The Nordic Media and the Cold War

摘要

NORDICOM has again provided a book that many researchers would not have known they needed until they encountered the book itself. The Nordic Media and the Cold War adds to a growing collection of research about news media (typically) and war coverage; however, this book differs from the others in its focus on one particular area, its attention to a less commonly studied time period, and its inclusion of multiple media. Much of the discussion of war in media coverage deals with the hot wars of the last century and the role that the news played in either covering the war or in serving as sites of war propaganda. This book, by focusing on the Cold War-the period following World War Ⅱ until the dissolution of the Soviet Union-invites the reader to look at the role that the media played in the Nordic countries, a focus that provides a kind of a special case or even a microcosm for what has been going on in other countries. As the editors write in their introduction "These countries constituted an important geopolitical area between East and West during the Cold War: They lay at the intersection of the USA, Canada, and Britain in the West and the Soviet Union and communist Eastern Europe in the east and south of the region" (pp. 9-10).