Friday, April 24, 2015
Response to Karen Randall
In Karen Randall's essay "Speaking the Unspeakable: Invisibility and Trauma after 9/11" she asks "why is television a suitable vehicle for sensitive or traumatic issues when cinema is not?" She prefaces this question by providing examples of both television broadcasts that deal directly with the trauma of 9/11 and cinematic endeavors that allude to the trauma. She explains that this format of dealing with trauma has been part of a trend in trauma's representation in media since WWI. After both WWI and the Vietnam war as well as other periods of conflict or disaster there is generally a gap of a few years before any cinematic representation of the event hits the big screen where as TV documentaries and coverage are released as soon as possible. I feel as though this gap is necessary because, as Randall mentions in the beginning of her essay, it has to be conscious of collective memory. Documentary footage and news reports provide cold factual information, with the occasional human interest stories sprinkled in when dealing with the immediate aftermath of a traumatic event. And in this immediate aftermath all people want are the facts, 9/11 was a major source of confusion and disorientation and it is the job of the news to relay information to the people as it becomes available. On the other hand one thing that is not needed in the immediate aftermath of a traumatic event is an artistic interpretation of said event. Communities need time to process and begin healing before reflecting on a disaster. Once a collective memory has begun to form after an appropriate amount of time cinematic interpretations can help to form that memory as well as encourage communities to continue reflecting on the event.
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I agree with you. While it is important to preserve the memory and the trauma through images, there is a time for certain types of images. Like you said, documentary photos are seemingly factual and reflect the event in a true light. They also serve as vehicles to deliver news and stories to viewers who perhaps were not there. Having something to consme in light of a tragedy is important because it gives other people the opportunity to learn what happened and make sense of their emotions and experiences by reconciling them with the facts.
I also agree that Hollywood type films are not appropriate in the wake of a tragedy. To me it feels that something of that nature is dramatizing and monetizing a tragedy, which strikes a nerve in me. Sometimes it is just too soon for certain kind of media, especially when it preys on other people's emotions.
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