Transnationalism and Universalism of the Memory Tourism of the Great War

Abstract

Thanks to the Centenary, a renewed interest has undoubtedly affected the landscapes of the memory of the First World War, moving away from the aims of past patriotic pilgrimages because it includes different perspectives. Over time, a broader and disenchanted view of the conflict has allowed a narrative of memory that also contains counter-memories and meets the different needs of visitors, in which the practices of commemoration and the duty of memory aspire to a universalist dimension. The article focuses on some findings of a field research aimed at analysing the existence of commemoration and remembrance practices in the memory tourism of the Great War in Friuli Venezia Giulia. One of the goals is also to explore how memory tourism can transform the collective memory of this war into a shared and participatory representation, overcoming national memory policies.The interviews highlighted general trends concerning the processes of individualisation of memory and growing post-national dimension, because a different awareness is present in memory mediators, influencing the same purposes of the memory tourism of the Great War, which is so anti-rhetorical and transnational.