September 11 – do artists have a free hand?
As anniversaries go, it’s big one. Unbeknownst to most, though, the date of September the 11th was infamous before the World Trade Center attacks. In 1973, General Augusto Pinochet led a U.S.-backed coup against the popularly elected government of Chile, marking the beginning of his repressive 17-year dictatorship. This is just one example of the way history has been rewritten post-911. Since 2001, the American media has been swept up by the ‘war on terror’, fostering a national obsession with security and the capture of extremists. It’s provided fertile ground for artists and cultural spectators alike – and five years on, we’re seeing the first big budget movies about September 11 released to mainstream audiences. But it’s not as if the wounds of the American public have disappeared. Amanda Third is a lecturer in media and communications at Monash University and an expert in the media’s representation of terrorism. She says even five years after the attacks, audiences are highly sensitive to popular portrayals of September 11. Sophie Gyles spoke to Amanda earlier today.