Rather than offering a coherent thesis, the previous chapters provided pointers to future scholarship of Arab media. I would like to summarize these pointers in these concluding remarks, but let me first summarize the main themes and arguments of the previous chapters.

First, as I argued in Chapter 1, media as well as education have served as the main building blocks in the modernization projects in several Arab States. While education was meant to spread a new sense of progressive identity, media was supposed to spread a sense of local as well as pan-Arab belonging. However, those modernization plans have not reached their goals, simply because they were based on essentialist views that saw indigenous cultural identity as a fixed entity that would not be altered by mixing with other cultures. More importantly, those plans discounted the ability of the laity, as well as intellectuals, to constantly reflect on their actions and continuously work towards improving their position in the social hierarchy. Media here play a decisive role in that they serve as a bridge among cultures as well as social classes.