Beautiful and Terrible: 9/11, Black Lives Matter, and the (Re)Creation of a National American Identity

• In Event: Teaching, Interrogating, and Dismantling Historical Injustices

Abstract

This conceptual paper analyzes how 9/11 and the Black Lives Matter movement acted as critical moments that re-forged American identity into something beautiful and terrible, and forced a reckoning with the double consciousness of what it means to be American alongside news outlets’ redefinition of a national identity. After analyzing newspaper coverage of both events, we found three themes: first, conceptualizations of American identity have dramatically changed course due to 9/11 and BLM; second, conceptualizations of a national identity vary greatly between what they present as American at the events’ onset, and what gets storied into ‘American’ post-event; and third, the public news narrative of these events uniquely challenge notions of America as a racially, religiously, and culturally equitable nation.

Authors

• Joanna Batt, University of Cincinnati

• Michael Joseph, Texas Tech University

• Anthony L. Brown, University of Texas at Austin