’s Civil War memorial omits the allegiances of the student-soldiers it records, implying a moral equivalency between the two armies. Princeton has long maintained connections to a variety of institutions that perpetuate wealth inequality and labor exploitation. The resultant dynamics of space on campus can elicit feelings of resentment, unworthiness, or degradation. Students should be empowered to more accurately examine the University and their place here. Only by students and the University doing work to deconstruct these hierarchical spaces and the forces behind them can these conflicts begin to be resolved.
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