Curriculum

Nils Arne Sørensen, studied at the University of Aarhus, Denmark and at the European University Institute, Florence, Italy. He holds a MA (1982) and a Ph.D. (1987) in history, both from the University of Aarhus. He has been at the University of Southern Denmark since 1992, since 2012 as full professor  in Modern and Contemporary European History. He has taught  at the Departments of History and English as well as in the School of Journalism. In 2003, he was awarded the university’s prize for teaching excellence. 

He was Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence at Millikin University, Decatur, Illinois in 1991; Visiting Fellow at the European University Institute in Florence in 1998-1999, and has been teaching at the University of Nice, France, and University College Dublin, Ireland as part of the European Union’s Teaching Exchange Programmes. He was a member of the directing committee of the interdisciplinary network “Krigserfaringer” (War Experiences), sponsored by the Danish Research Council for the Humanities for the period 2004-2007, and director (until the summer of 2007) of a research project on contemporary German history, also sponsored by the Research Council. He directed the research project Ameri-Danes on Americanization processes in Denmark 1945-1975, sponsored by the Danish Research Council for Culture and Communication, 2008-2011.

His research interests have included Italian Fascism, European Integration, History Culture and the uses of the past, The First World War, and the Social and Cultural History of the Cold War, transnational history with a special interest in Americanization processes in Denmark, The politization of the cityscape of Rome since Augustus and temporal history.

Among recent publications are

Books

Amerikanisering (Americanization, 100 pp., 2022)

Rom - Evighedernes By (Rome: City of Eternities, authored with Louise Kallestrup and Jesper Majbom Madsen, 351 pp, 2019),

Postordrecowboys og andre fortællinger om danskernes møde med Amerika (Postordrecowboys and other stories about the Danes' encounters with America,  272 pp., 2017, editor),

Den store Krig: Europæernes første verdenskrig (The Great War: The First World War of the Europeans, 3rd ed-. 527 pp., 2014, 2nd. ed. translated into Norwegian 2010)

Transnationale Historier (Transnational Histories, 278 pp., co-editor, 2004)

Articles:

“Narrating the Second World War in Denmark since 1945” (in Contemporary European History, 14, 2005)

“Ameri-Danes and Pro-American Anti-Americans: Cultural Americanization and Anti-Americanism in Denmark after 1945” (authored with Klaus Petersen and published in Alexander Stephan: The Americanization of Europe, New York: Berghahn Books 2006)

“Zwischen regionaler und nationaler Erinnerung. Erste Weltkrieg und Erinnerungskultur im Trentino der Zwischenkriegszeit”, in H.J.W. Kuprian & O. Überegger (eds.), Der Erste Weltkrieg im Alpenraum (Innsbruck: Universitätsverlag Wagner 2006)

"Crossing the Line between Fact and Fiction: A Historian's Perspective", in Johansen & Søndergaard (eds.), Fact, Fiction and Faction (University Press of Southern Denmark, 2010),

Corporate Capitalism or Coca-Colonization?: Economic Interests, Culturel Concerns, Tax Policies and Coca-Cola in Denmark from 1945 to the Early 1960s, i Contemporary European History, 21:4, 2012, 597-617 (authored with Klaus Petersen) 

Denmark, i 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War, ed. by Ute Daniel, Peter Gatrell, Oliver Janz, Heather Jones, Jennifer Keene, Alan Kramer,and Bill Nasson, issued by Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin 2014-10-08. DOI:

i10.15463/ie1418.10276 Last modified: 2014-10-05. 

From Military State to Welfare State: The Warfare-Welfare Nexus in Denmark, 1848-1950s, in Herbert Obinger, Klaus Petersen & Peter Starke (eds), Warfare & Welfare. Military Conflict and Welfare State Development in Western Countries, Oxford University Press 2018, 290-319 (authored with Klaus Petersen).

Research Interests

Currently, my main research area is World War I and the Inter-War period with a special focus on political-cultrual history, both from a European and a Danish perspecitve. I am also still doing research on Americanization processes in Denmark in the post-1945 period in a comparative perspective. I directed the research project Amerikansk på Dansk/AmeriDanes, sponsored by the Danish Research Council in Culture and Communication. Within the greater project, my own research focused on topics such as Coca-Colonization, Official and Private Exchange Programmes and Initiatives, and Perceptions of the United States in Denmark. 

I also work in the fields of public history and material culture, temporal history, and is currently developing a book project on Italy's difficult unification processes since Napoleon.

My main recent publications are:

Amerikanisering, Aarhus Universitetsforlag 2022.

Rom - evighedernes by, Gads Forlag 2019 (authored with Louise Kallestrup og Jesper Majbom Madsen)

From Military State to Welfare State: The Warfare-Welfare Nexus in Denmark, 1848-1950s, in Herbert Obinger, Klaus Petersen & Peter Starke (eds), Warfare & Welfare. Military Conflict and Welfare State Development in Western Countries, Oxford University Press 2018, 290-319 (authored with Klaus Petersen). 

Postordrecowboys og andre fortællinger om danskernes møde med Amerika, Syddansk Universitetsforlag 2017 (editor)

Langt fra Vestfronten: Første verdenskrig i middelhavsområdet, Forlaget Orbis 2015 (co-editor)

Den store Krig: Europæernes første verdenskrig, 3rd rev. edition, Gads forlag 2014

Denmark, i 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War, ed. by Ute Daniel, Peter Gatrell, Oliver Janz, Heather Jones, Jennifer Keene, Alan Kramer,and Bill Nasson, issued by Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin 2014-10-08. DOI:

i10.15463/ie1418.10276 Last modified: 2014-10-05.

Corporate Capitalism or Coca-Colonisation? Economic Interests, Cultural Concerns, Tax Policies and Coca-Cola in Denmark from 1945 to the Early 1960s.(sammen med Klaus Petersen) i  Contemporary European History, 21, 2012.