Conclusion: History on Our Minds and the Forms of Mediated History

Abstract

Focus here is on the present and past diversity of Europe, after a century of two wars, a Cold War-divided Europe and a miraculous unification. The chapter looks at the national and transnational development of European media culture, and what mediated cultural encounters mean for us as individuals, as nationally located citizens and Europeans. The twentieth century should teach us a lesson about nationalism, ethnicity and hate. The chapter compares newspaper articles from the millennium in 2000 with those dating from around 1900. There is a summary of the genre analysis and of how European series have dealt with twentieth-century European history. Finally, there is a discussion of past, present and future in a cognitive and social perspective, and the importance of keeping our memory alive.