Media and Events in History

The most intense hopes and fears of our collective lives centre around large-scale events – from competitions, celebrations and festivals to environmental disasters, pandemics and terror attacks. The media are a crucial part of this process: they enable the planning, resource allocation and circulation of the vital information needed to mount major events. They are also where traces of events are stored for history. In short, large-scale and collective events have been, and still are, mediated. Starting from nineteenth-century industrialisation, Media and Events in History explains how contemporary life has become saturated with events. It discusses how they have come to involve extensive infrastructures, forms of control and anticipation, attention and participation, contingency and transformation, and articulations of the past and the future. Synthesising and developing insights from history, media studies, philosophy and the social sciences, Ytreberg surveys the rise of event-planning via mediation, and exposes the historical driving forces behind ‘media events’, global ‘mega-events’ and ‘pseudo-events’. Revealing the importance of events in history, this eye-opening book will be of interest to students of media studies, history, historical sociology and cultural history, as well as the general reader.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements Part 1: Concepts and theories Chapter 1 Understanding large-scale events Chapter 2 Trans-ports: Key concepts for large-scale events Chapter 3 Return of the event in history, media critique and media studies Part 2: Cases and histories Chapter 4 Planned events Chapter 5 Media-planned events Chapter 6 Nonplanned events Conclusion: The challenges and limits of events Notes Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Espen Ytreberg is Professor of Media Studies at the University of Oslo.

Review :
''This book is impressive for its clarity, accessibility, interdisciplinarity, critical approach and its mastery of the massive literature on the idea of the event.'' Peter Burke, University of Cambridge   ''Espen Ytreberg’s book is a powerful account of the media’s role in the narration and construction of large-scale events in the West, from nineteenth-century industrialisation up to our times. While many media researchers are mesmerised by the here and now, Ytreberg brings a much-needed historical nuance to our understanding of events in media. He also offers a rare focus on the building blocks of events, highlighting the importance of the infrastructures that support them. A must-read for anyone interested in events as they shape societies over time.'' Julia Sonnevend, The New School for Social Research