How the World Trade Center Site in New York City is Now an Imaginary Place - Essay Example

HOW THE WORLD TRADE CENTER SITE IN NEW YOURK IS NOW AN ‘IMAGINARY PLACE’ Instructions: According to the text Myth & Knowing, An introduction toWorld Mythology by Leonard and McClure, pg 321, par. 2 the authors write; "Such sites are, of course, actual places. We can go there today, stand, look, and know we are in THE place. Yet, at the same time, these actual places are MYTHICAL because they embody meaning far beyond the scope of the events that happened and even beyond the limits of the physical locations themselves. In that sense, they are IMAGINARY places". Using any of the following 9 categories from Gullifords 9 categories of sacred places: sites associated with emergence and migration tales; sites of trails and pilgrimage routes; places essential to cultural survival; alters; vision quest sites; ceremonial dance sites; ancestral ruins; petroglyphs and pictographs; or burial and massacre sites) DESCRIBE HOW THE WORLD TRADE CENTER SITE IN NEW YOURK CITY IS NOW AND IMAGINARY PLACE". Is this important for 21sat century Americans? Why or why now? The continuous development of technology has led to the change of social and cultural structure in most countries within the international community. The format of infrastructure systems in states around the world has been also influenced; the urban design has been differentiated in order to meet the needs of people in current social and ethical conditions. Under these terms, sciences like sociology and even mythology have been called to explain the changes in all aspects of human life trying to identify the reasons that led to the deterioration of the quality of life especially in big cities worldwide. Current paper focuses on the examination of the characteristics of a specific place: the World Trade Center in New York. The above term (characteristics) refers to the influences of this place on the lives of people – not only locally but also around the world. In the past, the specific place was considered to be the center of commercial activities in the specific town influencing the development of commerce in USA; the reason was that the headquarters of many – well known firms were established in the specific buildings – two towers, the so called ‘Twin Towers’ and five smaller buildings. The specific site was destroyed in 2001 after a terrorist attack costing the life of about 2750 people. Currently the World Trade Center site is under re-construction but it will take many years for the local community to recover. The effects of the events of September the 11th – date of terrorist attacks that destroyed entirely the specific site – have been multi-dimensional1. Apart from the city’s and the country’s financial life – which were adversely affected by the events of September the 11th – the local social life has been also affected. The specific site – due to the number of people died – can be characterized as a ‘massacre site’ (using the Gulliford’s 9 categories of sacred places); under these terms, the role of this site to the development of social and cultural life of people of the specific region could be explored taking into account the fact that through the years the role of the specific site in the social and financial life of the greater region has changed; currently, the specific site could be evaluated using the views of mythology – up to now the projects referring to its reconstruction are under development, i.e. it is still an iconic project but even when finished it will not be approachable to the public under the same terms with the past – referring not just to its security features but also to the feelings of people that are going to visit the site when completed. Because of the issues explained above, the specific site could be characterized as an ‘imaginary place’ using the views of Leonard and McClure in their work ‘Myth and Knowing – an introduction to World Mythology’; the specific assumption could be justified using the descriptions and the views included in the above book while the views of other researchers – given under similar aspects – could be also considered as valuable and are going to be presented in this paper. Mythology has been traditionally used in order to show the conditions of life but also the beliefs of people of a specific region under particular social and cultural ethics and rules. In most cases, mythology has been found to be related with reality; more specifically, facts and events of a specific period of time are often isolated and are used as parts of stories (myths) that are considered to be unreal; however, mythology includes features of reality – although it is not clear at what level this interaction has been developed. Because of the above mythology has been often used in order to explain historical events or to foresee the consequences of specific events – especially if referring to similar social and cultural conditions. The World Trade Center has been for decades the center of commercial activities in New York; in fact, it has been the center of decisions involving in commercial initiatives around the world. On the other hand, the particular site could be characterized as the symbol of modern style of trading. Far from the traditional methods of trading, the control over the operations through the central offices and the development of appropriate strategies has been a style of corporate governance extensively developed during the last 30 years. It is perhaps for the above reason that the specific site has become a symbol of capitalism in terms of the Western style of life. However, the World Trade Center was also a key point in terms of social and cultural activities – the various parts of the specific site were open to tourists – a restaurant at the top of one of the Twin Towers was the favourite place of many people both locals but also foreigners. In this context, the explanation of the characteristics of the World Trade Center as an ‘imaginary place’ is rather a challenging task. The role of the World Trade Center within the international community can be evaluated using the literature especially the works focusing on the role of cities in the development of business activities. The specific issue is examined in the work of Jones (2002) where it is made clear that modern cities can be the center of commercial activities worldwide but only specific terms and conditions2. In this context, the evaluation of a city’s site as an imaginary place could be based to the fact that the specific site is no more actively involved in the development of the city’s commercial life – it is more used as the tool for the promotion of specific social messages. The specific site would not be approachable to all people around the world; it could be used as a symbol for a specific style of life or for a specific event. In order to understand the role of World Trade Center as an ‘imaginary place’ it should be necessary to refer primarily to the characteristics of such a place – as they can be identified in cities and other urban sites internationally. One of the most important characteristics of an ‘imaginary place’ is that the specific place can be evaluated not for its current position/ role but rather for the values (social, ethical, cultural, political) that it represents. Under these terms, the evaluation of the specific place as an ‘imaginary place’ could start by its description using the views of Fiske (1999)3 who sets the basic principles for the development of myths. The above researcher refers to a series of mythical concepts, like the barbaric world, ghosts and so on in order to explain the methods of development of myth through specific real events. The work of Fiske leads to the assumption that myth can be closely related with the reality – including, as explained above, real events; for this reason, all myths should be appropriately valued by the scientific community. According to Fiske (1999) the development of myths in ancient years can be explained using the conditions of life at that particular period; compared to modern way of life, the life of our ancestors was completely differentiated. More specifically, it is noticed that ‘we have come to regard all events as taking place regularly, in strict conformity to law: whatever our official theories may be, we instinctively take this view of things; but our primitive ancestors knew nothing about laws of nature, nothing about physical forces, nothing about the relations of cause and effect, nothing about the necessary regularity of things’ (Fiske, 1999, 16). In other words, today the development of myths could not be feasible – giving the fact that technology and science have been developed at extremely high levels and there is no much space for ‘mysteries’, i.e. stories with one or more unexplained parts. Rather scientific analysis and common sense is used to explain all aspects of life. In this context, the development of World Trade Center as an ‘imaginary place’ should be based on specific criteria. In the world of Adams (1990) the role of myth in the development of daily social life is explained using different criteria: still the myth is considered to be out of current social context – in terms that today myths are quite difficult to be developed compared to the past that myths were part of the daily life – however it has a different role: myth is used in order to show the importance of a place/ person within the social and historical context of its era; under this view, World Trade Center can be characterized now as a ‘mythical’ place (imaginary place) due to its role in the past (Figure 1, Appendix). In fact, the World Trade Center4 can be viewed as the sample of the modern style of urban development but also of the modern style of life. After being collapsed, the Twin Towers and the surrounding buildings of the specific site have become an ‘imaginary’ place bringing in mind the patterns of life in the greater region before the events of the September the 11th. The fact that now the World Trade Center does not exist – at least in its previous form – leads to the increase of its importance for the social life of the specific region. Under these terms, the World Trade Center is now a place of memories influencing still the perceptions of the people on the specific style of life – it is consider being a representation of the capitalistic style of life but not in real terms – anymore. It could be compared to the Tower of Babylon which was also collapsed having been an impressive piece of work (see Figure 2, Appendix). It is under the above terms that the specific site can be characterized as ‘imaginary place’ using the description given by Leonard and McClure (2004). Works Cited Adams, D. (1990) The World of Myth, An Anthology, Leeming Oxford University Press, NY Fiske, J. (1999) MYTHS AND MYTH-MAKERS - OLD TALES AND SUPERSTITIONS INTERPRETED BY COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY. Houghton, Mifflin and Company: Boston and New York – First published 1892 Global Security Organization (2008) World Trade Center - New York City 9-11 Terrorist Attacks, available from http://www.globalsecurity.org/eye/wtc.htm Ingram, G. (1998) Patterns of Metropolitan Development: What Have We Learned? Urban Studies, 35(7): 1019-1035 Jones, A. (2002) The ‘global city misconceived: the myth of ‘global management in transnational service firms. Geoforum, 33(3): 335-350 Leonard, S. McClure, M. (2004) Myth & Knowing, An Introduction to World Mythology, McGraw-Hill New Your, NY Appendix Figure 1- The World Trade Center, NY, before September the 11th (source: http://www.artificeimages.com/buildings/World_Trade_Center.html) Figure 2 – The Tower of Babylon (source: NewStatesman, 2008, http://www.newstatesman.com/arts-and-culture/2008/11/babylon-iraq-muftah-city) Read More