ABSTRACT
In National Trauma and Collective Memory, Arthur G. Neal argues that collective social identities emerge most prominently from moments of catastrophe. He writes: “Notions about ‘who we are’ and ‘what we are to become’ are shaped to a large degree from the shared identities that grow out of both extraordinary difficulties and extraordinary accomplishments in the social realm” (21). The events of September 11, 2001 certainly marked a national crisis as Americans, and New Yorkers in particular, struggled to understand the reasons for the attacks and the changes wrought upon their own sense of collective identity. In the aftermath of their destruction, the Twin Towers, already fraught icons of Americanness, became heightened symbols of capitalism, freedom, democracy, and other founding ideals. Although they were distinctive to New York, they easily laid claim to a broader symbolic imaginary, or as Sharon Zukin explains:
Ugly, awkward, functional—like the city itself—the Twin Towers made their great impression by sheer arrogance. They took over the skyline, staking their claim not only as an iconic image of New York but as the iconic image of what a modern city should aspire to be: the biggest, the mightiest, the imperial center. (13)
Writing about the relationship between buildings and national identity, Neil Leach observes, “The nation, in effect, needs to read itself into objects in the environment in order to articulate that identity” (85). Ironically, through their absence the once inelegant, though imposing, Twin Towers became newly elevated symbols of national identity.