This book is a publication of
INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS
Office of Scholarly Publishing
Herman B Wells Library 350
1320 East 10th Street
Bloomington, Indiana 47405 USA
iupress.indiana.edu
Telephone 800-842-6796
Fax 812-855-7931
2015 by Thomas Stubblefield
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition.
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.481992.
Manufactured in the
United States of America
Library of Congress
Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Stubblefield, Thomas.
9/11 and the visual culture of disaster / Thomas Stubblefield.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-253-01549-5 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-253-01556-3 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-253-01563-1 (ebook) 1. September 11 Terrorist Attacks, 2001 Influence. 2. September 11 Terrorist Attacks, 2001, in mass media. 3. September 11 Terrorist Attacks, 2001, in art. 4. Emptiness (Philosophy) I. Title.
HV6432.7.S78 2014
973.931 dc23
2014029044
1 2 3 4 5 20 19 18 17 16 15
FOR C. D. S.
Acknowledgments
As pieces of this book have passed through so many skilled and caring hands over the past decade, it is impossible to faithfully represent the full catalog of those who have helped bring it into being. What I offer here represents only a small sampling of the many individuals who have participated in the ongoing conversation.
I initially began to wrestle with issues surrounding the visual culture of 9/11 in 2004 while pursuing my masters degree in art history at the University of Illinois, Chicago. Throughout these early investigations, I was encouraged and inspired by Bob Bruegmann, Peter Hales, Hannah Higgins, and Woodman Taylor. Together, they not only pushed me to clarify and develop my ideas further, but introduced the possibility of my one day turning this project into a book. For that, I am eternally grateful. Several years later, the project was given new life at the Visual Studies Program at the University of California, Irvine. Anyone familiar with the unique interdisciplinary spirit of the program will immediately see its influence on my methodology and overall approach to visual culture. It is hard to imagine having the same opportunity to pursue these questions across such a disparate field of media at any other program at the time.
I would like to thank Peter Krapp, who was (and remains) extraordinarily giving of his time. Peter can always be counted on for a relevant source or thought-provoking question. Additionally, Ccile Whiting offered tireless and timely feedback throughout. I am also grateful to Martin Schwab, who had the uncanny ability to force me to revisit the assumptions of my argument with a single well-placed question. Mark Poster too proved an invaluable resource, particularly with regard to helping me to build the theoretical toolbox that this project necessitated. I will never read Foucault without thinking of him. In addition, my interaction with colleagues in the program was critical in helping me to sculpt my ideas into the form that they would eventually take. For this, I thank Chris Balaschak, Kim Beil, Mark Cunningham, Douglas Hodapp, Ari Laskin, Tim Seiber, Sami Siegelbaum, Nicole Woods-Beckton, and Ken Yoshida. It is also important to acknowledge the generosity of the University of California, Irvine, in this endeavor. The Chancellors Fellowship, numerous traveling grants from the International Center for Writing and Translation and the School of the Humanities, and a Summer Dissertation Research Fellowship allowed me to dedicate myself more fully to this project and are in no small part responsible for its success.
This project has come to full fruition while I have been working as professor in the Art History Department at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth. Throughout the endless revisions, I have benefited tremendously from the guidance and support of Anna Dempsey, Memory Holloway, Pamela Karimi, Hallie Meredith, Erin Sassin, and Michael Taylor. Allison Cywin and Charlene Ryder helped enormously in the endless hunt to procure images and essays. In addition, I am indebted to the students of the College of Visual and Performing Arts at UMD, especially those in two classes, The Visual Culture of Disaster and Theory of Photography, who kept me on my toes and forced me to keep my ideas fresh and relevant.
I also want to thank Indiana University Press for its diligence and commitment to this project. In particular, I would like to express my gratitude to my editor, Raina Polivka, who believed in the book from the beginning and worked tirelessly to bring it into being. Jenna Whittaker deserves ample credit for somehow ensuring that everything moved forward while at the same time always looking over my materials with a conscientious and critical eye. Eric Levy provided the fine-tooth comb and meticulous scrutiny that was needed to my whip my prose into shape. I am also very appreciative of the insightful suggestions and comments of the outside readers. Additionally, I want to acknowledge Tom Gunning, who fielded my questions about the representation of falling bodies in early film with characteristic expertise and generosity.
Finally, I want to thank Barbara, Dave, David, and Trisha Stubblefield for their unwavering support, Hayden, Zoey, and Damien for interjecting some much-needed perspective throughout, and Karen, whose gentle nature and wild optimism make all things appear obtainable.
Introduction
SPECTACLE AND ITS OTHER
The collision of the jet passenger planes with the Twin Towers, their subsequent collapse into nothingness, the ominous absence within the smoke-filled skyline, the busy streets of Manhattan turned disaster movie these scenes were images as much or more than actual events. With the remains of the dead still being sifted out of the rubble at Ground Zero and the Tribute in Light beaming into the night sky as a daily reminder of the horrific events of the day, it was all but impossible to see through the callousness and publicity-driven nature of these remarks at the time. Eventually, however, as references to the Hollywood disaster movie and the rhetoric of the sublime reverberated throughout popular discourse, the realization set in that the eerily photogenic quality of the event was not a coincidence. Rather, as Stockhausen and Hirst suggest, the attack was aimed at and made for the image.
