Mediated Experience

The single most memorable mediated experience of my life was learning about the 9/11 terrorist attacks. I was in gym class when my principal made an announcement that the entire school was to report to the auditorium. She tried to explain to us what had happened, but I was too young to understand. I didn't know what a terrorist was, and I certainly, as a nine-year-old, couldn't understand why anybody would crash a plane on purpose. Even though I didn't know what was going on, or why all of the teachers were hysterical, I did realize that something was very wrong.

My teacher had the radio on in our classroom that day, but the only piece of information I clearly remember was that all streets below 14th were being closed down because of debris. I remembered that because my mom worked on 13th street. I was terrified that she had been caught in the mess and wouldn't be able to get out (later that day, she picked me up from school and was fine).

When I got home, my parents watched live coverage on a news channel. I don't remember which one, because every single channel had shut off its original programming. All that was on TV that day (and that week) were the twin towers. I remember watching the planes fly into each building. I watched them crumble to the ground, and I saw people running for their lives, desperately trying to make it far enough uptown.

I live on the upper west side so I never saw any of this with my own eyes. I didn't experience this horrific moment in history in New York, as a New Yorker. I only saw it on the television screen and in the newspaper. I saw it just as others had across the country and across the world.

Once I was old enough, I re-read newspaper articles from that day, and watched documentaries made by eyewitnesses. The documentaries and youtube videos, especially, had such a profound impact on me. Real people were experiencing 9/11, and it made me feel like I had experienced it too. I know what it's like to be a New Yorker, and I know these places so well. I know what happens when the subways don't run and when streets are blocked off. Half of Manhattan shut down that day, people came together like never before, and even though I didn't witness it, I feel as though I understand the impact it had on New York City just as much as anybody who had been there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXnA9FjvLSU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-Tr0u35Tek

Hanson, Ralph E. Mass Communication: Living in a Media World. Vol. 3. Washington, DC: CQ, 2011. Print.