Projections 4: Responding to Disaster: Trauma, Recovery, and Remembrance

Projections

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INNOCENTS AND MONSTERS:THE STRUGGLES OF AFTERMATH IN LITTLETON, COLORADO JESSICA KATZ Massachusetts Institute of Technology Department of Urban Studies + Planning

ABSTRACT This article examines the social construction and the memorialization process in the aftermath of the Columbine shootings. The tragedy played out on the national stage, and its effects rippled far beyond the small affluent suburb where the tragedy took place. At the same time, mourning, healing, and memorializing had to take place within the Littleton community. While the nation bounded ahead in appropriating the tragedy for political purposes, the Littleton community realized the need to reflect on the meaning of the event. In the media and in the political arena the event has been labeled and wrung dry of symbolism and meaning, while at Columbine High School itself, the community has had the sense to step back and take time to mourn and reflect before making final decision about how to remember the event and tell the story of the Columbine tragedy.

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Projections 4: Responding to Disaster: Trauma, Recovery, and Remembrance

Published on Dec 8, 2022

MIT DUSP

In a world of real and imagined danger in which we find ourselves, the process of trauma, recovery and remembrance has taken on new significance. While we do not address the events of September 11th 2001 directly, this volume of Projections certainly has its genesis in the struggle we have faced to rebuild, personally and professionally, in the months and years following that tragic morning. For me, the struggle to cope with disaster recovery began earlier, following my visit to Sarajevo in 2000 where I was part of a group re-designing the government center after its 1992-95 siege. Five years after the war ended, the scars of conflict were immediately present: buildings toppled, areas land mined, growing squatter settlements and thousands of simple white sticks dotting the landscape, marking the resting place of the city's defenders.