BIBFRAME Work

Title

Covid-19, the Second World War, and the idea of Britishness

Type

• Text
• Monograph

Contribution

• Pettitt, Joanne (editor)

Subject

• World War, 1939-1945--Great Britain--Influence (LCSH)
• National characteristics, British (LCSH)
• COVID-19 Pandemic, 2020-2023--Social aspects--Great Britain (LCSH)
• Collective memory--Great Britain (LCSH)

Language

• English

Classification

• LCC: DA118 (Assigner: dlc) (Status: used by assigner)
• DDC: 941.085 (Assigner: dlc)

Content

• text

Supplementary content

• index
• bibliography

Summary

"In Great Britain, discussions of the Coronavirus pandemic have frequently been intertwined with references to the Second World War. Such allusions are to be found in political speeches, journalistic accounts and opinion pieces; they are also replete in the cultural sphere. Bringing together scholars from a range of disciplines, this comprehensive volume seeks to evaluate the uses (and abuses) of this rhetoric. The result is a multifaceted meditation on Britain's response to the pandemic. If memories of the war constitute part of the so-called foundation myth of Britain, Covid-19 may well have pushed us into a new age of myth making and remembrance. The concurrent occurrence of Brexit and the Black Lives Matter movement adds complexities that also need to be addressed. How we will remember this time remains to be seen, but the essays collected here mark a first step in the process of working through this unprecedented period of British history-in-the-making"-- Provided by publisher.

Table of Contents

Covid-19, the Second World War and the idea of Britishness / Joanne Pettitt -- Global threats to an island story : Covid-19 and the British 'foundation myth' of 1940 / Charlie Hall -- 'A nation at war' : battle of Britain narratives revived and repurposed by Covid-19 / Sophy Antrobus -- Don't mention the war / Julian Petley -- 'Like any wartime government' : Covid-19, Churchillian imaginaries, and the limits of English exceptionalism / Leighton Andrews -- Taking it on the chin : sport, war and Covid-19 / Peter Donaldson -- England is not a template : Wales, Britishness and Covid-19 / Eluned Gramich -- Wrong war mate (reprise) : Britain, the Holocaust and Covid-19. A polemic / Tony Kushner -- 'A beacon of light' : representations of Captain Tom Moore and the 'silent generation' of Covid-19 victims / Linda Maynard -- Disrupting the rituals of grief : conflict, Covid-19 and the fracturing of funerary tradition / Kara Critchell -- 'We will meet again' : mobilising prosthetic memories of the Second World War during the UK Covid-19 lockdown / Cat Mahoney -- 'Keep calm and bake bananas' : reimagining wartime posters for Covid-19 / Lauren Cantillon -- Cruel nostalgia and Covid-19 / Robert Eaglestone -- Finest hour 2.0 : digital nostalgic popular culture and Covid-19 / Michael Samuel.

Authorized Access Point

Covid-19, the Second World War, and the idea of Britishness

Geographic Coverage

• Great Britain

Admin Metadata

• Date: 2026-09-11T20:17:39.411491+00:00
• Agent: cbc
• Status: c
• Derived from: 22176306

Admin Metadata

• Date: 2026-09-11
• Cataloger id: Unknown
• Description level: http://id.loc.gov/ontologies/bibframe-2-6-0/
• Description language: eng
• Description authentication: pcc