Hiroshima and 9/11: Linking memorials for peace

Utilizing theories from the field of collective memory, this article explores the meaning and implications behind the installation of a small origami crane folded by a Hiroshima bombing victim in the Tribute WTC Visitor Center in New York City. The Tribute WTC Visitor Center was established by the September 11th Families' Association to commemorate the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. The origami crane installed in 2007 at the Tribute WTC Visitor Center was folded in 1955 by Sadako Sasaki, a 12-year-old girl suffering from leukemia as a result of radiation exposure from the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima. The installation of this crane at the Tribute WTC Visitor Center presents an informative model of how collective memories of tragic events of global proportion may intersect today in new and creative ways. The overlapping of these memories, after these have been transformed, depoliticized and centered on the innocent victims and not the perpetrators, has the potential to create new meanings that not only re-orient memories of the past, but may also impact social action now and in the future.