World of Media-2013
World of Media-2013. Journal of Russian Media and Journalism Studies
Current issue includes 14 publications written by media scholars from 6 different Russian cities and one foreign university.
The issue was published in 2014 by the Faculty of Journalism, Lomonosov Moscow State University.
Assistance in editing English language texts was rendered by Professor Julie de Sherbinin, Colby College (USA), and Colby students who interned at the Faculty of Journalism, MSU, through support from the Goldfarb Center for Public Affairs and Civic Engagement, Quinn Louis Ziegler and Benjamin Carlin
Part 1. Mass Communication Research: Russian Approaches
Strovsky, D. (2014). Media Globalization and Its Influence on National Communities: Evaluating M. Mcluhan’s Concept Today. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 9-38.
It was Canadian sociologist Marshall McLuhan who seems to have been first in introducing the frameworks of the theory of media globalization. However, since then (the early 1960s) there have been many discussions about the effects of this process, which continue to this day due to numerous contractions that arise in the course of modern information transformation. Following the agenda of the international conference “Media Readings 2013” held at the MGU’s Faculty of Journalism, the author tends to carefully discover the pros and cons of different approaches to the theory of media globalization and its consequences for modern national societies. The analysis is based on numerous scientific investigations concerning the current situation. Diverse scholarly approaches confirm that technological breakthroughs currently taking place, which seem to be productive for fruitful national developments, are likely to increase confrontations between countries because of the great imbalances that have already appeared in these relationships. Therefore, the McLuhan’s concept still provokes discursiveness and can be applicable to different trends in the humanities.
Key words: communication process; media audience; postindustrial society; information market; technologically advanced countries.
Received: 15.04.14
Accepted: 19.05.14
Goldenzwaig, G. (2014). Music Consumption Practices in the Age of the Cloud: Listening to Russia. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 39-59.
The article presents early insights from an ongoing study of the respective musical cultures of young audiences in Stockholm and Moscow. The 3-year research project ”Music in the Digital Age” is conducted by a research group at Södertörn University, Sweden and financed by The Bank of Sweden Tercentenary Foundation. The crosscultural study focuses on the impact of the Internet on music in everyday life. This article presents the first results from the Russian segment of the study: we look into how the growing Internet access affects the patterns of music-related practices in Russia.
Key words: music; the Internet; social media; media consumption; materiality; media economy
Received: 04.03.14
Accepted: 12.04.14
Kazakov, A. (2014). Setting the Agenda: A View of Western Communication Scholars. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 60-74.
The term, “agenda”, quite common in modern political communication studies, was coined in the United States. Nowadays, different aspects of agenda setting attract the attention of scholars from all over the world, including Russia. Paying tribute to those Russian researchers who contributed to the exploration of this phenomenon, we deem it necessary to place emphasis on the way agenda is analyzed in Western (mostly Anglo-Saxon) communication studies. Main trends and tendencies of agenda studies by European and American scholars are considered in this article. Similarities and differences between agenda setting and priming, on the one hand, and framing, on the other hand, are analyzed. Special attention is accorded to the patterns of different types of agenda-setting, i.e. political, media, and public, as well as to the correlation between “agenda setting” and “agenda building”. The media agendas effects on international relations, which are attracting attention abroad, are also addressed. Twenty-five of the most cited articles about various aspects of an agenda from the database Web of Science contributed to the empirical basis of this paper.
Key words: media agenda; agenda setting; agenda building; framing; priming; evaluative tone.
Received: 11.04.14
Accepted: 27.05.14
Part 2. Russian Media: Analyzing Current Trends
Dzyaloshinsky, J. (2014). Russian Mass Media: Prospects for Transformation. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 77-105.
This article analyzes the communication matrices that determine the functioning of Russian mass media. It is shown that the prospects for Russian mass media transformation are determined by the contradictions of the Russian social system, and dependent on the chosen model of national development.
Key words: public institution; mass communication; communication matrix; matrix media; mass media.
Received: 30.04.14
Accepted: 16.06.14
Korkonosenko, S. (2014). Mediapolis as a New Reality and Complex Research Project. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 106-127.
The article represents modern media, cultural and social realities in the context of the Mediapolis. European theorists, Roger Silverstone in particular, proposed this effective concept. In essence, it reflects the formation of a new environment for the individual, society, and for their media life. The Mediapolis represents a specific analogue of the real city taken in its media hypostasis. In the article behavior is considered as everyday practices of the individual. Taken together, different aspects of media life comprise the content of the research project “The Modern Russian Media-polis”, the main directions of which are described in the essay.
Key words: media life; individual; society; Mediapolis; everyday practice; research project.
Received: 06.02.14
Accepted: 09.03.14
Frolova, T. (2014). Civil Applications in Russia’s Media Communication Structure. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 128-146.
The article dwells on the present role of Internet communications in the development of Russia’s civil society and social infrastructure.In particular, it looks into the use of civil applications, which have been increasingly popular in recent years. The author touches upon the factors preconditioning the active employment of civil applications, and points out the criteria for their systematization. Furthermore, the author provides an overview of the new types of media communications, and contemplates the prospects and potential problems connected with their development and use in the field of professional journalism.
Key words: civil society; Russian media transformation; network communications; NGOs’ media background; civil applications in the Internet; humanitarian media agenda.
Received: 20.07.14
Accepted: 21.08.14
Kokkonen, E. Forms of Conflict Discourse as a Reflection of Conflict Dynamics: Peculiarities of Regional Media. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 147-159.
From the perspective of discoursive psychology, discourse is “the primary arena for human action, understanding and intersubjectivity” (Potter,2012: 114). Conflict discourse as it appears in media texts refers to the descriptions of situations and psychological states that play an important role in the formation of particular actions, and the tactics disputants use to criticize other parties’ moves and position themselves for accountability. The Novgorodian media (newspapers and e-papers) are enclosed within the information field of the region and reflect changing situations within its frame through different forms of conflict discourse. It presupposes that descriptions of the situation change as the situation alters under the influence of participants involved in confrontation. Thus the media bring into focus and fix parties’ positions, their motives, their conflict interaction as it develops, and their conflict resolution (termination) if it happens; they influence to some extent the trajectory of a developing situation.
Key words: conflict discourse; conflict dynamics; regional media; forms of conflict discourse; language peculiarities of the conflict discourse forms.
Received: 12.05.14
Accepted: 15.07.14
Pilgun, M. (2014). Communicative Behavior Types of New Media Users. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 160-180.
This article analyzes the most common user communicative behavior models in the Russian-speaking new media. The method of coordinated management of meaning (CMM, by B. Pearce and V. Cronen) serves as the methodological basis for this research. As part of the research plan, a 500 respondent survey was conducted. The survey results highlight the most actively used blogging services and makes it possible to analyze 135 blogs (27 of each type) and to identify five Russian blogosphere communication models. The study finds that the dominant communicative strategy of current web space is dialogical.
Key words: new media; blogosphere; communicative behavior.
Received: 18.03.14
Accepted: 20.05.14
Zhilavskaya, I. (2014). Media Informational Literacy: A New Concept. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 181-192.
This article illuminates questions of interconnection between the basic concepts in the theory of media informational literacy, the elimination of logical contradictions, and the creation of a modern conception of media informational literacy and media education.
Key words: media; information literacy; media education; noospheric media education; informal education; media informational literacy; MI-literacy; media informational potential of the individual; media informational outlook.
Received: 13.04.14
Accepted: 21.05.14
Khroul, V. (2014). Media and Religion Studies: Challenges of New Millenium. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 193-206.
This paper examines existing paradigms and approaches in media and religious studies while analyzing new trends in this field of research both in Russia and abroad. The author suggests that searching for a common approach and framework – as universal as possible – is an important challenge for the international community of scholars in the new millennium.
Key words: media; religion; research paradigms; trends.
Received: 11.06.14
Accepted: 08.08.14
Part 3. Journalism Studies in Russia and Abroad
Vartanova, E., Lukina, M. (2014). New Competences for Future Journalists: Russian Journalism Education Executives Evaluate Industrial Demand. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 209-232.
The article provides results and analysis of the survey of how journalism educators as main stakeholders in Russian journalism education evaluate the current situation in the area of high professional education. The survey also focuses on what decisions on curriculum priorities they make, what revisions in education programs they plan according to new requirements of the Russian media industry, and what competences are being envisaged for the future media practitioners. The article presents results of the national survey of Russian JE (Journalism Education) executives – deans, directors and heads of different schools /chairs/institutions which provide journalism training in a wide range of educational structures from universities to academic chairs. Geography of the study covers journalism education all over the country – from the enclave Kaliningrad in the Western part of Russian to the Siberia and the Far East region. The study showed that while journalism basic courses are still at the core of the education programs, digital professional competences and tech savvy skills, due to their innovative nature and attractiveness to employers, predominate in modern journalism training. We also revealed that there exists a common understanding of the need for further developments of JE towards cross-platform and networking programs.
Key words: journalism education; bachelor’s degree; journalism competences; multimedia; convergence.
Received: 31.05.14
Accepted: 29.06.14
Anikina, M. (2014). Journalism as a Profession in the First Decades of the 21st Century: the Russian Context. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 233-251.
The new century poses a wide range of research questions and defines new approaches for research, which deal with the specifics of journalism as a field of professional activity, with the characteristics of the professional journalistic community and with the peculiar features of its representatives. The rapid development of the diverse spheres of everyday life leads to a larger scope for research, a formation of new thematic streams and a redefinition of the methodological approaches in studies of professional journalistic culture. This article analyzes journalism as a profession in contemporary Russia. Such an approach will try to fit within the existing sociologic frames. This article is focused on the skills and competencies of modern Russian journalists, their freedom and professional autonomy, and covers the issues of responsibility and ethics of service. The empirical basis of the presented article is constructed with data from an international research project titled “Journalism in change – professional journalistic cultures in Russia, Poland and Sweden” initiated by Södertörn University (Sweden), granted by the Baltic Foundation in Sweden and realized by scholars from Lomonosov Moscow State University (Russia), Södertörn University (Sweden) and Wroclaw University (Poland) in 2011-2014.
Key words: journalism as a profession; Russian journalists; professional skills; professional autonomy; responsibility; norms of conduct.
Received: 23.07.14
Accepted: 05.09.14
Mansurova, V. (2014). Intellectual Journalism vs Copy-Paste Journalism. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 252-264.
“Journalism of facts” gives its place to journalism of ideas. The excess of information in global communication systems leads to the necessity for “protocols of access to meanings” of informational messages. Intellectual journalism is the answer to this demand since it has the necessary potential to create a socially important world view and to accept digital technology challenges associated with the production and broadcasting of information in a social medium. “Personological turn” in the field of mass communication is the revival of journalism in a new social status to represent the basic life values of society.
Key words: crisis of journalism; informational rationality; media person (homo mediatus); intersubjective communication; ethical standard; is-ought problem (“Hume’s Principle”).
Received: 10.06.14
Accepted: 16.07.14
Kulchitskaya, D. (2014). Multimedia Text in Journalism: An Analysis of Russian and American Mass Media. World of Media. Yearbook of Russian Media and Journalism Studies, 265-275.
This article presents the results of a complex analysis of the multimedia content of U.S. and Russian media outlets. The research aims to distinguish specific features of multimedia stories as a new type of media text. The results of the research point to the fact that multimedia, as a special technique for presenting information, can be used in various genres. The author challenges the myth that multimedia cannot be used in the creation of analytical journalistic materials.
Key words: multimedia journalism; multimedia text; polyphony of reality; multimodality of perception.
Received: 26.02.14
Accepted: 20.04.14