Jonas Harvard is Manager for the Nordic Spaces research programme at the Centre for East European and Baltic Studies, Södertörn University, Stockholm, and Research Fellow at the Department of Humanities, Mid Sweden University. Peter Stadius is Lecturer in Nordic Studies and Culture and Area Studies at the Department for World Cultures, Helsinki University, Finland.

• Contents: A communicative perspective on the formation of the North: contexts, channels and concepts, Jonas Harvard and Peter Stadius; Nordic media systems 1850-1950: myths, mixtures and metamorphoses, Lars Nord; Connecting the Nordic region: the electric telegraph and the European news market, Jonas Harvard; Media Scandinavianism: media events and the historical legacy of pan-Scandinavianism, Jonas Harvard and Magdalena Hillström; Nordic solidarity in print: the Nordens Frihet Association and its magazine, 1939-45, Tora Byström; Expressions of pan-Scandinavian sentiments in the magazine Fram among Scandinavian migrants in South Africa, 1914-1954, Erlend Eidsvik; ’One Valhalla for the free’: Scandinavia, Britain and Northern identity in the mid-19th century, Andrew G. Newby; Selling the Sami: Nordic stereotypes and participatory media in Georgian Britain, Linda Andersson Burnett; The Valkyrie in a bikini: the Nordic woman as progressive media icon in Spain, 1891-1975, Elena Lindholm Narváez; Unity exposed: the Scandinavian pavilions at the world exhibitions in 1967 and 1970, Nikolas Glover; Happy countries: appraisals of interwar Nordic societies, Peter Stadius; A Swedish Norden or a Nordic Sweden? Image politics in the West during the Cold War, Carl Marklund; Constructing a Nordic community in the Polish press - past and present, Kazimierz Musial and Maja Chacinska; Conclusion: mediating the Nordic brand - history recycled, Jonas Harvard and Peter Stadius; Index.