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Since Freud's views of the unconscious mind grew in part out of his writings about aesthetics, applying psychoanalytic theory to the conceptualizing of a memorial museum design was an ironic reversal of terms. After all, Freud developed ideas about things that could be thought and things that could not be known except in their absence while attending theater performances, reading myths and philosophy, and attempting to understand the psyches of artists (Ranciere, 2009). Deconstructing psychoanalytic praxis so its constituent parts could be repurposed to help this country regain its footing after collective trauma might once have seemed an overreach. But since newer formulations of psychoanalysis have privileged subjectivity, experiencing, and expanding individual potential (cf. Summers, 2013), and intersubjective recognition theory (Benjamin, 2004; 2014) has extended ideas about the moral third and the problem of witnessing into the political realm, this seemed like a less far-fetched goal. In this essay, I discuss how these developments catalyzed a re-transcription of old understandings in ways relevant to a time that has been likened to an “age of overstimulation” (Huyssens, 2003).
So much collapsed on 9/11, including the meanings denoted by the name. The popular shorthand for the massive catastrophe of that day condensed in nightmare images what were actually tangled but distinct physical, symbolic, narrative, temporal, and intersubjective collapses. The world watched in unbelieving horror as both the buildings and our American bravado literally disintegrated in real time and repeatedly. Only afterwards did it become apparent-at least to psychoanalysts-that our ability to narrate our collective and individual losses was hindered by numerous gaps in our understanding, precipitated in large measure by our fleeting dislocation in time. The relational remnant of reality that remained was polarized