Under construction: more-connected communities
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"My hope is that we can find things that can be repeated," he says. "This is an important period of exploration for Americans who are involved, to share what kinds of approaches seem to be working, so that other Americans can try the same thing."
At least one organization has already begun spotlighting community activists and their work. Under an awards program announced just prior to the September tragedies, the Ford Foundation has singled out 20 grass-roots leaders from some 3,000 nominees, among them Bill Rauch of Cornerstone Theater.
"Leadership for a Changing World," as the program is called, includes financial support for the awardees and is intended to focus attention on their work.
"There was a feeling out there that there really are no solutions to the problems we face," says Melvin Oliver of the Ford Foundation. The leadership program, which was developed over the past four years, is meant "to antidote that view. We know from our continuous work throughout the world that there are amazing people and organizations out there who are tackling these problems in an effective way," he says.
"We need to understand how they do it, what kind of qualities they bring to it. We need to make them models for people to aspire to, so that we can have generations of those leaders to come."
Still other experts say they hope the nation's current mood of goodwill - and the disappearance, at least for now, of "hyphenated" Americans - can help lead to a renewed national dialogue on larger community issues such as race relations.
"It's one of those rare moments in history when things are molten enough that a learning curve can get started," says Jim Sleeper, a newspaper columnist and author of "Liberal Racism."
Even before the terrorist attacks, he notes, the country's cultural conversation was changing, as more and more experts and critics began to explore how to broaden the dialogue beyond ethnocentric concerns and racial grievances.
"It's not that those things don't count," says Mr. Sleeper, a liberal who has criticized the left's obsession with multiculturalism. "It's just figuring out that other things count, too. Some of us think we have to work overtime on identifying a few of our common bonds, on what keeps things going."
What happened on Sept.11, he says, "scrambled the categories, the lenses through which many of us have been accustomed to viewing these things. It forces people to go inside and say, 'What do we really stand for?' "
Mr. Franklin, of the Interdenominational Theological Center, agrees. "We've discovered a common ground, which is the basis for dropping the hyphen," he says. "The new terms of conversation are community and citizenship and character."
But he says there's no guarantee that lasting change will result from recent events and the emotions they have triggered in Americans. That kind of change takes long-term commitment.
"I'm hoping it's not just a blip," says Melanie Adams of Metropolis St. Louis. "I'm hoping that even if the whole thing is solved tomorrow, that people will still realize the importance of [being involved with] their communities and their neighborhoods.
"I hope people see the benefits of that," she says, "of how it makes a better community for everyone."
