Today, Orientation Sunday, we welcome Freshmen to Duke. Orientation, that's when you learn the "in's and out's" of life here, when you get oriented to expectations of the university. A big part of Orientation is the acquisition of a new vocabulary. Every new place has its own language, its own special words. If you are new, you are learning the meaning of such verbal mysteries as ASDU, the Black and Blue Room, Grosschem. Soon, with a little practice, you'll be able to converse like a native!

Each generation has its own vocabulary. For my generation it was "power to the people," "civil rights," "involvement," and "change." When someone looks back on the 1980's they will think of words like, "Yuppie," and "disarmament," and "upscale." But I suspect one word will be remembered as the key to …