Community, 9/11, and the Imagined Nation After Tragedy

Defining Community: From Geography to Shared Values

Within the concept of modernity, the idea of culture and groups has become complex, morphing into an amalgamation of definitions surrounding the question of what defines a community. The idea of "community" as a political or sociological concept has taken on new meaning in the 21st-century era of globalization. First, however, it is important to understand the basic idea of community, as well as the political, social, and cultural changes that create a need for a different definition of what community means and how it influences the individual's life.

In general, the idea of community conveys two rather distinct messages. It is often used to refer to a social unit of varying size that shares common values, or to a national or international community in which individuals hold something unique — a set of principles and beliefs common to most of the group. In science, the term describes a group of interacting organisms that share a specific environmental niche. For humans, however, community has been something shared in terms of beliefs, resources, ideologies, and protection — the idea that a common set of circumstances brings people together for a mutually beneficial outcome.

Indeed, many scholars believe that the notion of community is one of the prime ways humans became civilized, urbanized, and grew both socially and technologically (Effland). Because community is so deeply ingrained within the social and cultural fabric of human life, it becomes more than simple geography — more than neighbors and more than ethnicity. Instead, community becomes the sum total of an imagined unity: unity within disagreement and diversity, unity within structure and chaos — a unity that overcomes adversity and brings humans together, focusing on what it means to be human.

The September 11 Attacks and Global Community Response

When the unthinkable happens, this imagined community of unity not only expresses what is best in humanity, it generates a sense of togetherness and structure that, in some cases, demonstrates that the best in human beings can arise out of negativity and adversity. Such an event occurred on September 11, 2001. On that day, a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks were launched upon the United States. The Islamic fundamentalist terrorist group al-Qaeda hijacked four passenger airliners: two flew into the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, one struck the Pentagon, and the fourth — targeted at Washington, D.C. — crashed before reaching its destination. Nearly 3,000 people were killed, making it the deadliest attack on U.S. soil in modern history. The resulting tragedy affected millions globally: a global war on terror was launched, numerous laws and governmental agencies were created, and the world was fundamentally changed ("9-11: The Basics").

As a community, the world reacted with understandable horror. Numerous expressions of emotion emerged from the event, and for many, the quality of life in New York City was forever changed. CNN commissioned artists to create or choose work that illustrated the "ripple" effect of 9/11 — all the changes in society and culture that have occurred in the years since. One such work illustrates the manner in which events like 9/11 affect humanity in an iconic way.

Art, Poetry, and the Ripple Effect of 9/11

Martin Mendelsberg observed that one of the most often repeated symbols of America is the Stars and Stripes of its flag. The symbol, however, means many things to many people — for some, an expression of freedom; for others, a symbol of imperialism or tyranny; and for many, a way to individualize the community that transcends all other demographic and psychographic variables to solidify the nation as a whole, as if to say: whatever you may be, you are an American (CNN Network). Mendelsberg used footage from airport security cameras to intersperse images of people traveling after 9/11, capturing the ripple effect and the fear individuals now carry regarding a basic right to travel. Yet what is most powerful in this piece is not merely the issue of travel, but the notion that within the stripes of the flag we see Americans of all types — all economic and demographic backgrounds, various ethnicities, ages, and purposes — all bound together under the notion of an imagined community.

Contrast this with a poem by Colette Inez that seems to epitomize the notion of New York as more than just a city, in which she writes: "From a pocket of air under stone, imagined voices seeped out like water from a fissure in the year" (Inez). The poem captures the way in which loss, memory, and place intertwine to form a collective emotional community forged through shared grief.

In the past, community was somewhat dependent upon geography. One of the hallmarks of civilization was the manner in which individuals bonded together to form mutually advantageous groups that would protect one another, distribute labor based on expertise, and act as a safety net so that the group could survive and prosper. Community tends to mean a shared system of norms that uses culture to pass on learning and acceptable standards from generation to generation. This allows the community to educate, tolerate others, and even anticipate future behavior in terms of needs and wants (Effland).

Imagined Communities in a Globalized World

In the 20th and 21st centuries, communications technology has produced such sweeping global change that instead of thinking of cultures and political entities as their own self-contained communities, we can now visualize them as "imagined communities." These communities refer to groups of individuals who may or may not be physically accessible to one another, who "connect" through the power of imagination, emotions, or other intangibles. As we move through our day, we interact with a number of communities directly — neighborhoods, workplaces, educational institutions, religious groups, hobby groups, and more. In the modern global world, however, these are certainly not the only communities with which we engage. When we interact directly with a community, we participate; but when we use our imagination to identify community, we must think beyond physical boundaries.

A community, then, is imagined "because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion." Furthermore, "communities are to be distinguished, not by their falsity or genuineness, but by the style in which they are imagined" (Anderson 6).