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"The past is never dead. It's not even past." William Faulkner

Not Even Past

A thoughtful historian on “The future of memory”

Our colleague Judy Coffin alerted us to this blog post on 9/11 by Claire Potter, Prof of History and American Studies at Wesleyan University, aka “Tenured Radical.”

It is a thoughtful consideration of many issues connected with thinking historically about the events of September 11, 2001 and the decade since.

Especially striking to me is the push-pull so many of us have been feeling about commemorating 9/11: a resistance to the public, politicized enacting of memory fighting against the irresistable surge of feelings and some kind of genuine sense of community.

I also am attracted to her suggestion that we think about the experiences of 9/11 locally and regionally, as we collect our memory documents and construct our historical narratives.

I wonder what everyone else thinks?

 

Posted September 15, 2011 More 2000s, Blog, Memory, United States

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