Book Description
This book contributes to the debate on what Europe is by demonstrating the complexities and contradictions inherent in the concept. They are seen most clearly when Europe is viewed from a long historical perspective. During the closing decades of the twentieth century Europe emerged as one of the main points of reference in both the cultural and the political constructs of the global community. An obsession with the concept of European identity is readily identifiable. European identity is usually seen in relation to national identity, either in an uneasy opposition to it, that is, as an alternative to the nation, or in a situation in which it overlaps with and complements the nation. The structure of national identity is «projected» onto European identity, and this projection has an ideological underpinning, for no projection is ever non-interested or non-ideological. This process of identity construction provokes searching questions which the book aims to address. At the same time the book explores the opportunities offered by the concept of Europe to see how it may be used in the construction of the future. The approach is one of both deconstruction and reconstruction. The issue of Europe is closely related in the book to more general issues relating to the cultural construction of community. The book should therefore be seen as the companion of Myth and Memory in the Construction of Community, which also is published by PIE-Peter Lang in the series Multiple Europes.
