Faculty of Journalism held traditional ‘Journalism in 2019: Creativity, Profession, Industry’ conference

24.02.2020

On February 6-8, 2020 Faculty of Journalism, Lomonosov Moscow State University held traditional ‘Journalism in 2019: Creativity, Profession, Industry’ conference. The conference has been organized at the Faculty of Journalism for 30 years and is currently one of the biggest and best-known academic conferences on media and journalism in Russia. In 2020, the conference addressed the issues of media convergence, media system transformations, the shift of journalists' functions and roles in the digital age, as well as local and ethnic media developments trends, gender studies, media psychology and many other topics. Conference partners included National Association of Russian Mass Media Researchers, Russian Union of Journalists, School of Journalism and Mass Communications at St. Petersburg State University and Federal Educational and Methodological Association. For the first time the event was co-sponsored by one of the leading organizations in the field of media studies International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR).

The first day of the conference traditionally started with a meeting of the Russian Council for Journalism Education. It was attended by more than 100 representatives of Russian universities. The new standards of journalism education and teaching administrating were discussed.

The second day of the conference was opened with a plenary session, where the Head of the Union of Journalists of Russia Vladimir Soloviev, General Director of the Publishing House ‘Argumenty I Fakty’ Ruslan Novikov, Associate Professor of the Faculty of Journalism, MSU Dr. Maria Anikina discussed the most topical issues of current media landscape. The meeting was moderated by the Head of the Organizing and Program committees, Corresponding member of Russian Academy of Education, Dean of the Faculty of Journalism Professor Elena Vartanova.

The plenary session on the final day was conducted to scholar research of journalism and was moderated by Professor Galina Shepilova. Professor Elena Vartanova started the session with the presentation about media theory transformation, summarizing a broad research co-authored by Dr. Maria Anikina, Dr. Andrey Vyrkovsky, Dr. Anna Gureeva, Dr. Denis Dunas, Dr. Mikhail Makeemko, and Dr. Sergey Smirnov. Dr. Olga Smirnova presented her study of social and professional aspects of journalism, and Dr. Maxim Babyk described his research of media economics during NEP.

Conference program included two plenary sessions, 24 sessions and 19 round table meetings. The event was attended by 420 people from Russia and foreign countries (Belorussia, Ukraine, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Estonia, Finland, Italy, Germany, China and other countries) who presented their papers and took part in discussions. Among conference participants were media scholars, media managers, journalists, undergraduate and graduate students from different cities of Russia and abroad.

Dean of the Faculty of Journalism, Professor Elena Vartanova mentioned that the conference is organized jointly with IAMCR in her greeting speech at the opening ceremony. IAMCR Ambassador in Russia Anna Gladkova answered questions about IAMCR and its activities and encouraged scholars join association as individual or institutional members.