Toward a 'Rooted Cosmopolitanism': Reading In the Shadow of No Towers as a Call for Local Community
Author:
- Erin Marie Arizzi (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill)
Art Spiegelman's In the Shadow of No Towers, which chronicles Spiegelman's own experience as witness to the attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11/01, offers an important critique of post-9/11 America. Throughout this paper, I argue that No Towers is a rhetorical text that uses the comic form to highlight the problem of nationalism and to reiterate the importance of local communities. I argue the form of the book provides a model for active citizenship. In the same way that we critically consume comic books, Spiegelman suggests that we should critically engage with the community, the nation, and the media.