Tower power

Tower Power presents an engaging series of discussions in dialogue on one of the first truly interdisciplinary and historically informed studies of the American skyscraper and September 11. Devrim F. Kilicer's book offers a critical inspection of the ways in which “the center of the center,” the vertical temenos of the United States, New York City, is comprehended as the place for the American Dream of material success with its overwhelming bundle of skyscrapers. The author contends that it is only by approaching the phenomenon of September 11 in the context of iconic American skyscrapers that we can truly understand the ways September 11 has been canonized and imbued with a sacred character. At the same time, her study allows September 11 to inform our understanding of the skyscraper as the essential American architectural form. She provides a socio-psychoanalytic lens through the works of psychoanalysts Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan together with social theorists Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu in understanding why New York City has been expanding vertically and what this architectonic verticality tells us about the American psyche.