February 4-6 ‘Journalism in 2020: Creativity, Profession, Industry’ conference
International scientific-practical conference on current challenges and contemporary problems of journalism has been organized by the Faculty of Journalism for more than 30 years. This year, owing to the pandemic situation, this landmark event has undergone changes. The Covid-19 crisis affected both the format of the conference, which was held online on Zoom, and the thematic scope, since a substantial part of the issues addressed by the speakers was linked to the pandemic challenges.
The first day of the conference traditionally started with a meeting of the Russian Council for Journalism Education. The meeting, which went under the theme “Journalism education during the pandemic: Experience of Russian institutions”, was hosted 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. Her opening speech was followed by the statements by the representatives of the Ministry of Science and Education and the welcoming speech by MSU vice-rector. The issues raised on the meeting reflected the general topic of the conference: the speakers discussed the pandemic challenges in connection with journalism education, outlined the lessons learned and talked about the best practices of the past, as well as relevant issues of the following year.
The second day of the conference started with a plenary session, which was moderated by Elena Vartanova and attended by a number of renowned media experts, such as Alexander Khinshtein, Chairman of the Committee of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly on Information Policy, Information Technologies and Communications; Vladimir Soloviev, Head of the Union of Journalists of Russia; A. L. Nikolov, RT General Director; I. V. Pototsky, Chairman of the Committee on Entrepreneurship in media communications of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Next came a whole range of sessions and round table meetings, where a variety of topics was broached. Top rate experts were given the floor to speak about the issues and development trends of Russian journalism and share their experience on online media education. Sessions were themed as follows: “Journalism education during the pandemic: Experience of Russian institutions”, “Journalism and media systems of the Eurasian Economic Unioncountries in the face of digitalization”, “Strategies of content production in Russian media”, “Journalism during the pandemic”, “Current reality representation on television: topics, issues, forms”, “Current development trends of photojournalism and photo editing”, “Potential of modern media speech”, “Advertising and PR given the lack of communication”, “Foreign media in a changing world: challenges, trends, development strategies”, “Radio journalism in 2020: trends, issues, opportunities”, “Media stylistics: theoretical and applied aspects”, round table meetings included “Media educational practices considering the digitalization of society” (jointly with Russian Academy of Education), “Artificial intelligence and modern media practices”, “12th Grushin readings on Mokhovaya st.”.
The final day was marked by another plenary session, attended by faculty members and dedicated to various relevant issues of Russian journalism such as regional media, professional neologisms, media consumption among youngsters etc. Echoing the schedule of the second day, a variety of sessions and round table meetings were to follow. These included sessions “Role of media in the resolution of social conflict”, “Sociology of mass communication”, “Legal risks for journalists and bloggers: acute issues”, “Media psychology and risks of information society”, “30 years of German unity and European safety in media coverage”, “Editor as a career path: trends and potential”, “Literary criticism and pop culture”, “Digital divide as a pressing issue of modern Russian communication environment”; and round table meetings “Social journalism”, “Public inquiries and media agenda’, “Regional media agenda and audience preferences”, “Media for children and youngsters: relevant issues”.
Conference partners traditionally 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.