After returning from a great winter break my ASTU class read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by John Safran Foer, which deals with both the personal loss of a parent after the 9/11 attacks and other sources of trauma felt by those the main character Oskar encounters. After Osakar, a creative and curious nine year old, loses his father in the terrorist attacks of 9/11 he sets out to find a lock that matches a key he finds in his father’s closet. Of course this quest has a far more metaphorical meaning relating to the grieving process but throughout his journey Oskar meets people who have suffered different types of trauma including the loss of a spouse and the death of a loved one. The book is dense, and theres a lot more to it, but what I want to focus on is is how personal stories that convey an experience of trauma can be both a helpful aid in humanizing an event that’s often seen as political and can also be dangerous when kept out of context.

The terrorist attacks on the twin towers was a turning point in American history and being from the US myself I feel the affects of the attacks every time I go to the airport or cross the border. One of many things Foer accomplish in his novel is personalizing the event by conveying the impact of the loss on a innocent and fragile child. By giving the reader insight into the grieving process and other impacts that spawn from the loss of a parent on a family, Foer takes the event out of the political realm and places it back in human one. This tactic of personalizing a sensationalized event that is often hushed up with bumper stickers and clickbait brings the long lasting impact of the attack back into public discourse. It allows for readers to look at the event through innocent eyes which is effective because Americans were naive and unaccustomed to such things happening on their soil. For people to move on and make amends with such a life changing day they need access to stories like Oskar’s who deal with the messy feelings of loss and confusion that even adults feel after trauma. This book in a way achieves some of the same goals as the graphic narrative Safe Area Goražde did, a book we read earlier in the year, in that it humanizes a tragic event that has since been sensationalized. Confusion, grief, and loss are human experiences that are often commercialized through the media but books like Foer’s allow the innately human experience to be heard through the white noise.

On the other hand, stories of tragedy like terrorist attacks carry inherently political implications that must be contextualized in order to make broader policy decisions. The terrorist attacks of 9/11 were horrific and there is nothing that can take away from that but they were also not as random and unwarranted as those in the media and the Bush administration will have you believe. It’s of equal importance to abstain from discourse that paints the attacks as anomalous or as some have said “an attack on freedom and democracy” because it manipulates victims. When American’s were most fragile they were fed lies about how Arabs hate freedom and all things American like hot dogs and Fords. The fact of the matter is Oskar’s story is not one in a million but is actually the experience of thousands of children around the globe. The personalization of a political tragedy should allow readers to empathize with the victims while giving them a greater understanding into how the story is a microcosm for large systematic issues. When Dr. Luger asked the class whether this book promotes 9/11 exceptionalism I felt torn because I feel like hearing someones personal experience with a tragedy that is unique to them makes the event feel exceptional and yet personal stories aren’t inherently exceptionalist. I realized that humanizing one tragedy while understanding the broader implications and acknowledging that the event isn’t happening in a vacuum isn’t mutually exclusive. If the humanization of an event allows the reader to gain insight to the humanity in other equally horrific events then theres nothing exceptionalist about it.

Overall, the book achieves it goal of humanizing an event that’s often sensationalized by utilizing the perspective of a child with emotions that everyone can relate to. At the same time it gives readers insight into the grieving process in general and makes greater statements about how people deal with the loss of someone important to them in what seems like a random or unwarranted event. 9/11 exceptionalism is dangerous in that it creates a culture that ignores the causes of attacks and creates a culture that is incapable of mourning without hatred and ignorance. When people are able to empathize with loss while gaining insight into the larger context in which the tragedy exists then they’re better equipped to exist in a post 9/11 or post trauma world.