Golden State Today

Unless you lived through the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, it’s hard to know what it was like, said UC Berkeley Professor Michael Mark Cohen. Especially because a lot of people don’t want to talk about it.

“Americans have a really hard time talking about 9/11, either because it’s too traumatizing or too controversial,” said Cohen, an associate teaching professor of American studies and African American studies.

And maybe it’s also because people don’t know how to talk about it, he said — to make sense of what came after and how it continues to shape our country today, from unremitting wars in the Middle East and mass digital surveillance to the precipitation of our hyperpolarized political climate.

But, Cohen said, it’s important for today’s college students, most of them born after 2001, to understand not just what happened but to grasp how disastrous the consequences of 9/11 have been for the U.S.

That’s what led him to create a new course, History of the Present: The U.S. After 9/11, designed to introduce students to that vital history.

In the class, which he first taught last spring and is teaching again this fall, Cohen wants his students to absorb the impact of 9/11 in a deeper way. To feel the collective shock and anguish that followed in order to fathom what came next.

“I think students finally came to understand why the country lost its mind after this disaster,” he said, recalling his spring class. “Why the U.S. lashed out in these ‘wars on terror’ in Afghanistan and Iraq; where this explosion of Islamophobia and anti-immigrant xenophobia came from; how the United States became incredibly militarized; and how this new sort of patriotism became weaponized into a polarized politics.

“All of a sudden, this basic subtext of the political wars of the Obama and Trump eras that they’ve grown up in became manifest.”

In 2001 smartphones and TikTok didn’t exist so there were no personal videos or social media posts during the attack. The only way people could view it was in person or on TV.

To help students comprehend the magnitude of 9/11, Cohen plays the entire 89-minute Today Show live broadcast during his class. They listen as TV morning show hosts Katie Couric and Matt Lauer try to figure out what is happening as they watch events unfold on screen. They hear witnesses call into the show from public pay phones on New York City streets describing the attack in panicked voices choked with emotion.

While students watch these scenes unfold Cohen encourages everyone to talk and ask questions as they come up.

“It’s really an extraordinary exercise,” he said. “To sit together in that shared space and experience this world-changing event in real time is transformative. Students get a sense of its scale duration and deliberate spectacle in a way their education has largely avoided.”

The class goes on to discuss transformative consequences including the Global War on Terrorism humanitarian disaster post-Hurricane Katrina financial collapse in 2008 Obama era Black Lives Matter movement election of Trump Jan. 6 insurrection among others.

To examine racism politics at that time Cohen has students read books on Islamophobia poetry by Claudia Rankine watch Arthur Jafa's video artwork Love is The Message The Message is Death montage about Black American experience which Cohen deems "the most important work of art in 21st century so far."

Throughout all sessions students are encouraged to think about their personal memories interacting with historical events.“They begin drawing parallels between their experiences memories ways historians think about period” said Cohen “and identify where they might diverge.”

At semester end Cohen steps away asks students become historians themselves giving group presentations significant events cultural moments offering analyses making sense historically.

“In becoming historians they can inhabit era grown up more confidently,” said Cohen “but also see themselves knowledge producers own right.”

“In end their turn hold room teach us what now know true — as young historians democratic citizens seeking understanding dramatic changes history present.”