Article

The popularisation of History in Italian contemporary culture. The 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall

in Versus n. 116, Politiche della memoria. Uno sguardo semiotico, pp.61-80

Abstract (english)

One of the “memory obsessions” of our years is the proliferation of anniversaries. Among these celebrations, the 20th anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall had a significant impact. In this essay I consider three types of public discourse that, in Italy, celebrated the anniversary (the discourse of newspapers, the television broadcasting devoted to related historical themes, the touristic discourse), in order to investigate which kinds of narrative of the fall of the Berlin Wall they have developed and how they have presented an event of such historic significance as that. In other words, how, after all, they have assumed the responsibility of an
historical discourse.