FC NOW: The Fast Company Weblog
June 28, 2006
A Monument to Work?
There's an interesting debate brewing in New York City over the design of the World Trade Center memorial.
The original plan calls for the names of the 2,979 victims of the trade center terrorist acts in 1993 and 2001 to be listed at on eight parapets at plaza level--in a random order that architect Michael Arad says reflects the "haphazard brutality of the attacks."
But the victims' families aren't content with that. According to The New York Times, they're insisting that victims' names be arranged by the building in which they worked, by their employer or other affiliation, and by floor. Says Edith Lutnick, executive director of the Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund. "You're addressing what everyone asks: 'Where did they work? How old were they? What tower were they in?"
I'm not going to try to assess the emotion or the politics driving this argument (though it certainly does sound like the victims' organizations are throwing their weight around).
But I find it very telling that our instinct is to associate people so closely with their employers and places of work. Not with their communities, not with their families. And not as individuals, as Arad's design stipulates. No: The firefighters' union wants its guys identified foremost as firefighters. Thomas S. Johnson, chairman of the executive committee of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation, says it's "nonnegotiable" that his son be listed as an employee of the brokerage firm of Keefe, Bruyette & Woods.
It's been observed before that the Trade Center disaster was distinctive as a tragedy set in the workplace. But should that define how we remember its victims? Do our jobs so define us? Do our associations with organizations supercede who we are as individuals?
Posted by Keith Hammonds at June 28, 2006 11:02 AM | Category: culture |
7 Comments
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I'm not going to hold my breath about whether or not my insight on this matter is all inclusive.
Our work can be defining, in the plural sense, but not the single definition. In the same vein, we can bring meaning to our work and take meaning from it, but it can never be how we define our meaning. Our worth is called into great question if we base it on the things that we do. Otherwise, getting fired means our life is over. Retirement means our life is over. And making major mistakes creates a "mid-life crisis" of self. (Some introspection is healthy once big mistakes are made, but some things we should never question.) We are all artists, work should be another expression of our lives.
Thanks for letting a young buck chime in.
Christopher
I am a workplace columnist who was at the World Trade Center when it fell. I came very close to dying.
The way people recover from a trauma like this, is we retell the story over and over again. I have never heard someone tell a story about being there, that day, and not say where they were working.
For one thing, it tells where you started, which is the biggest factor in determining if you lived. For another thing, each of us who was at the World Trade Center when it fell reassessed our lives. For someone who almost dies at work, work needs to have meaning if you go back.
I cannot speak for the families who had someone die that day. But I can only say that if the people who lived are obsessed with where they were working, then it seems reasonable to me that the families of those who died would be obsessed too.
Here is a link to a column I wrote about why the World Trade Center will always be associated with work for me:
http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2003/09/911_two_years_later.html
Penelope Trunk
I have always believed that the most stunningly moving aspect of the Washington Vietnam memorial was the fact that the casualties are listed by date of death, forcing people to search through the plethora of names rather than being able to go straight to an individual. (http://www.nps.gov/vive/memorial/wall.htm)
History is the proof.Naming or not putting the names at certain places of work will not let people forget 9/11.The tragedy is bigger than the names.
History is the proof.Are the names at particular place more significant than the tragedy it self?
I think that fundamentally, human beings have a need to contribute to the world, and one of the main ways we feel that we do that is through our work. This is why we want our work acknowledged. We want to make a difference, and for those people who were indeed at work that day in the towers, maybe their families want the world to know how their loved ones were contributing to the world through their work.
Name a commission, give them control, let THEM call the shots. End of discussion.