Introduction
Everyone is interested in what had happened when he or she was born. What was going on in the country, what were the people doing, how were they living. The information can be acquired in different ways: asking parents or grandparents about that day or reading books about that time or searching in libraries for information.
The easiest way to find particulars is to look at a newspaper which deals with the events, happenings, stories that happened on your day of birth. To find the information, next day’s newspaper is need because the paper comes out from the press in the evening or morning, with yesterday’s news. For example, the newspaper which you buy on April 28 is about the news that happened on April 27.
In order to find what happened on my birthday I had look in next day’s newspaper. The newspaper I used was NÉPSZABADSÁG, volume XXXII, issue 98.
This newspaper (NÉPSZABADSÁG) was the central newspaper of the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party. This newspaper was the government’s paper, so if the government wanted to acquaint the people of Hungary with information, they published it in NÉPSZABADSÁG.
The articles of the newspaper were censored in advance, in order to avoid unnecessary information or not wanted articles.
My aim with this research paper is to find out what happened on the 27th of April 1979. I wish to find out not only what happened. I also would like to know what was going on in Hungary back than. Was the 27th of April an important day? What happened on the 27th of April in Hungary?
Method
I used two methods in this paper. The first was a very simple one. It may sound simple but indeed it is a complex research which has several different parts. These parts are the following, in order of importance:
- reading and understanding the articles of the newspaper. The emphasis is on understanding because the articles were written eighteen years ago. The language differs a little bit from today’s language.
- making short notes from the articles
-drawing a conclusion or conclusions from the text by using the articles and notes together.
All of these units are very simple ones. But only if they are dealt with separately. The difficult part is putting them together into one text. I used the simple, well known way of understanding a text: I made notes while I was reading an article. I chose fifteen articles on which I based my results and discussion. The articles dealt with internal affairs, sport and common affairs of Hungary. I chose only Hungarian-related articles because I only wanted to know what happened in Hungary. The other countries had no importance to me. This is why I excluded the other countries.
I enclose only two examples in this paper. The first one shows one note from the fifteen notes I made while I was reading the newspaper. From these notes and the articles I came to my summation. The second example lists words which are related to the second method I used.
The first method was reading, understanding and taking notes from the texts. With the help of this I produced my conclusion.
The second method was to look at the words in connection with communism. This method was needed because from this I could picture the language usage of communism. These words also helped me to understand what was the year 1979 like in Hungary.
The examples are written in English and Hungarian because the real meanings of the words can be understood only in Hungarian. Some words might not be correct translations because I was not sure about some abbreviations.
Example 1
Diáknapok ------- - Április 28 - Május 2
7000 diák
Kisz KB és Állami Ifjusági Bizottság által meghirdetett
szakmai és politikai tanácskozások
sport és humor
tükrözi a pedagógusok és a KISZ szervezetek munkáját
kultúrában és politikában
Student days ------- - from April 28 to May 2
7000 students
sport and humour
professional and political conferences
shows the cultural and political work of teachers and KISZ organisations
Results and discussion
After reading the fifteen articles I found that Hungary was a real communist country. The words that were used show this. Example two shows the most frequently used communist words.
The titles of the articles also show that Hungary was a communist country.
I also found that nothing important happened on the 27th of April in 1979. I should know it by the age of eighteen. But nothing significant happened.
To be reassured about the fact that the 27th of April was an ordinary day I should not have read the daily journal. Hungary was living its life. Life was going on without any unusual events.
The governing force was still the communist party, known as the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party. The country’s foreign affairs were going well.
The first thing that caught my attention was on page three:
” Éljen és virágozzék szeretett hazánk, a Magyar Népköztársaság!”(3)
This sentence clearly states that Hungary was a communist country. It also shows the way of thinking: Hungary will live with communism for ever.
As I was reading an article on page three, namely ” Felelõséggel a környékért”, I could not believe what the author was writing. Here is the quotation from the text:
” A városoknak kulcsszerepük van a lakosság - beleértve a környezõ községeket- minden irányú ellátásában, foglalkoztatásában, letelepedésben”
(Palkó, 3).”
The author said that the cities were playing a big role in the life of the villages that surround the city. This is obvious. The city helps the smaller villages in almost everything. It seems that this was not so clear to those people who governed Hungary in 1979. This article shows that Hungary was not so developed in 1979. The whole section deals with this topic: the cities should take care of the problems of the smaller villages.
Example 2
There are two articles which characterise the 27th of April 1979. One of them states that this day was a boring, usual day and the other states what was before the 27th of April 1979 and what was after it.
For the boring one the title is enough because it says everything:
”Borbély Sándor a Pamutfonóiparnál”(3)
This title summarises the whole day of April 27 in one sentence: nothing happened. With such simplicity that no more information should or even could be added.
The second article has the title ”Baranyai szõttesek” and its first paragraph is the important one:
”Szövetkezetünk életének története egy kicsit tükre az ország gazdasági fejlõdésének... Voltak nehézségeink, kezdetben szegények voltunk ... ma már elmondhatjuk: egy erõs szövetkezet tagjai vagyunk” (Szente, 8 ).
This in English looks like this: Our co-operative’s history is somewhat like our country’s development in economics. We had difficulties, we were poor in the beginning. But now we are part of a strong co-operative. So before the 27th of April 1979, the country was in bad shape, but after it everything turned out fine. I am not saying that the changes occurred because of me , but they did happened on the 27th of April. This is an example to show that on my day of birth good things happened too. these two quotations show that my birthday was contradictory. On one hand it was a boring day but on the other hand it was memorable.
One thing was sure to me. The day I was born was a communist day. This can be seen on the first page of the newspaper:
”Világ proletárjai, egyesüljetek!”(1)
This is the well known call of the communists. In English it looks like this: Proletarians of the World unite! Every communist newspaper had this on the first page.
Conclusion
So what was the 27th of April like? What happened in Hungary? Two easy questions. The 27th of April 1979 was an ordinary, normal day. Nothing important happened in Hungary. Only one important thing happened: I was born. I found out that almost the same life was going on in 1979 as it is going on right now. The newspapers were the same: they contain so little information and so much scrap, that nothing can be taken out as information. The only difference is that those papers were blue-pencilled by the communist and now nobody does that. With this paper I got the information, what I wanted to know.
Showing posts with label day student was born. Show all posts
Showing posts with label day student was born. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
W 126 M
Introduction
Most of the people is curious what happened on the first day of their life - above that they were born. Did happen something very significant on that day?
In my paper I would like to present the day when I began to live by the articles of a newspaper. Probably the reader would ask why I had chosen this topic, as my tutor, Mr. József Horváth, gave me several topics to choose from. The answer is simple: I knew little details about that day and it was a very determining one for me, so I wanted to learn more about it.
Let’s start searching, what happened on the 23rd November in 1978.
Method
To examine and to value the day I was born (November 23, 1978) I used the best known local newspaper called Dunántúli Napló - the predecessor of Új Dunántúli Napló. This issue was the 323rd copy of the XXXVth volume, and Ervin Mitzki was its chief editor.
The choice: first I used Dunántúli Napló because it gives information about the events of the world. Plus, it gives detailed information about the events of Pécs and its environs.
In the selected issue of that newspaper most of the articles were written about the previous day, so these were not the happenings and events of the day I was born. But, I’ve chosen the 23rd of November 1978 issue, because I found more personal the issue with my birthday date on its front-page than the one with the date after my birth. On the other hand, I found several articles about the 23rd of November.
I read through all the articles of the newspaper except the classified advertisements, and I made notes to easily process their contents.
Results and Discussion
I start with the weather forecast. The 23rd of November in 1978 was a rather cold Thursday, the temperature was 3 degrees centigrade below zero in the night and 2 or 3 degrees centigrade during the day; the sky was cloudy, and there was fog ("Idõjárás" 4).
The main events of that day and the previous one - based on the articles of Dunántúli Napló - were the following: the Political Conferring Corporation of Warsaw Pact countries was to began their session in Moscow. Hungary was to be represented by János Kádár, the party secretary ("Megkezdõdött a Varsói" 1).
Pál Losonczi, the chairman of the Presidential Council, made an official visit to the Csepel Iron and Metal Works ("Losonczi Pál látogatása" 1).
The autumnal planting of trees was to begin that day, but problems cropped up as the chairman of the warden's office made a statement to the journalist of Dunántúli Napló ("Õszi fásítás" 1).
The Hungarian - Czechoslovakian region development conference began on the 22nd of November ("Magyar - Csehszlovák" 2).
Fire prevention of Komló was suitable as the captain of the fire station told the journalist of Dunántúli Napló ("Megfelelõ a tûzvédelem" 2).
The national children's book week was announced. It was to be held from the 4th of December until the 8th of December ("Országos gyermekkönyvhét" 2).
The Mayor of Pécs and Eszék signed a cooperation agreement between the two cities for 10 years (Gejer 2).
"The snow can come!" - the snowploughs were on the alert ("Jöhet a hó!" 2).
Parliament of youth at the building industry - some of the workers made pledges to perform the home building programme (Török 3).
The chairman of the socialist brigades appealed to their members for coordinated work against alcoholism (Kurucz 3).
The 4th page contains the weather forecast, some public phone numbers, the surgery hours of hospitals and opening hours of pharmacies, date of weddings and exhibitions.
The 5th page contains the events of 24 hours ranked by cities ("24 óra" 5):
- Helsinki: conference about establishing a North-European nuclear-free zone leaded by Urho Kaleva Kekkonen;
- Moscow: Andrej Gromiko (member of the Soviet Political Committee) received Malcolm Toon (ambassador of the United States in Moscow);
- Washington: the dragging on of SALT-negotiations, new armament plans;
- Conakry: the name of the Guinean Republic was changed to Guinean Revolutionary People's Republic;
- Tuva: a Scythian golden statuette - presumably from the middle of the Ith millennium before Christ - was found by archaeologists in the South Siberian region, near Tuva;
- San José: the Sandinist National Liberation Movement launched an offensive against the Somoza regime;
- Lisboa: the new Prime Minister of Portugal took the oath;
- Havana: the 35th session of Council for Mutual Economic Aid began. The main subject was the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes;
- Beograd: Ziaur Rahman, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, arrived to the capital to confer with Joszip Broz Tito, the president of the Yugoslavian Republic;
- Oslo: Jimmy Carter, the president of the United States, announced that he would not be able to participate on the Nobel Peace Prize award;
- Bonn: on Tuesday two Dutch fighter aircraft, belonging to the unit of NATO, crashed during the touch down near an English base in West Germany. One of the two aircraftmen died in the accident;
- Berlin: new one and two mark coins were to be put into circulation;
- Teheran: heated debate milled about the program of general Gholam Reza Azhari's military cabinet.
The Central Committee of Communist Alliance of Youth (KISZ) held a meeting on Wednesday ("Ülést tartott" 5).
Yugoslavian national assembly was to arrive in Nógrád county to visit the county town, Salgótarján and some surrounding villages ("Jugoszláv nemzetgyûlési" 5).
The leadership of the Common Market and of the Council for Mutual Economic Aid held a meeting in Brussels ("KGST - Közös" 5).
The 6th page of Dunántúli Napló was the economical supplement ("Közgazdasági élet" 6), where two articles were about inflation. The first one dealt with the cause of inflation, as it was a new phenomenon at that time. The author of the article tried to describe in an easily intelligible way to the readers why they would have to pay more for the goods. The article said this is not a unique symptom of the Hungarian economy; other countries were also suffering from inflation (Petsching 6).
The second article in this field was about the national price conference held at Pécs ("Országos árkonferencia" 6).
The 7th page of the newspaper was for the classified ads ("Hirdetés" 7).
The last page of Dunántúli Napló is always reserved for sports events. It was the case in that issue, too ("Dunántúli Napló Sport" 8). I list here some of the events but I am not intended to be exhaustive, because some of the short news were programmes for the upcoming weekend.
In the UEFA Cup the Budapest Honvéd team beat the Ajax team. The Hungarian eleven scored 4 goals and got only one (the score of the game at the end of the first half: 0:0) ("UEFA Kupa" 8).
The PMSC team of Pécs played against the team of Szekszárd and won. The score at the end was 3:1 (2:0) ("Labdarúgó NB-s" 8).
In the UEFA qualifying matches the Hungarian team beat the Rumanian team. The visiting side got 3 goals (1:0) ("UEFA selejtezõ" 8).
The Salgótarjáni TC beat the Russian Olympic Representative Team with one goal (1:0) ("Rosszul lõttek" 8).
I compared the events of that day described in Dunántúli Napló with other days' events that I've read and lived in the course of my life and I found among the articles only one, which caught my attention: this was the sports news article on the last page about the success of Bp. Honvéd. The Hungarian team beat the nowadays so successful team, Ajax Amsterdam. Now, people would not believe that a Hungarian team won a game against a world-class football team. Those were the days of the Hungarian national soccer.
The other articles showed me that the day of my birth was quite an ordinary one. No one particularly significant event happened, which could have been published in any history coursebook or anybody would remember it for its great importance.
But, perhaps this is not the verity. Something could have happened which was not written in this newspaper. When this issue was released, it were the late seventies; it was the term of soft socialism in Hungary, when the press had been under the control of the government. Every article was submitted to the censor before being prepared for the press. If the leadership found something not worthy to know for the people, they simply cut it out and that time it was not released. Most of these events, which were tried to be cleared from people’s memory or not even let them become known by the people, were in connection with the dirty affairs of the Soviet government. The leadership could not allow itself that some facts leak out, because this could have undermined their well-established regime and their position.
For instance lots of nuclear weapon tests were kept in secret, because their harm to the human beings (Vajda). Those who suffered serious injuries by these experiments or only witnessed them were isolated from the other members of the society. Those who did dare speak their mind were liquidated or thrown into jail. The inhabitants had been terrorized for so many years that they became passive and they taught their children to behave the same way. These conditions were present in the countries of the Eastern block, directed by the Soviet Union, and in dictatorial regimes.
Conclusion
No matter which theory is the truth, my task was to analyze the day when I was born by the articles of Dunántúli Napló, released on that day. This is why I had to say that the day of my birth was a customary Thursday, nothing specially significant event happened.
To seek after the truth can be the task of another paper, which requires much more research among the works released after the change of regime, and dealing with the events of this day. Then, the author of that paper could answer the open question of my work.
Most of the people is curious what happened on the first day of their life - above that they were born. Did happen something very significant on that day?
In my paper I would like to present the day when I began to live by the articles of a newspaper. Probably the reader would ask why I had chosen this topic, as my tutor, Mr. József Horváth, gave me several topics to choose from. The answer is simple: I knew little details about that day and it was a very determining one for me, so I wanted to learn more about it.
Let’s start searching, what happened on the 23rd November in 1978.
Method
To examine and to value the day I was born (November 23, 1978) I used the best known local newspaper called Dunántúli Napló - the predecessor of Új Dunántúli Napló. This issue was the 323rd copy of the XXXVth volume, and Ervin Mitzki was its chief editor.
The choice: first I used Dunántúli Napló because it gives information about the events of the world. Plus, it gives detailed information about the events of Pécs and its environs.
In the selected issue of that newspaper most of the articles were written about the previous day, so these were not the happenings and events of the day I was born. But, I’ve chosen the 23rd of November 1978 issue, because I found more personal the issue with my birthday date on its front-page than the one with the date after my birth. On the other hand, I found several articles about the 23rd of November.
I read through all the articles of the newspaper except the classified advertisements, and I made notes to easily process their contents.
Results and Discussion
I start with the weather forecast. The 23rd of November in 1978 was a rather cold Thursday, the temperature was 3 degrees centigrade below zero in the night and 2 or 3 degrees centigrade during the day; the sky was cloudy, and there was fog ("Idõjárás" 4).
The main events of that day and the previous one - based on the articles of Dunántúli Napló - were the following: the Political Conferring Corporation of Warsaw Pact countries was to began their session in Moscow. Hungary was to be represented by János Kádár, the party secretary ("Megkezdõdött a Varsói" 1).
Pál Losonczi, the chairman of the Presidential Council, made an official visit to the Csepel Iron and Metal Works ("Losonczi Pál látogatása" 1).
The autumnal planting of trees was to begin that day, but problems cropped up as the chairman of the warden's office made a statement to the journalist of Dunántúli Napló ("Õszi fásítás" 1).
The Hungarian - Czechoslovakian region development conference began on the 22nd of November ("Magyar - Csehszlovák" 2).
Fire prevention of Komló was suitable as the captain of the fire station told the journalist of Dunántúli Napló ("Megfelelõ a tûzvédelem" 2).
The national children's book week was announced. It was to be held from the 4th of December until the 8th of December ("Országos gyermekkönyvhét" 2).
The Mayor of Pécs and Eszék signed a cooperation agreement between the two cities for 10 years (Gejer 2).
"The snow can come!" - the snowploughs were on the alert ("Jöhet a hó!" 2).
Parliament of youth at the building industry - some of the workers made pledges to perform the home building programme (Török 3).
The chairman of the socialist brigades appealed to their members for coordinated work against alcoholism (Kurucz 3).
The 4th page contains the weather forecast, some public phone numbers, the surgery hours of hospitals and opening hours of pharmacies, date of weddings and exhibitions.
The 5th page contains the events of 24 hours ranked by cities ("24 óra" 5):
- Helsinki: conference about establishing a North-European nuclear-free zone leaded by Urho Kaleva Kekkonen;
- Moscow: Andrej Gromiko (member of the Soviet Political Committee) received Malcolm Toon (ambassador of the United States in Moscow);
- Washington: the dragging on of SALT-negotiations, new armament plans;
- Conakry: the name of the Guinean Republic was changed to Guinean Revolutionary People's Republic;
- Tuva: a Scythian golden statuette - presumably from the middle of the Ith millennium before Christ - was found by archaeologists in the South Siberian region, near Tuva;
- San José: the Sandinist National Liberation Movement launched an offensive against the Somoza regime;
- Lisboa: the new Prime Minister of Portugal took the oath;
- Havana: the 35th session of Council for Mutual Economic Aid began. The main subject was the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes;
- Beograd: Ziaur Rahman, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, arrived to the capital to confer with Joszip Broz Tito, the president of the Yugoslavian Republic;
- Oslo: Jimmy Carter, the president of the United States, announced that he would not be able to participate on the Nobel Peace Prize award;
- Bonn: on Tuesday two Dutch fighter aircraft, belonging to the unit of NATO, crashed during the touch down near an English base in West Germany. One of the two aircraftmen died in the accident;
- Berlin: new one and two mark coins were to be put into circulation;
- Teheran: heated debate milled about the program of general Gholam Reza Azhari's military cabinet.
The Central Committee of Communist Alliance of Youth (KISZ) held a meeting on Wednesday ("Ülést tartott" 5).
Yugoslavian national assembly was to arrive in Nógrád county to visit the county town, Salgótarján and some surrounding villages ("Jugoszláv nemzetgyûlési" 5).
The leadership of the Common Market and of the Council for Mutual Economic Aid held a meeting in Brussels ("KGST - Közös" 5).
The 6th page of Dunántúli Napló was the economical supplement ("Közgazdasági élet" 6), where two articles were about inflation. The first one dealt with the cause of inflation, as it was a new phenomenon at that time. The author of the article tried to describe in an easily intelligible way to the readers why they would have to pay more for the goods. The article said this is not a unique symptom of the Hungarian economy; other countries were also suffering from inflation (Petsching 6).
The second article in this field was about the national price conference held at Pécs ("Országos árkonferencia" 6).
The 7th page of the newspaper was for the classified ads ("Hirdetés" 7).
The last page of Dunántúli Napló is always reserved for sports events. It was the case in that issue, too ("Dunántúli Napló Sport" 8). I list here some of the events but I am not intended to be exhaustive, because some of the short news were programmes for the upcoming weekend.
In the UEFA Cup the Budapest Honvéd team beat the Ajax team. The Hungarian eleven scored 4 goals and got only one (the score of the game at the end of the first half: 0:0) ("UEFA Kupa" 8).
The PMSC team of Pécs played against the team of Szekszárd and won. The score at the end was 3:1 (2:0) ("Labdarúgó NB-s" 8).
In the UEFA qualifying matches the Hungarian team beat the Rumanian team. The visiting side got 3 goals (1:0) ("UEFA selejtezõ" 8).
The Salgótarjáni TC beat the Russian Olympic Representative Team with one goal (1:0) ("Rosszul lõttek" 8).
I compared the events of that day described in Dunántúli Napló with other days' events that I've read and lived in the course of my life and I found among the articles only one, which caught my attention: this was the sports news article on the last page about the success of Bp. Honvéd. The Hungarian team beat the nowadays so successful team, Ajax Amsterdam. Now, people would not believe that a Hungarian team won a game against a world-class football team. Those were the days of the Hungarian national soccer.
The other articles showed me that the day of my birth was quite an ordinary one. No one particularly significant event happened, which could have been published in any history coursebook or anybody would remember it for its great importance.
But, perhaps this is not the verity. Something could have happened which was not written in this newspaper. When this issue was released, it were the late seventies; it was the term of soft socialism in Hungary, when the press had been under the control of the government. Every article was submitted to the censor before being prepared for the press. If the leadership found something not worthy to know for the people, they simply cut it out and that time it was not released. Most of these events, which were tried to be cleared from people’s memory or not even let them become known by the people, were in connection with the dirty affairs of the Soviet government. The leadership could not allow itself that some facts leak out, because this could have undermined their well-established regime and their position.
For instance lots of nuclear weapon tests were kept in secret, because their harm to the human beings (Vajda). Those who suffered serious injuries by these experiments or only witnessed them were isolated from the other members of the society. Those who did dare speak their mind were liquidated or thrown into jail. The inhabitants had been terrorized for so many years that they became passive and they taught their children to behave the same way. These conditions were present in the countries of the Eastern block, directed by the Soviet Union, and in dictatorial regimes.
Conclusion
No matter which theory is the truth, my task was to analyze the day when I was born by the articles of Dunántúli Napló, released on that day. This is why I had to say that the day of my birth was a customary Thursday, nothing specially significant event happened.
To seek after the truth can be the task of another paper, which requires much more research among the works released after the change of regime, and dealing with the events of this day. Then, the author of that paper could answer the open question of my work.
W 120 M
Introduction
In this paper my aim is to compare two Hungarian daily newspaper issues--Népszabadság (People’s Liberty) and Esti Hírlap (Evening Herald)--from the mid-70’s with a view to how they presented foreign policy events that occurred on the day I was born, April 16, 1976. I am going to make a comparison between the style of the two papers and argue that Esti Hírlap, though considered to be a serious publication, in fact, was very much like what we might call a tabloid today.
Although, as Paul Underwood notes, “in the Hungarian context, the Western distinctions of elite, popular and yellow journals are meaningless”, as “all papers are serious publications, emphasising political, economic and cultural news” (1982, p. 462), still we can clearly differentiate between the two newspapers in what events they had chosen to report on and how much space they devoted to single news. Népszabadság was--and still is--the “largest and most important Hungarian paper”, which was at those times the “party’s principle organ, setting the tone for the rest of the press” (1982, p. 462). It boasted with a circulation of around 810,000 in 1976. The third most important daily was Esti Hírlap, with a circulation of about 251,000, the only evening paper of the country, sponsored by the capital’s Party Committee. Népszabadság ran 12 pages, while Esti Hírlap 8 pages. Both published six days a week, “printing on Sundays but skipping Mondays” (1982, p. 462). Both papers cost 80 fillérs at that time, which price was apparently kept artificially low.
The Method
The two papers were aimed at different audiences as it is clear both from taking a look at the headlines and at their content as well. My method was systematically comparing the headlines and the contents of the foreign affairs news stories in the two dailies presented on their front pages. I was interested in the extent to which these papers could be regarded as biased, so I have made an attempt to provide some background to the prejudices on behalf of the press, free or partially free. After having compared the contents of the front pages of the two papers I translated the articles in question then collated the styles of them taking into consideration such features as highlighting certain sentences and the wording of the events.
Results and Discussion
In spite of recent developments, as the government had chosen to soften the restrictions on the freedom of press, journalists chose events to publish, and published their articles with a certain bias, of course, in order to avoid hurting the interests of the socialist regime and its way of thinking. On the other hand, even in countries with the most possible freedom of press given, there exists a kind of bias in every piece of printed or broadcast media, thus the idea of press without prejudices and ideologies to follow is almost nonsense. As Fowler explains it in his work, “what events are reported is not a reflection of the intrinsic importance of those events, but reveals the operation of a complex and artificial set of criteria for selection” (1991, p. 2). Each happening in the world is subject to this kind of selection: “they are not intrinsically newsworthy, but only become ‘news’ when selected for inclusion in news reports. The vast majority of events are not mentioned, and so selection immediately gives us a partial view of the world” (1991, p. 11). Not only selection influences what gets in the news thus enhancing the possibility of certain biases but also “transformation, differential treatment in presentation according to numerous political, economic and social factors” (1991, p. 11).
Although the events described in the two newspapers in question were highly distorted to be favourable to fit the Party’s interests, it is parallel to what is going on in the media all over the world. As Fowler concludes, “the world of the Press is not the real world, but a world skewed and judged (1991, p. 222)”. Not only in the Communist world could--and in some places, still can--be seen news as a product, as the author expresses, but it is a general phenomenon wherever media exist. Moreover, this product is “produced by an industry, shaped by the bureaucratic and economic structure of that industry, by the relations between the media and other industries and, most importantly, by relations with government and with other political organisations” (1991, p. 222).
We might get a picture of the audience addressed of the two newspapers if we compare their contents. On the twelve pages of Népszabadság 25 foreign affairs news stories were published, while in Esti Hírlap 17. Furthermore, the stories in Népszabadság tended to be elaborated on, as opposed to Esti Hírlap, where only a few short sentences were devoted to them. As for home politics the number of articles was 17:3 in Népszabadság and Esti Hírlap, respectively. However, the latter paper covered more human-interest, miscellaneous soft news items, the number in their case was 13:25, further strengthening the tabloid character of the evening paper. Also, the number of articles concerning opinions, that is editorials and readers’ letters was higher in Esti Hírlap as the 1:10 figure shows. This fact is worth considering if we take into account that editorials and opinions are organic parts of a newspaper, as they “have an important symbolic function, seeming to partition off the ‘opinion’ component of the paper, implicitly supporting the claim that other sections, by contrast, are pure ‘fact’ or ‘report’” (1991, p. 222). In Esti Hírlap a whole page devoted to readers’ opinions and four more editorials were in the paper concerning various topics (a critique of a TV programme, one expressing discontent over technical books’ supply in the country, a critical essay on some US legal affair concerning a person’s acquittal in a dubious court case and an account on Easter memories of the author), whereas in Népszabadság there was only one such article, an open letter to the authorities about the problems of a Budapest council house--from which, however, we had better not draw any long-term conclusion, as it is possible that on another day of the week Népszabadság as well gave space to this kind of articles.
Comparing the content of the front pages of the two dailies anew tend to be underlying the differences between their style. There was only one news item published in both papers--it appeared among the headlines of the dailies, namely one concerning severe fighting going on in Lebanon, under the same title: “Súlyos harcok Libanonban”. The contents of the two articles differed in some aspects, though the amount of space given to the topic was roughly the same in the two papers. These differences might well stemmed from Esti Hírlap’s later deadline owing to its being an evening paper. For instance, Esti Hírlap reported 108 casualties, whereas Népszabadság 74. A characteristic of Esti Hírlap was that some sentences were printed in bold in order to underscore some essential points in the texts. In this article four sentences were highlighted this way: “In Beirut the adversaries were having severe gunfight deploying trench mortars, machine guns and heavy artillery”; “the right wing is deliberately striving to sharpen the military situation”; “in Damascus Syrian president Hafes Assad received the Palestinian delegation led by Yasser Arafat, head of the PLO’s executive committee”; “during the six-hour discussion the common Palestinian-Syrian point of view was outlined”, while in Népszabadság no such highlighting can be detected, only one clause is printed in italics, namely the one describing the number of the casualties and the wounded. The other paper’s using such techniques to attract attention might again hint at why it was regarded as a ‘quasi-tabloid’ even in those times.
On its front page Népszabadság had more articles on foreign policy matters, none of which is mentioned in the other daily. These were as follows: “Spanish Patriots Court-martialed”--in this article members of separatist terrorist organisation ETA are described, quite typically, as freedom fighters put on display trials; “The Declaration of the Cambodian National Assembly”--a short description of the Communist country’s proceeding on the policy of independence, peace and neutrality, at the same time strengthening and developing solidarity and friendship toward all revolutionary movements and peace-loving countries and people of the world, as reported by the Soviet news agency TASS; “Laos Has Taken the Initial Steps on the Way of Social Progress”--another TASS report about a Communist leader addressing his people invite them to strengthen further the national unity and mobilise the revolutionary forces in order to restore and develop national economy; “Schmidt on the Necessity of Détente Policy”--this one was by the Bonn correspondent of the daily, about the West-German chancellor’s making his point of view about the détente unmistakably clear. Interestingly enough, all articles on the first page were complete ones as opposed to today’s fashion, according to which many articles only hint at the essence of the topic and the whole discussed in detail inside the paper.
The leading headline of Esti Hírlap, apart from the one about the Lebanon crisis, was reporting that the 15th Congress of the Czechoslovak Communist Party had been over and had elected Gustav Hushak as secretary general. (The same topic was discussed at length on the third page of Népszabadság.) Another lengthy article, titled “Deng is set upon anew”, reported by Endre Aczél, discusses that Deng Xiaoping had been considered to be a rebel by many in China. It is notable that the article had a slightly ironic, definitely critic tone when describing the petty delays going on within the Chinese Communist Party. There was an article about a cabinet crisis in Italy as well, indicating that the postponing of the crisis in the Italian government could only be an ‘Easter present’ for the Italians, as the crisis could not be avoided. To the remaining three foreign policy news only a few short sentences were devoted in Esti Hírlap. One of them described East Germany’s achievements in shipbuilding and export, another was about French antifascists’ organising a commemorative celebration on May 8, Victory Day. The last one was a propaganda news item about the US House of Representatives conceding that a multitude of firearms had disappeared from the Pentagon’s alleged store-rooms, which reportedly had got in the hands of drug dealers and other criminals.
Conclusion
Features in Esti Hírlap, like its including several scoops underline the fact that its editors aspired to have their paper full of sensations--in Népszabadság the aim was to report more serious events as objectively as it was allowed. In the former paper more space was devoted to soft news, which in the latter played only secondary role. We might conclude after having compared the two dailies that even though all publications were deemed to be serious ones in the Communist era in Hungary, at least one exception existed, and this was Esti Hírlap, with its more colourful, sensation-centred style and shorter, more concise articles and numerous photographs.
In this paper my aim is to compare two Hungarian daily newspaper issues--Népszabadság (People’s Liberty) and Esti Hírlap (Evening Herald)--from the mid-70’s with a view to how they presented foreign policy events that occurred on the day I was born, April 16, 1976. I am going to make a comparison between the style of the two papers and argue that Esti Hírlap, though considered to be a serious publication, in fact, was very much like what we might call a tabloid today.
Although, as Paul Underwood notes, “in the Hungarian context, the Western distinctions of elite, popular and yellow journals are meaningless”, as “all papers are serious publications, emphasising political, economic and cultural news” (1982, p. 462), still we can clearly differentiate between the two newspapers in what events they had chosen to report on and how much space they devoted to single news. Népszabadság was--and still is--the “largest and most important Hungarian paper”, which was at those times the “party’s principle organ, setting the tone for the rest of the press” (1982, p. 462). It boasted with a circulation of around 810,000 in 1976. The third most important daily was Esti Hírlap, with a circulation of about 251,000, the only evening paper of the country, sponsored by the capital’s Party Committee. Népszabadság ran 12 pages, while Esti Hírlap 8 pages. Both published six days a week, “printing on Sundays but skipping Mondays” (1982, p. 462). Both papers cost 80 fillérs at that time, which price was apparently kept artificially low.
The Method
The two papers were aimed at different audiences as it is clear both from taking a look at the headlines and at their content as well. My method was systematically comparing the headlines and the contents of the foreign affairs news stories in the two dailies presented on their front pages. I was interested in the extent to which these papers could be regarded as biased, so I have made an attempt to provide some background to the prejudices on behalf of the press, free or partially free. After having compared the contents of the front pages of the two papers I translated the articles in question then collated the styles of them taking into consideration such features as highlighting certain sentences and the wording of the events.
Results and Discussion
In spite of recent developments, as the government had chosen to soften the restrictions on the freedom of press, journalists chose events to publish, and published their articles with a certain bias, of course, in order to avoid hurting the interests of the socialist regime and its way of thinking. On the other hand, even in countries with the most possible freedom of press given, there exists a kind of bias in every piece of printed or broadcast media, thus the idea of press without prejudices and ideologies to follow is almost nonsense. As Fowler explains it in his work, “what events are reported is not a reflection of the intrinsic importance of those events, but reveals the operation of a complex and artificial set of criteria for selection” (1991, p. 2). Each happening in the world is subject to this kind of selection: “they are not intrinsically newsworthy, but only become ‘news’ when selected for inclusion in news reports. The vast majority of events are not mentioned, and so selection immediately gives us a partial view of the world” (1991, p. 11). Not only selection influences what gets in the news thus enhancing the possibility of certain biases but also “transformation, differential treatment in presentation according to numerous political, economic and social factors” (1991, p. 11).
Although the events described in the two newspapers in question were highly distorted to be favourable to fit the Party’s interests, it is parallel to what is going on in the media all over the world. As Fowler concludes, “the world of the Press is not the real world, but a world skewed and judged (1991, p. 222)”. Not only in the Communist world could--and in some places, still can--be seen news as a product, as the author expresses, but it is a general phenomenon wherever media exist. Moreover, this product is “produced by an industry, shaped by the bureaucratic and economic structure of that industry, by the relations between the media and other industries and, most importantly, by relations with government and with other political organisations” (1991, p. 222).
We might get a picture of the audience addressed of the two newspapers if we compare their contents. On the twelve pages of Népszabadság 25 foreign affairs news stories were published, while in Esti Hírlap 17. Furthermore, the stories in Népszabadság tended to be elaborated on, as opposed to Esti Hírlap, where only a few short sentences were devoted to them. As for home politics the number of articles was 17:3 in Népszabadság and Esti Hírlap, respectively. However, the latter paper covered more human-interest, miscellaneous soft news items, the number in their case was 13:25, further strengthening the tabloid character of the evening paper. Also, the number of articles concerning opinions, that is editorials and readers’ letters was higher in Esti Hírlap as the 1:10 figure shows. This fact is worth considering if we take into account that editorials and opinions are organic parts of a newspaper, as they “have an important symbolic function, seeming to partition off the ‘opinion’ component of the paper, implicitly supporting the claim that other sections, by contrast, are pure ‘fact’ or ‘report’” (1991, p. 222). In Esti Hírlap a whole page devoted to readers’ opinions and four more editorials were in the paper concerning various topics (a critique of a TV programme, one expressing discontent over technical books’ supply in the country, a critical essay on some US legal affair concerning a person’s acquittal in a dubious court case and an account on Easter memories of the author), whereas in Népszabadság there was only one such article, an open letter to the authorities about the problems of a Budapest council house--from which, however, we had better not draw any long-term conclusion, as it is possible that on another day of the week Népszabadság as well gave space to this kind of articles.
Comparing the content of the front pages of the two dailies anew tend to be underlying the differences between their style. There was only one news item published in both papers--it appeared among the headlines of the dailies, namely one concerning severe fighting going on in Lebanon, under the same title: “Súlyos harcok Libanonban”. The contents of the two articles differed in some aspects, though the amount of space given to the topic was roughly the same in the two papers. These differences might well stemmed from Esti Hírlap’s later deadline owing to its being an evening paper. For instance, Esti Hírlap reported 108 casualties, whereas Népszabadság 74. A characteristic of Esti Hírlap was that some sentences were printed in bold in order to underscore some essential points in the texts. In this article four sentences were highlighted this way: “In Beirut the adversaries were having severe gunfight deploying trench mortars, machine guns and heavy artillery”; “the right wing is deliberately striving to sharpen the military situation”; “in Damascus Syrian president Hafes Assad received the Palestinian delegation led by Yasser Arafat, head of the PLO’s executive committee”; “during the six-hour discussion the common Palestinian-Syrian point of view was outlined”, while in Népszabadság no such highlighting can be detected, only one clause is printed in italics, namely the one describing the number of the casualties and the wounded. The other paper’s using such techniques to attract attention might again hint at why it was regarded as a ‘quasi-tabloid’ even in those times.
On its front page Népszabadság had more articles on foreign policy matters, none of which is mentioned in the other daily. These were as follows: “Spanish Patriots Court-martialed”--in this article members of separatist terrorist organisation ETA are described, quite typically, as freedom fighters put on display trials; “The Declaration of the Cambodian National Assembly”--a short description of the Communist country’s proceeding on the policy of independence, peace and neutrality, at the same time strengthening and developing solidarity and friendship toward all revolutionary movements and peace-loving countries and people of the world, as reported by the Soviet news agency TASS; “Laos Has Taken the Initial Steps on the Way of Social Progress”--another TASS report about a Communist leader addressing his people invite them to strengthen further the national unity and mobilise the revolutionary forces in order to restore and develop national economy; “Schmidt on the Necessity of Détente Policy”--this one was by the Bonn correspondent of the daily, about the West-German chancellor’s making his point of view about the détente unmistakably clear. Interestingly enough, all articles on the first page were complete ones as opposed to today’s fashion, according to which many articles only hint at the essence of the topic and the whole discussed in detail inside the paper.
The leading headline of Esti Hírlap, apart from the one about the Lebanon crisis, was reporting that the 15th Congress of the Czechoslovak Communist Party had been over and had elected Gustav Hushak as secretary general. (The same topic was discussed at length on the third page of Népszabadság.) Another lengthy article, titled “Deng is set upon anew”, reported by Endre Aczél, discusses that Deng Xiaoping had been considered to be a rebel by many in China. It is notable that the article had a slightly ironic, definitely critic tone when describing the petty delays going on within the Chinese Communist Party. There was an article about a cabinet crisis in Italy as well, indicating that the postponing of the crisis in the Italian government could only be an ‘Easter present’ for the Italians, as the crisis could not be avoided. To the remaining three foreign policy news only a few short sentences were devoted in Esti Hírlap. One of them described East Germany’s achievements in shipbuilding and export, another was about French antifascists’ organising a commemorative celebration on May 8, Victory Day. The last one was a propaganda news item about the US House of Representatives conceding that a multitude of firearms had disappeared from the Pentagon’s alleged store-rooms, which reportedly had got in the hands of drug dealers and other criminals.
Conclusion
Features in Esti Hírlap, like its including several scoops underline the fact that its editors aspired to have their paper full of sensations--in Népszabadság the aim was to report more serious events as objectively as it was allowed. In the former paper more space was devoted to soft news, which in the latter played only secondary role. We might conclude after having compared the two dailies that even though all publications were deemed to be serious ones in the Communist era in Hungary, at least one exception existed, and this was Esti Hírlap, with its more colourful, sensation-centred style and shorter, more concise articles and numerous photographs.
W 111 M
Draft 3
The local daily paper of Pécs, called 'Dunántúli Napló', was in an almost perfect monopolistic position in the '70s, being the only publication dealing with the city's life and the events taking place there, while reported about the more important happenings of the world as well. It was published by the News Publisher Company of Baranya, edited by Ervin Mitzki and was revised by the local Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Workers Party.
What I want to do now is to analyse and write down how could the staff of the daily accomplish their tasks, analysing the paper from the viewpoint of Proximity, Negativity and Eliteness, comparing the presentation and apparent importance of events and affairs, as well as the selected articles' typography. More so, I'd like to examine the position of individualism and opinion in the paper.
My last aim is to examine how well did the paper fulfil its role as a local daily paper, introducing local events and those of a greater range, whether it was a full informational source. Was it an all-in-one package, so the reader was well informed by all means after reading an issue, or s/he had to read other papers as well, to avoid missing news of great importance?
The chosen issue of the daily was the one released on the 22nd of March, in the year 1978.
It's worth mention before detailing the publication that for technical reasons the articles reflect the happenings of the previous day (21st of March), or even older events. These are the following:
In Pécs, a memorial wreathation had been celebrated at the Republic Monument; the students of the secondary school named after Károly Zipernowsky again deserved the red 'wandering flag' of the Communist Youths' Association for their outstanding results on certain fields; a ceremony had been held honouring the veterans of the Labour Movement; on 18th of March the police arrested the suspect of the murder done one day before; on 14th and 15th the Ballet of Sarayevo performed in the town; teachers had been honoured on 21th for their achievements; also, CYA-organizations had been honoured and a miner as well; the first swallow and the first stork arrived to the agglomerate of the city; a new brigade had been sent to Székesfehérvár to help the locals in their time of need.
In the capital, there was a memorial march of young ones; the delegation of the Hungarian Socialist Workers Party met with the local leaders of the Socialist Party of Arabic Rebirth in Syria; Willy Brandt, president of the German Socialist Democratic Party arrived to Budapest; Frigyes Puja, Hungarian minister of foreign affairs came back from Bulgaria, where he met Todor Zsivkov; Ezer Weizman, minister of war of Israel ordered a pause-in-firing in South-Lebanon.
Compared to the present issues of the same daily, it contains a surprisingly little amount of news. Indeed, there are very few news dealing with the common citizen, and there are only one or two writings that are of a non-political nature (so, most of the articles are subjective).
Also, there is a tendency of presenting only news coming from particular areas of the globe, and then from a particular point of view. Articles reporting of small local events might be longer than those written about occurrences in the life of the capital, although the latter affected a much greater mass of people than the local happening.
Newspapers' got a tendency to make themselves more interesting, thus selling better, by shocking people. Crime, death, warfare - each one are presented differently in a local daily.
Furthermore, the paper seems to mention only specific kinds of people, their deeds and achievements, but never their personalities or everyday lives. This mirrors specific thoughts and ideals of the society, thus building a set of merits.
These are the news values of Proximity, Negativity and Eliteness. Some of them can be examined in virtually all articles (e.g. Proximity, because all events should take place somewhere), but some of them are connected to a special theme (e.g. Negativity). It's almost impossible to focus on them through pure samples, because their nature, being news values, demands a mixture of them to build an article.
The most essential of them is Proximity, dealing with the effects of spatial distance on importance, value and presentation of the information. Even continent-shaking events can be diminished and shorted into news-in-brief status, while occurrences only important to the nearby citizenship may seize the headlines. All that matters is the relative importance of the event to the locals.
There are clear examples for that manifesting in the paper: On the front page, two articles appeared without a signature (possibly written by the editor himself), dealing with the same event, the 59th anniversary of the Hungarian Soviet Republic. The work positioned higher on the page describes the local ceremonies triggered by the date, a wreathation at the Republic Monument, with a photo as an illustration. The title is underlined. The lower article describes how the capital celebrated the feast, it contains no illustration, but the title uses bold font. Although the latter writing is slightly longer, the positioning of the articles and the underlining of the title of the first one (which, by nature, catches the eye) makes clear, which seemed to be more important to the editor. The photo serves this purpose too, by making the scene, thus the event more vivid.
More important events usually occupy a position where they get priority, so are read before anything else. These can be on the front of the daily, or on the upper half of a page - or might manifest as something else that draws importance to the article. One of the best examples of this can be found on page four, where two short news can easily be compared in means of proximity and importance. One of them appears in the lower right corner, reporting about a fire-in-pause in South-Lebanon - and event affecting great masses. The other one is located in the centre of the page, with a bold and italic headline. The article simply tells of the arrival of the first migratory birds to the proximity of Pécs. The two articles occupy almost the same amount of space, but their positioning makes their importance clear.
The next category to be stendahled is Negativity. Generally speaking, this one contains events that can at first sight be called sensations. This category covers all that is connected with damage, loss, injury, death. Being rare and far between in an established society and bringing thrill to the reader, these events are almost always written about. Negativity is very useful to incite and/or control emotions with precalculatable result.
On the middle of the second page, an article deals with a local murder. Although the writing presents the murder as being stem from extreme emotions, the author uses a strictly objective language. Just if as he wanted to distance both himself and the readers from the act. It's worth to be mentioned that only the most involved and guilty parties are named - the two who found the body by the brook 'Konica', were only mentioned in a half sentence and remained anonymous. Not even name of the chief leader of the investigation had been written down. Although the article occupies an important position and has three title lines, it is as short as possible. Just as if the writer was reluctant to deal with the topic any longer than necessary.
Eliteness was always present in the cultures of mankind, although being the pride of the community meant the possession of different merits in each era. Elite is the one who stands out of the mass in one way or another. In other, more accurate words: the elite are those who met the ideals of the society, or occupy important social, monetary, artistic or political positions, so those whom we may look upon. In the Hungary of the late '70s, Eliteness was measured in two ideals, both of them based upon the ruling political/ideological system: the working man and the politician. The former was the hero, who kept the country going, the second one was the ruler, who helped the worker accomplish the task. The two categories were often both present in individuals (thus, the politically conscious worker or the political leader with a background in physical work).
The article on the second page about the veterans of the Labour Movement clearly strengthens the position of this elite, giving respect to the heroes. These men are those of the past; they are not heroes now, but beacons who shedded light on a clear road to be followed.
The working hero of the late '70s is described on the fourth page. A brigade of local workers travelled to Székesfehérvár, to help the natives in their time of need. A high-pressure water pipe broke up in the town, creating an emergency situation. The scheme is simple: the workers went out to help their fellow heroes, and together they will save their compatriots (also workers). The author's aim might was that to express his/her views on the working society as being a great family.
The politician hero appears on the fifth page. He belongs to the world in general, being the channel to greater events. In facts, Frigyes Puja, minister of foreign affairs arrived back to the capital after completing negotiations with the head-of-state of Bulgaria. According to medieval and ancient customs, the only one who travels to far lands and is of great importance is someone whose aim is warfare - in modern terms, winning something for the country and its people. And if s/he returns openly, s/he must be victorious - the beaten one must hide. So, the politician hero must have won something of importance for the Hungarian People's Republic - and his only weapons were politics.
Most often, no sign of individualism or display of opinion can be found in the articles. The reasons for this can be many: The 'Dunántúli Napló' is a daily news paper, has nothing to do with literature, nor take the role of entertaining magazines. There is no need for this from the viewpoint of the average consumer, rather accuracy and an easily readable, non-fancy style is needed.
The second reason for the needlessness of individual taste and colour possibly was their monopoly. As there was no other daily specifically edited for the local citizens and they got most of their funds from the state, they weren't forced to be increasingly interesting.
There is a third reason as well: most news had been broadcast from the capital as ready-made articles, and no one felt the right to alter them. So the staff had to compare their own writings to the given articles, adopting the language of bureaucracy.
No opinions are reflected in the articles; the reason for this might be among those in the former three paragraph, or it might stem from the ideology of communism. If everyone is perfectly equal, then their opinions must be the same too. So there is no need to show up new ideas and individual thoughts - this shows that the author do not think that his/her readers are as clever as s/he is. And that cannot be the point ...
The staff of the 'Dunántúli Napló' succeeded in creating a daily, sufficiently fulfilling its role as a local paper. By mingling articles important from the town's point of view and news reporting of events from a great geographical range, they were able to create an interesting and exciting publication, giving a great overview, but not going into peculiar details. This compensates for the lack of individualism and flavour. 'DN' is a practical publication for the average (working) man, to be easily read before breakfast, and thus acquiring a fast, but comparatively precise knowledge about events in the immediate vicinity and far away. With this, the 'Napló' maintains the illusion of Baranya as being isolated, while connecting it to the world and the country with million threads.
The local daily paper of Pécs, called 'Dunántúli Napló', was in an almost perfect monopolistic position in the '70s, being the only publication dealing with the city's life and the events taking place there, while reported about the more important happenings of the world as well. It was published by the News Publisher Company of Baranya, edited by Ervin Mitzki and was revised by the local Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Workers Party.
What I want to do now is to analyse and write down how could the staff of the daily accomplish their tasks, analysing the paper from the viewpoint of Proximity, Negativity and Eliteness, comparing the presentation and apparent importance of events and affairs, as well as the selected articles' typography. More so, I'd like to examine the position of individualism and opinion in the paper.
My last aim is to examine how well did the paper fulfil its role as a local daily paper, introducing local events and those of a greater range, whether it was a full informational source. Was it an all-in-one package, so the reader was well informed by all means after reading an issue, or s/he had to read other papers as well, to avoid missing news of great importance?
The chosen issue of the daily was the one released on the 22nd of March, in the year 1978.
It's worth mention before detailing the publication that for technical reasons the articles reflect the happenings of the previous day (21st of March), or even older events. These are the following:
In Pécs, a memorial wreathation had been celebrated at the Republic Monument; the students of the secondary school named after Károly Zipernowsky again deserved the red 'wandering flag' of the Communist Youths' Association for their outstanding results on certain fields; a ceremony had been held honouring the veterans of the Labour Movement; on 18th of March the police arrested the suspect of the murder done one day before; on 14th and 15th the Ballet of Sarayevo performed in the town; teachers had been honoured on 21th for their achievements; also, CYA-organizations had been honoured and a miner as well; the first swallow and the first stork arrived to the agglomerate of the city; a new brigade had been sent to Székesfehérvár to help the locals in their time of need.
In the capital, there was a memorial march of young ones; the delegation of the Hungarian Socialist Workers Party met with the local leaders of the Socialist Party of Arabic Rebirth in Syria; Willy Brandt, president of the German Socialist Democratic Party arrived to Budapest; Frigyes Puja, Hungarian minister of foreign affairs came back from Bulgaria, where he met Todor Zsivkov; Ezer Weizman, minister of war of Israel ordered a pause-in-firing in South-Lebanon.
Compared to the present issues of the same daily, it contains a surprisingly little amount of news. Indeed, there are very few news dealing with the common citizen, and there are only one or two writings that are of a non-political nature (so, most of the articles are subjective).
Also, there is a tendency of presenting only news coming from particular areas of the globe, and then from a particular point of view. Articles reporting of small local events might be longer than those written about occurrences in the life of the capital, although the latter affected a much greater mass of people than the local happening.
Newspapers' got a tendency to make themselves more interesting, thus selling better, by shocking people. Crime, death, warfare - each one are presented differently in a local daily.
Furthermore, the paper seems to mention only specific kinds of people, their deeds and achievements, but never their personalities or everyday lives. This mirrors specific thoughts and ideals of the society, thus building a set of merits.
These are the news values of Proximity, Negativity and Eliteness. Some of them can be examined in virtually all articles (e.g. Proximity, because all events should take place somewhere), but some of them are connected to a special theme (e.g. Negativity). It's almost impossible to focus on them through pure samples, because their nature, being news values, demands a mixture of them to build an article.
The most essential of them is Proximity, dealing with the effects of spatial distance on importance, value and presentation of the information. Even continent-shaking events can be diminished and shorted into news-in-brief status, while occurrences only important to the nearby citizenship may seize the headlines. All that matters is the relative importance of the event to the locals.
There are clear examples for that manifesting in the paper: On the front page, two articles appeared without a signature (possibly written by the editor himself), dealing with the same event, the 59th anniversary of the Hungarian Soviet Republic. The work positioned higher on the page describes the local ceremonies triggered by the date, a wreathation at the Republic Monument, with a photo as an illustration. The title is underlined. The lower article describes how the capital celebrated the feast, it contains no illustration, but the title uses bold font. Although the latter writing is slightly longer, the positioning of the articles and the underlining of the title of the first one (which, by nature, catches the eye) makes clear, which seemed to be more important to the editor. The photo serves this purpose too, by making the scene, thus the event more vivid.
More important events usually occupy a position where they get priority, so are read before anything else. These can be on the front of the daily, or on the upper half of a page - or might manifest as something else that draws importance to the article. One of the best examples of this can be found on page four, where two short news can easily be compared in means of proximity and importance. One of them appears in the lower right corner, reporting about a fire-in-pause in South-Lebanon - and event affecting great masses. The other one is located in the centre of the page, with a bold and italic headline. The article simply tells of the arrival of the first migratory birds to the proximity of Pécs. The two articles occupy almost the same amount of space, but their positioning makes their importance clear.
The next category to be stendahled is Negativity. Generally speaking, this one contains events that can at first sight be called sensations. This category covers all that is connected with damage, loss, injury, death. Being rare and far between in an established society and bringing thrill to the reader, these events are almost always written about. Negativity is very useful to incite and/or control emotions with precalculatable result.
On the middle of the second page, an article deals with a local murder. Although the writing presents the murder as being stem from extreme emotions, the author uses a strictly objective language. Just if as he wanted to distance both himself and the readers from the act. It's worth to be mentioned that only the most involved and guilty parties are named - the two who found the body by the brook 'Konica', were only mentioned in a half sentence and remained anonymous. Not even name of the chief leader of the investigation had been written down. Although the article occupies an important position and has three title lines, it is as short as possible. Just as if the writer was reluctant to deal with the topic any longer than necessary.
Eliteness was always present in the cultures of mankind, although being the pride of the community meant the possession of different merits in each era. Elite is the one who stands out of the mass in one way or another. In other, more accurate words: the elite are those who met the ideals of the society, or occupy important social, monetary, artistic or political positions, so those whom we may look upon. In the Hungary of the late '70s, Eliteness was measured in two ideals, both of them based upon the ruling political/ideological system: the working man and the politician. The former was the hero, who kept the country going, the second one was the ruler, who helped the worker accomplish the task. The two categories were often both present in individuals (thus, the politically conscious worker or the political leader with a background in physical work).
The article on the second page about the veterans of the Labour Movement clearly strengthens the position of this elite, giving respect to the heroes. These men are those of the past; they are not heroes now, but beacons who shedded light on a clear road to be followed.
The working hero of the late '70s is described on the fourth page. A brigade of local workers travelled to Székesfehérvár, to help the natives in their time of need. A high-pressure water pipe broke up in the town, creating an emergency situation. The scheme is simple: the workers went out to help their fellow heroes, and together they will save their compatriots (also workers). The author's aim might was that to express his/her views on the working society as being a great family.
The politician hero appears on the fifth page. He belongs to the world in general, being the channel to greater events. In facts, Frigyes Puja, minister of foreign affairs arrived back to the capital after completing negotiations with the head-of-state of Bulgaria. According to medieval and ancient customs, the only one who travels to far lands and is of great importance is someone whose aim is warfare - in modern terms, winning something for the country and its people. And if s/he returns openly, s/he must be victorious - the beaten one must hide. So, the politician hero must have won something of importance for the Hungarian People's Republic - and his only weapons were politics.
Most often, no sign of individualism or display of opinion can be found in the articles. The reasons for this can be many: The 'Dunántúli Napló' is a daily news paper, has nothing to do with literature, nor take the role of entertaining magazines. There is no need for this from the viewpoint of the average consumer, rather accuracy and an easily readable, non-fancy style is needed.
The second reason for the needlessness of individual taste and colour possibly was their monopoly. As there was no other daily specifically edited for the local citizens and they got most of their funds from the state, they weren't forced to be increasingly interesting.
There is a third reason as well: most news had been broadcast from the capital as ready-made articles, and no one felt the right to alter them. So the staff had to compare their own writings to the given articles, adopting the language of bureaucracy.
No opinions are reflected in the articles; the reason for this might be among those in the former three paragraph, or it might stem from the ideology of communism. If everyone is perfectly equal, then their opinions must be the same too. So there is no need to show up new ideas and individual thoughts - this shows that the author do not think that his/her readers are as clever as s/he is. And that cannot be the point ...
The staff of the 'Dunántúli Napló' succeeded in creating a daily, sufficiently fulfilling its role as a local paper. By mingling articles important from the town's point of view and news reporting of events from a great geographical range, they were able to create an interesting and exciting publication, giving a great overview, but not going into peculiar details. This compensates for the lack of individualism and flavour. 'DN' is a practical publication for the average (working) man, to be easily read before breakfast, and thus acquiring a fast, but comparatively precise knowledge about events in the immediate vicinity and far away. With this, the 'Napló' maintains the illusion of Baranya as being isolated, while connecting it to the world and the country with million threads.
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
W 098 F
Introduction
NEPSZABADSAG is the oldest still existing newspaper in Hungary. It was first edited during the Second World War, in 1942. It was the only Hungarian party's the MSZMP's central newspaper. It represented the party's opinion, it consisted of only such news what the MSZMP wanted to put forward. It mainly wrote about The Eastern block, and only mentioned Western countries in connection of disaster or some failure. The news was mainly faked to be in favour of the party. Even the sport news was changed from reality. It did not have an opposition paper.
The day
This essay presents one day in the life of Hungary through NEPSZABADSAG. The day is the 27, February, 1974, it was 32. volume, 48. issue of NEPSZABADSAG. This was in the middle of the week, it was Wednesday. This day's issue consisted of 12 pages. Out of these 12 pages, 6 dealt with news generally, with foreign news as well as with home news. On the sevens page there appears a cultural session, containing book-reviews and a folktale. The whole of the 8. page shows the day's lucky car winners. The cars to serve as a present are all Dacias, Zaporozsec, Polski, Zsiguli, Moszkvics, Trabant. On the 9. page takes place the cultural news. On the 10. the weather forecast and agricultural matters. Then follows the advertisements; goods for sale, goods to buy, houses to rent, and most of all job advertisements. And the last page is for the sport news. There are few illustrations and pictures in these copy, but I assume it was like these in those days. A small black and white picture of Serif Belkaszem appears however on the front page, and some small illustrations of some buildings of an engineer called Mihail Lesznyikov,- who was the world's greatest water builder-, and some other illustration of some machine on sale. And of course there is an illustrated map of the weather forecast.
News in the issue.
There are two main news on the front page. Both of them are foreign. The main cover story is that today met, for the first time, the Soviet-American commercial and agricultural consultation in Washington. Patolcsev, the Foreign Trade Minister met President Nixon. A delegation of 22 Soviet members dined with Frederich Dent who represented the idea that the Soviet-American relationship works absolutely well. And he wants to continue and improve this connection with them. Another lead article is about the troops in Saigon whose trial started today. In South- Vietnam today(27, February) the two opposition started a 90 minute long discussion, on which they agreed that by the fourth of march they will let altogether 1338 troops free. This agreement should have ended on the eighths of February but Saigon made all sort of excuses to delay the action. Among the troops are civil people as well as military. On the front page there appears to be some news, in length smaller, but not in importance. As for example the two paragraph long and only about 16 sentences short sketch on the right hand column of the sheet.
" Rebels against the army, in carnage fight, on the Philippines ". Says the title of the report. The battles had been going on since 1972 between the Muslims and the Philippines government on Joel-Island. The news reporting said that Joel-Island's 5 or 6 major towns which population reaches up to 100000 was destroyed and completely ruined by fire. According to the military news reporters Joel, which lies about 1000 kilometres south from Manila, in the last two days had more than 400 citizen lost their lives. These were the front page stories of Wednesday’s issue. None of them was home news. The headlines of 27, February NEPSZABADSAG are: 1) Up to date technique and democratism in the agricultural co-operative. ( page 3 )
2) American situation- the twice opened meeting. ( page 4 ) 3) Tattoo, the 20 years old city ( page 4-5 ) 4) On an expedition in Siberia. ( page 6 ) 5) The Saran experiment ( page 6 ) Vehicle winner's list. ( page 8 )
News in the country.
Important events in the life of the country on the 27, February. On page 3 appears the correspondent on the Up to date technique and democratism in agricultural co-operative. The agricultural co-operative had been a great success. It gives the whole agricultural income's 70 percent. All the home news seems to be of agricultural interest. It might be because the coming march, and the forth- coming spring. For instance; agricultural equipments are under experiment in Godollo. On the meeting which was held on Tuesday Dimenyi Imre was present who is the minister of agriculture and food. Rab Gyorgy who had been the director of the institute for decades, was presented with the Great Workers price. Four other member of the institute was awarded with The Great Worker Of The Agriculture price.
Also under the work, leisure, health subhead there is a survey about the use of the small, private gardens. On the 9. page there is an article about Hungarian game export. The Hungarian game is widely wanted across Europe. 160 thousand rabbits, 50 thousand pheasant, 25 thousand birds had been exported. The hunting season just finished and about its result Gabber Jozsef said that our export had grown ten times in the last ten years. Most of the shot game, exactly 95 percent was sold abroad. It brought 15 million dollars to our country. The main economical news of the country is about the Allami Fejlesztesi bank. The Allami Fejlesztesi Bank is the main source and helper of the Hungarian economy. The bank started to operate in 1972, its president is Peter Havas. The education column is about strict rules in schools. It deals with the question whether pupils should wear some sort of uniform like apron above their own cloth, and whether the use of make- up would be aloud. There is only one person mentioned in the obituary. He was a devoted member of the Hungarian party the MSZMP.
News values.
Recency
Definition
The more recent the news is the more wanted, interesting it is. Newspapers always try to be the first in catching on the newest story. To be of something new, its in its name. Normally the day is the basic cycle of a news.
Identification
On Tuesday the KGST started its 66. meeting in Moszkva. Its main project was the socialist integration. The delegation discussed the KGST countries work together and their process to help each other and Yugoslavia. Our country was represented by Gyorgy Lazier.
( Front page news. N. A. )
Negativity
Definition
Negativity is the news value that is presented and read more quickly and widely. Journalists are aware of that so they are especially trained to seek for and write negative stories. These are articles which involve death, injury, damage, conflict between people political parties or nations . It has been always popular to read about catastrophes.
Identification
The rebellion on the Philippines ended with more than 400 people, civil as well as soldiers death and adding to the human loss there was also loss in property, as five- six big cities were burnt down and ruined. ( front page N. A. )
And there was another rebellion but it took place in Africa, in Ethiopia. The rebels took over the major strategically places in Aszmara, and even the airport. From Addisz Abeda there was not a straight forward answer for the reasons of the rebellion and about the rebels. ( page 2, MTI )
For those who enjoy football, the short article on the back page where the Sport section took place, there is a news which they would consider negative. On the football match Bp. Honved, Vasas, three of the players were sent of the pitch and were refused to play in the next 5 games.
In Kecel the 34 years old Laszlo Romsics in a toxicated state seriously injured, with his car the 12 years old Margit Vancsik school student. Than he left without even stopping, to give aid. ( page 8 AN )
There happened another serious accident where the driver was under the influence of alcohol. ( Same column as above. )
Personalisation
Definition
Something which can be pictured in personal terms is more newsworthy than a concept, a process, the generalised or the mass. Striving for personalisation has brought journalists to grief for instance in the Washington Post's Janet Cooke affair. Cooke's feature writing about an eight-years- old drug addict won a 1981 Pulitzer Prize which was withdrawn when it was found the boy did not exist
Identification.
Dimitrov's escape. One of the Reichstag-case's victim recalling. "It has been for forty years today, in the 27, February, 1934....... .". In Hitlers court Van der Luppet was condemn to death, but Dimitrov and his two Bulgarian communist fellow was let off, because of the international reaction. But Dimitrov was kept in prison. "Dimitrov will stay here!"- said Gobbels to Dimitrove's elderly mother. Sentimental expression-"elderly mother" makes the reader feel sorry about Dimitrov. It is a personalisation. It creates a more dramatic feeling. Dimitrov and the others asked, through their relatives, for Soviet citizenship from the Soviet embassy in Berlin. Within 48 hours the Soviet government asked Berlin to let its citizens free. The three prisoner Dimitrov, Popov and Tanev received a paper from the Gestapo, saying that they are not wanted citizens in Germany. They were put on an aeroplane and were sent to the Soviet Union. In Moszkva a huge crowd of people gathered to celebrate them. Inspite of the fact that their destination had been kept a secret and it was only a guess that they might fly to the Soviet Union. ( page 2 Karoly Nagy )
Superlativeness
Definition
The biggest, the best, the highest and other superlatives cause attraction. It urges the reader to want to achieve even more. For example The Guinness Books Of Records is a widely red book, Inspite of the fact that it has nothing else in it but records, in other words, superlatives.
Identification
In Siberia the world biggest water engine was under construction. ( page 6 Peter Serene )
Conclusion
The 32. volume, 48. issue of the NEPSZABADSAG which was the 27, February, 1974 Wednesday was writing about foreign politics mainly. It had few news in connection of Hungary. These few was generally about agriculture. The country was waiting and was all ready for spring. There is one article which haven’t been mentioned yet and it is very much in connection with my birthday. The article is about my birthplace Tattoo. The city was celebrating its 20. birthday on the very same day when I was born.
NEPSZABADSAG is the oldest still existing newspaper in Hungary. It was first edited during the Second World War, in 1942. It was the only Hungarian party's the MSZMP's central newspaper. It represented the party's opinion, it consisted of only such news what the MSZMP wanted to put forward. It mainly wrote about The Eastern block, and only mentioned Western countries in connection of disaster or some failure. The news was mainly faked to be in favour of the party. Even the sport news was changed from reality. It did not have an opposition paper.
The day
This essay presents one day in the life of Hungary through NEPSZABADSAG. The day is the 27, February, 1974, it was 32. volume, 48. issue of NEPSZABADSAG. This was in the middle of the week, it was Wednesday. This day's issue consisted of 12 pages. Out of these 12 pages, 6 dealt with news generally, with foreign news as well as with home news. On the sevens page there appears a cultural session, containing book-reviews and a folktale. The whole of the 8. page shows the day's lucky car winners. The cars to serve as a present are all Dacias, Zaporozsec, Polski, Zsiguli, Moszkvics, Trabant. On the 9. page takes place the cultural news. On the 10. the weather forecast and agricultural matters. Then follows the advertisements; goods for sale, goods to buy, houses to rent, and most of all job advertisements. And the last page is for the sport news. There are few illustrations and pictures in these copy, but I assume it was like these in those days. A small black and white picture of Serif Belkaszem appears however on the front page, and some small illustrations of some buildings of an engineer called Mihail Lesznyikov,- who was the world's greatest water builder-, and some other illustration of some machine on sale. And of course there is an illustrated map of the weather forecast.
News in the issue.
There are two main news on the front page. Both of them are foreign. The main cover story is that today met, for the first time, the Soviet-American commercial and agricultural consultation in Washington. Patolcsev, the Foreign Trade Minister met President Nixon. A delegation of 22 Soviet members dined with Frederich Dent who represented the idea that the Soviet-American relationship works absolutely well. And he wants to continue and improve this connection with them. Another lead article is about the troops in Saigon whose trial started today. In South- Vietnam today(27, February) the two opposition started a 90 minute long discussion, on which they agreed that by the fourth of march they will let altogether 1338 troops free. This agreement should have ended on the eighths of February but Saigon made all sort of excuses to delay the action. Among the troops are civil people as well as military. On the front page there appears to be some news, in length smaller, but not in importance. As for example the two paragraph long and only about 16 sentences short sketch on the right hand column of the sheet.
" Rebels against the army, in carnage fight, on the Philippines ". Says the title of the report. The battles had been going on since 1972 between the Muslims and the Philippines government on Joel-Island. The news reporting said that Joel-Island's 5 or 6 major towns which population reaches up to 100000 was destroyed and completely ruined by fire. According to the military news reporters Joel, which lies about 1000 kilometres south from Manila, in the last two days had more than 400 citizen lost their lives. These were the front page stories of Wednesday’s issue. None of them was home news. The headlines of 27, February NEPSZABADSAG are: 1) Up to date technique and democratism in the agricultural co-operative. ( page 3 )
2) American situation- the twice opened meeting. ( page 4 ) 3) Tattoo, the 20 years old city ( page 4-5 ) 4) On an expedition in Siberia. ( page 6 ) 5) The Saran experiment ( page 6 ) Vehicle winner's list. ( page 8 )
News in the country.
Important events in the life of the country on the 27, February. On page 3 appears the correspondent on the Up to date technique and democratism in agricultural co-operative. The agricultural co-operative had been a great success. It gives the whole agricultural income's 70 percent. All the home news seems to be of agricultural interest. It might be because the coming march, and the forth- coming spring. For instance; agricultural equipments are under experiment in Godollo. On the meeting which was held on Tuesday Dimenyi Imre was present who is the minister of agriculture and food. Rab Gyorgy who had been the director of the institute for decades, was presented with the Great Workers price. Four other member of the institute was awarded with The Great Worker Of The Agriculture price.
Also under the work, leisure, health subhead there is a survey about the use of the small, private gardens. On the 9. page there is an article about Hungarian game export. The Hungarian game is widely wanted across Europe. 160 thousand rabbits, 50 thousand pheasant, 25 thousand birds had been exported. The hunting season just finished and about its result Gabber Jozsef said that our export had grown ten times in the last ten years. Most of the shot game, exactly 95 percent was sold abroad. It brought 15 million dollars to our country. The main economical news of the country is about the Allami Fejlesztesi bank. The Allami Fejlesztesi Bank is the main source and helper of the Hungarian economy. The bank started to operate in 1972, its president is Peter Havas. The education column is about strict rules in schools. It deals with the question whether pupils should wear some sort of uniform like apron above their own cloth, and whether the use of make- up would be aloud. There is only one person mentioned in the obituary. He was a devoted member of the Hungarian party the MSZMP.
News values.
Recency
Definition
The more recent the news is the more wanted, interesting it is. Newspapers always try to be the first in catching on the newest story. To be of something new, its in its name. Normally the day is the basic cycle of a news.
Identification
On Tuesday the KGST started its 66. meeting in Moszkva. Its main project was the socialist integration. The delegation discussed the KGST countries work together and their process to help each other and Yugoslavia. Our country was represented by Gyorgy Lazier.
( Front page news. N. A. )
Negativity
Definition
Negativity is the news value that is presented and read more quickly and widely. Journalists are aware of that so they are especially trained to seek for and write negative stories. These are articles which involve death, injury, damage, conflict between people political parties or nations . It has been always popular to read about catastrophes.
Identification
The rebellion on the Philippines ended with more than 400 people, civil as well as soldiers death and adding to the human loss there was also loss in property, as five- six big cities were burnt down and ruined. ( front page N. A. )
And there was another rebellion but it took place in Africa, in Ethiopia. The rebels took over the major strategically places in Aszmara, and even the airport. From Addisz Abeda there was not a straight forward answer for the reasons of the rebellion and about the rebels. ( page 2, MTI )
For those who enjoy football, the short article on the back page where the Sport section took place, there is a news which they would consider negative. On the football match Bp. Honved, Vasas, three of the players were sent of the pitch and were refused to play in the next 5 games.
In Kecel the 34 years old Laszlo Romsics in a toxicated state seriously injured, with his car the 12 years old Margit Vancsik school student. Than he left without even stopping, to give aid. ( page 8 AN )
There happened another serious accident where the driver was under the influence of alcohol. ( Same column as above. )
Personalisation
Definition
Something which can be pictured in personal terms is more newsworthy than a concept, a process, the generalised or the mass. Striving for personalisation has brought journalists to grief for instance in the Washington Post's Janet Cooke affair. Cooke's feature writing about an eight-years- old drug addict won a 1981 Pulitzer Prize which was withdrawn when it was found the boy did not exist
Identification.
Dimitrov's escape. One of the Reichstag-case's victim recalling. "It has been for forty years today, in the 27, February, 1934....... .". In Hitlers court Van der Luppet was condemn to death, but Dimitrov and his two Bulgarian communist fellow was let off, because of the international reaction. But Dimitrov was kept in prison. "Dimitrov will stay here!"- said Gobbels to Dimitrove's elderly mother. Sentimental expression-"elderly mother" makes the reader feel sorry about Dimitrov. It is a personalisation. It creates a more dramatic feeling. Dimitrov and the others asked, through their relatives, for Soviet citizenship from the Soviet embassy in Berlin. Within 48 hours the Soviet government asked Berlin to let its citizens free. The three prisoner Dimitrov, Popov and Tanev received a paper from the Gestapo, saying that they are not wanted citizens in Germany. They were put on an aeroplane and were sent to the Soviet Union. In Moszkva a huge crowd of people gathered to celebrate them. Inspite of the fact that their destination had been kept a secret and it was only a guess that they might fly to the Soviet Union. ( page 2 Karoly Nagy )
Superlativeness
Definition
The biggest, the best, the highest and other superlatives cause attraction. It urges the reader to want to achieve even more. For example The Guinness Books Of Records is a widely red book, Inspite of the fact that it has nothing else in it but records, in other words, superlatives.
Identification
In Siberia the world biggest water engine was under construction. ( page 6 Peter Serene )
Conclusion
The 32. volume, 48. issue of the NEPSZABADSAG which was the 27, February, 1974 Wednesday was writing about foreign politics mainly. It had few news in connection of Hungary. These few was generally about agriculture. The country was waiting and was all ready for spring. There is one article which haven’t been mentioned yet and it is very much in connection with my birthday. The article is about my birthplace Tattoo. The city was celebrating its 20. birthday on the very same day when I was born.
W 095 F
Draft 3
Journalism was always present in life. It had and still has great influence on the readers, that is why political parties and other organisations have their own newspapers. In 1976 the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party (MSZMP in Hungarian) was in power. The party had its Committees in every county , so in Baranya, too. This committee owned the regional newspaper of that time called Új Dunántúli Napló. I compared the little column for the newspaper’s staff and realised that it was printed in the same press, although the name of the company has changed. In 1976 the publisher was called the Baranya County’s Publishing Company and in 1996 a Hungarian-German joint venture publishes the paper. The editor-in-chief, who had one story in this issue, was Mitzki Ervin, Who fulfilled this duty till 1989. Of the journalists I found two names who worked for Dunántúli Napló and still writes articles for Új Dunántúli Napló. It is to be noted that many authors put down only their initials, so it is hard to define if the persons hid behind the same initials in the two newspapers are the same. With the change of the regime the editor-in-chief was dismissed and Lombosi Jenõ took up his post. From that staff about 20 people still works for the paper, but reducing the number of employees is concomitant of capitalism.
Socialist influence is sensible through the whole newspaper. I tried to observe the clichés and techniques that were used in that era and I will also present three news values in Dunántúli Napló’s December 6,1976 edition. This paper will highlight how the newspaper reported events that were characterised by personalization, facility and negativity.
On the basis of the Monday edition, many events happened in the world at weekend, all of them are very short, only a few-sentence-long. There are longer international news, which are about the Spanish and the Japan Social Parties one is about Marlon Brando, demonstrating against the white men’s treating of Indians, and another reports the death of the actor, Rupert Davis, who acted in the Maigret series.
In Hungary there were two political news worth mentioning according to the newspaper, one is about Kádár János intending to go Wien, and the other is about Gáspár Sándor staying in Warsaw. The edition contained articles about the bigger cities in Transdanubia, like Zalaegerszeg, Baja, Szekszárd. Each informed readers about regional events, constructions or factories. Kampis Péter wrote two interviews about public health. first he talked with the assistant under-secretary of the Ministry of Public Health. Secondly he put down his impressions about heart operation. He was amused by the incredible medical treatments doctors did, and he had some examples from the USA. Besides, after reading the newspaper readers came to know that in Bem street in a shop gold was sold for 3 million forints that year; that the number of crime decreased in Komló, and that Darvas Iván would act in Pécs and he spoke about the character he personified. And at last there’s an article which was written by the present editor-in-chief, Lombosi Jenõ, introducing us Klárika , who suffers from muscular contraction and has no identification card, because she cannot look after herself.
I counted a list concerning the number of the articles about Hungarian and international news and the length of them. I found that these were 18 Hungarian-topic stories without sports news on 5 pages and 15 international news on 1 page. That suggests an impressive picture of the length of international news, namely that most of them are not longer than a few rows.
Not only shortness is a main feature of news reporting in the issue, but also personalization. Many of the articles do not contain the specific place, time, person and the event. While reading them I felt like looking at a magazine for women. If I want to generalise I could find the column in which a person with serious illness tells about his life. The story titled ‘ Klárika él ,de ...’ ( Klárika lives but...) touches the reader deeply , even if Lombosi Jenõ does not contain much news values. The illness of the 20-year-old girl turns out only half of the story , the author used the technique of retardation to raise curiosity and sympathy in the reader. This way people get more enthusiastic or indignant. In the end the reader is not interested in the fate of Klárika, but he is angry with the system and the bureaucratism that rather hinder than help the life of this unlucky girl.
Another way of getting 8 people involved in an issue is writing about famous persons as an example for them. For instance Harmat Endre’s story about Marlon Brando, who sent an Indian girl to the Oscar ceremony to take over the prize. Brando wanted people to realise how badly Indians are treated. To confirm the actor’s opinion Harmat Endre provided statistics of Indians’ average age and historical facts about the government’s politics towards the natives. The personality of Brando influences many readers to take side of the Indians. Setting up a good example, people believe an opinion more easily than talking in general, warning and advising people what to pay attention to.
It is surprising to find printed matter like the one about Klárika in a socialist newspaper, since it criticises the bad provision of the socially disadvantaged people. It contradicts the image of socialism, that ‘Proletarians of the World, Unite!’, which slogan is found on the front page of the newspaper. There is an article mentioning the typical thinking of the previous system, namely ‘the settled and accepted rules of socialist living together’. (Mitzki, E. 1976, p2) The article contains almost no news values, only the repeal of the noise restriction order. The author tells the public opinion about vandals and machines operating too loudly, so disturbing the ones trying to sleep after night shift. The socialist attitude is well-perceptible, it suggests people not to allow to disturb the everyday men’s life. After feeling the feed-back for their complaint, the audience will surely have more confident in the newspaper and higher selling rates will be accomplished.
Tradition was another socialist value, presenting positive events and views on customs fortifies pride in people. They become more faithful citizen of the party which praise them. I read a short story titled ‘Bárány nélkül kereskedõ’(no author, 1976, p3), which had no news values at all. It just helped people to get over difficult points in life, by telling them how great and famous forests we had. It really encourages people to make themselves believe the magnitude of the Hungarian nation. On the second page news about the main cities of the region are to be found. Among these news one deals with the pig market in Pécs (Rné, 1976. p2). It misses the more varied supply of pigs, although the demand was booming. The author worries about the dying out of another tradition. It gives detailed amounts of sold , brought and processed pigs at the abattoir. These facts catch the attention of skilled workers, agricultural workers and of people living in villages, who meant the great mass in 1976.
A more stratified topic is public health. People are always concerned in their health, thus they are curious about the state of hospitals, new operation techniques and about improvements in hospital treatment. Kampis Péter wrote two articles about public health. Facility as news value appear in both, though to different degree. The first one is an interview with Õry Imre, the assistant under-secretary of the Ministry of Public Health(Kampis, P. 1976. p6), as stated in the subheads. He informs us about labour frequency in different strata, sums of money invested in developing equipment and the advance in professional skill. The reader might think that this article does not include many features of facility, for example facts, figures, names or locations. But after the second article he will realise how many times more facts appeared in the interview with Mr Õry. So, the second article I would like to mention has the title ‘ szívet mûtenek’ (Kampis, P. 1976. p3), and the subhead is ‘Csodálatosan precíz és emberi’ (in English: Wonderfully precise and human). It implies that the style of the writing is more human, not so scientific, consequently more people will at least read into. After realising that the topic might concern himself as well, he will read through it thoroughly. In fact, the article is entertaining, since it describes the author’s personal experiences, which is more impressive than reading an interview about the newest operation. What most astonished me was the use of foreign words, loan words, like ‘team’, ‘pacemaker’ or ‘akupuntúra’ (acupuncture in English). I thought that these words invaded Hungary only after 1989, and in some places ‘team’ is not well-accepted, though many people use it. Kampis Péter wrote about the same operation done every day in the USA with more modern equipment and with more money. He also gave statistics about heart-attack: it appears most frequently among doctors and journalists.
If I stick to pure facts the regional news on page 2 offer more occurrence of facility. The numbers of the pig market in Pécs and the information about a factory enlargement in Zalaegerszeg (K.G. 1976. p2) give the reader exact ideas of money, places and numbers. These news are less exciting, but they are more objective, because they cover more figures. In the centrefold appears the most facility and meanwhile the most negativity. Negativity cannot be left out from any newspapers or television news. People are always attentive while speaking about crimes, catastrophes or accidents. In Dunántúli Napló not many of these occur, because socialist leaders did not want people to get worried or afraid. Also the number of crimes was lower than it is now, in 1996. The ‘peaceful, socialist living together ‘ was supported by the newspapers leaving out news full of negativity. But I counted a bit again, and I realised that 7 of the 13 international news deals with negativity. For example, in New York a smuggler group was arrested and violent conflict formed between black Americans and white people. In Rome the number of divorces, armed robberies, murders and kidnappings has increased. From Japan and Spain socialist successes were reported. In the few sentences about Vietnam the USA was presented as an unfriendly, aggressive country, who wants to build military positions to an island just to observe the Arabian-peninsula and the Persian-gulf.
On the other part of the centrefold there is an article about Komló, which was an important industrial city at that time. In the second half of the article facility is characteristic. It tells about the number of crimes decreasing in Komló, although, as it is an industrial, developing city new-comers, skilled workers will arrive in big number. It warns the inhabitants to be careful with strangers, while police will work on protecting people due to the socialist attitude. The title indicates negativity in the printed matter, but only the first part of the story deals with subsequent offender, who moves the reader to pity, instead of making him angry.
During the weekend before Santa Claus’ arrival not many breakthrough events happened in Hungary (maybe to give children time to clean their boots). Journalists tried to fulfil every reader’s requirement and interest, including political, regional news, stories about famous persons and sports news. Ergo to catch people’s attention personalization prevailed. The less of negativity and facility assures the impression of the slow motion of the world. People did not get anxious about anything, it was only an ordinary day in their life. Only children were excited when they were waiting for Santa Claus to bring them presents.
Journalism was always present in life. It had and still has great influence on the readers, that is why political parties and other organisations have their own newspapers. In 1976 the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party (MSZMP in Hungarian) was in power. The party had its Committees in every county , so in Baranya, too. This committee owned the regional newspaper of that time called Új Dunántúli Napló. I compared the little column for the newspaper’s staff and realised that it was printed in the same press, although the name of the company has changed. In 1976 the publisher was called the Baranya County’s Publishing Company and in 1996 a Hungarian-German joint venture publishes the paper. The editor-in-chief, who had one story in this issue, was Mitzki Ervin, Who fulfilled this duty till 1989. Of the journalists I found two names who worked for Dunántúli Napló and still writes articles for Új Dunántúli Napló. It is to be noted that many authors put down only their initials, so it is hard to define if the persons hid behind the same initials in the two newspapers are the same. With the change of the regime the editor-in-chief was dismissed and Lombosi Jenõ took up his post. From that staff about 20 people still works for the paper, but reducing the number of employees is concomitant of capitalism.
Socialist influence is sensible through the whole newspaper. I tried to observe the clichés and techniques that were used in that era and I will also present three news values in Dunántúli Napló’s December 6,1976 edition. This paper will highlight how the newspaper reported events that were characterised by personalization, facility and negativity.
On the basis of the Monday edition, many events happened in the world at weekend, all of them are very short, only a few-sentence-long. There are longer international news, which are about the Spanish and the Japan Social Parties one is about Marlon Brando, demonstrating against the white men’s treating of Indians, and another reports the death of the actor, Rupert Davis, who acted in the Maigret series.
In Hungary there were two political news worth mentioning according to the newspaper, one is about Kádár János intending to go Wien, and the other is about Gáspár Sándor staying in Warsaw. The edition contained articles about the bigger cities in Transdanubia, like Zalaegerszeg, Baja, Szekszárd. Each informed readers about regional events, constructions or factories. Kampis Péter wrote two interviews about public health. first he talked with the assistant under-secretary of the Ministry of Public Health. Secondly he put down his impressions about heart operation. He was amused by the incredible medical treatments doctors did, and he had some examples from the USA. Besides, after reading the newspaper readers came to know that in Bem street in a shop gold was sold for 3 million forints that year; that the number of crime decreased in Komló, and that Darvas Iván would act in Pécs and he spoke about the character he personified. And at last there’s an article which was written by the present editor-in-chief, Lombosi Jenõ, introducing us Klárika , who suffers from muscular contraction and has no identification card, because she cannot look after herself.
I counted a list concerning the number of the articles about Hungarian and international news and the length of them. I found that these were 18 Hungarian-topic stories without sports news on 5 pages and 15 international news on 1 page. That suggests an impressive picture of the length of international news, namely that most of them are not longer than a few rows.
Not only shortness is a main feature of news reporting in the issue, but also personalization. Many of the articles do not contain the specific place, time, person and the event. While reading them I felt like looking at a magazine for women. If I want to generalise I could find the column in which a person with serious illness tells about his life. The story titled ‘ Klárika él ,de ...’ ( Klárika lives but...) touches the reader deeply , even if Lombosi Jenõ does not contain much news values. The illness of the 20-year-old girl turns out only half of the story , the author used the technique of retardation to raise curiosity and sympathy in the reader. This way people get more enthusiastic or indignant. In the end the reader is not interested in the fate of Klárika, but he is angry with the system and the bureaucratism that rather hinder than help the life of this unlucky girl.
Another way of getting 8 people involved in an issue is writing about famous persons as an example for them. For instance Harmat Endre’s story about Marlon Brando, who sent an Indian girl to the Oscar ceremony to take over the prize. Brando wanted people to realise how badly Indians are treated. To confirm the actor’s opinion Harmat Endre provided statistics of Indians’ average age and historical facts about the government’s politics towards the natives. The personality of Brando influences many readers to take side of the Indians. Setting up a good example, people believe an opinion more easily than talking in general, warning and advising people what to pay attention to.
It is surprising to find printed matter like the one about Klárika in a socialist newspaper, since it criticises the bad provision of the socially disadvantaged people. It contradicts the image of socialism, that ‘Proletarians of the World, Unite!’, which slogan is found on the front page of the newspaper. There is an article mentioning the typical thinking of the previous system, namely ‘the settled and accepted rules of socialist living together’. (Mitzki, E. 1976, p2) The article contains almost no news values, only the repeal of the noise restriction order. The author tells the public opinion about vandals and machines operating too loudly, so disturbing the ones trying to sleep after night shift. The socialist attitude is well-perceptible, it suggests people not to allow to disturb the everyday men’s life. After feeling the feed-back for their complaint, the audience will surely have more confident in the newspaper and higher selling rates will be accomplished.
Tradition was another socialist value, presenting positive events and views on customs fortifies pride in people. They become more faithful citizen of the party which praise them. I read a short story titled ‘Bárány nélkül kereskedõ’(no author, 1976, p3), which had no news values at all. It just helped people to get over difficult points in life, by telling them how great and famous forests we had. It really encourages people to make themselves believe the magnitude of the Hungarian nation. On the second page news about the main cities of the region are to be found. Among these news one deals with the pig market in Pécs (Rné, 1976. p2). It misses the more varied supply of pigs, although the demand was booming. The author worries about the dying out of another tradition. It gives detailed amounts of sold , brought and processed pigs at the abattoir. These facts catch the attention of skilled workers, agricultural workers and of people living in villages, who meant the great mass in 1976.
A more stratified topic is public health. People are always concerned in their health, thus they are curious about the state of hospitals, new operation techniques and about improvements in hospital treatment. Kampis Péter wrote two articles about public health. Facility as news value appear in both, though to different degree. The first one is an interview with Õry Imre, the assistant under-secretary of the Ministry of Public Health(Kampis, P. 1976. p6), as stated in the subheads. He informs us about labour frequency in different strata, sums of money invested in developing equipment and the advance in professional skill. The reader might think that this article does not include many features of facility, for example facts, figures, names or locations. But after the second article he will realise how many times more facts appeared in the interview with Mr Õry. So, the second article I would like to mention has the title ‘ szívet mûtenek’ (Kampis, P. 1976. p3), and the subhead is ‘Csodálatosan precíz és emberi’ (in English: Wonderfully precise and human). It implies that the style of the writing is more human, not so scientific, consequently more people will at least read into. After realising that the topic might concern himself as well, he will read through it thoroughly. In fact, the article is entertaining, since it describes the author’s personal experiences, which is more impressive than reading an interview about the newest operation. What most astonished me was the use of foreign words, loan words, like ‘team’, ‘pacemaker’ or ‘akupuntúra’ (acupuncture in English). I thought that these words invaded Hungary only after 1989, and in some places ‘team’ is not well-accepted, though many people use it. Kampis Péter wrote about the same operation done every day in the USA with more modern equipment and with more money. He also gave statistics about heart-attack: it appears most frequently among doctors and journalists.
If I stick to pure facts the regional news on page 2 offer more occurrence of facility. The numbers of the pig market in Pécs and the information about a factory enlargement in Zalaegerszeg (K.G. 1976. p2) give the reader exact ideas of money, places and numbers. These news are less exciting, but they are more objective, because they cover more figures. In the centrefold appears the most facility and meanwhile the most negativity. Negativity cannot be left out from any newspapers or television news. People are always attentive while speaking about crimes, catastrophes or accidents. In Dunántúli Napló not many of these occur, because socialist leaders did not want people to get worried or afraid. Also the number of crimes was lower than it is now, in 1996. The ‘peaceful, socialist living together ‘ was supported by the newspapers leaving out news full of negativity. But I counted a bit again, and I realised that 7 of the 13 international news deals with negativity. For example, in New York a smuggler group was arrested and violent conflict formed between black Americans and white people. In Rome the number of divorces, armed robberies, murders and kidnappings has increased. From Japan and Spain socialist successes were reported. In the few sentences about Vietnam the USA was presented as an unfriendly, aggressive country, who wants to build military positions to an island just to observe the Arabian-peninsula and the Persian-gulf.
On the other part of the centrefold there is an article about Komló, which was an important industrial city at that time. In the second half of the article facility is characteristic. It tells about the number of crimes decreasing in Komló, although, as it is an industrial, developing city new-comers, skilled workers will arrive in big number. It warns the inhabitants to be careful with strangers, while police will work on protecting people due to the socialist attitude. The title indicates negativity in the printed matter, but only the first part of the story deals with subsequent offender, who moves the reader to pity, instead of making him angry.
During the weekend before Santa Claus’ arrival not many breakthrough events happened in Hungary (maybe to give children time to clean their boots). Journalists tried to fulfil every reader’s requirement and interest, including political, regional news, stories about famous persons and sports news. Ergo to catch people’s attention personalization prevailed. The less of negativity and facility assures the impression of the slow motion of the world. People did not get anxious about anything, it was only an ordinary day in their life. Only children were excited when they were waiting for Santa Claus to bring them presents.
W 093 F
INTRODUCTION
The aim of my research is to represent the day of my birth on 10th February in 1979. This paper introduces the happenings that occupied people on that particular day, based on the articles of two daily papers: Népszabadság and Csongrádi Hírlap. I chose Népszabadság because it has been the most popular daily paper in Hungary ever since. . Csongrádi Hírlap mainly focused on the events of Csongrád county where I was born. I examined two daily papers, because I wanted to see which one emphasised which aspect.
As 10th February in 1979 was a free Saturday, the structure and content of the papers differed from those on other weekdays. These newspapers were written to a wider layer of people; they included also entertaining articles and more sports news in order to amuse both young and old.
A history textbook (Konrád, Salamon. Történelem 4.) claims that by the late 70s the economic and social situation of the country was going regularly from bad to worse; the over-indebtedness became alarming. The leadership of the country considered the financial balance, solvency and sustaining the life standard to be in the centre. The Party apparatus directed the country without asking people, so the latter turned away from politics. They took care only of their personal prosperity and if they worked hard they succeeded.
As both newspapers begun with the slogan: Proletarians of the World, Unite!, it is not a surprise that the articles on politics were written according to the Hungarian Socialist Labour Party.
METHOD
I surveyed Népszabadság and Csongrádi Hírlap issued on 10th February in 1979 according to three aspects.
First I analysed the two newspapers separately in accordance to form, structure and content, then compared them and examined the overlaps and differences between them.
® FORM
Newspaper readers seek for either the usual type of papers or the unusual attention-attracter papers. I checked the sizes of the newspapers and the location of the articles....
® STRUCTURE
I examined the structural proportion of the articles in both newspapers - how much they commented on politics, economics and sports.
® CONTENT
I analysed the content of both newspapers and what the editorial articles were about; as those would call the attention of the readers to the actual problems. I investigated what home news and news from abroad could be found in which paper, and whether there were any overlaps between them
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Népszabadság was the central newspaper of MSZMP, and as such it had a wide circulation.. Its significance used to be nation-wide; not only because it did not have many competitors, but because it rose questions of public interest. It gave a global view about the country. It talked to everyone using a language within the capacity of ordinary people.
Népszabadság consisted of 12 pages which were the size of 60X40 cm. The title was located on the top of the first page, it got the hugest emphasize. The titles of articles were composed with letters according to the size and importance of them. The outlook of the newspaper was rather serious; it was set in black and white; it contained few illustrations, as the task of a political daily paper is not to entertain but to inform people.
The main subjects of Népszabadság were internal politics and foreign affairs; in particular consideration for socialist countries and economics. It also included advertisements, TV and radio programs, sports and crossword puzzles..
The editorial article of the paper was situated on the left of the first page so that the reader could catch it first. The first and second pages commented on foreign affairs through 15 articles. On the third and fourth pages Hungarian politics took part - articles about the Party and visits of statesmen to certain areas of the country.. The fifth and sixth pages informed the reader about the state of Hungarian economics and commerce. On the following pages news was to be found being rather mixed, talking to people who were interested in interesting information, including deaths of famous people, disasters, accidents, sports and TV programs. Népszabadság also dealt with legal guidance, opinions of readers and advice for gardeners. A whole page was given for advertising purposes and one - the last one - for commenting on sports news.
The editorial article is usually the first item that one would read. According to Kapajag Imre the most up-to-date information to be communicated is that the Minister of Commerce opened a self service restaurant in Óbuda. The writer of the article considers the step a significant one for the future. The presence of the Minister was symbolic as the Ministry had announced the self service program 10 years earlier. The changing demands of customers, the troubles of staffnumber in commerce, the growing of foreign tourist traffic incited the craft to initiate new methods. So, however slowly, self service system was more and more spreading.
Foreign affairs took place in the first two pages; the situation abroad was rather vivid those days - social tensions were to face with in several countries.
The correspondent of Népszabadság gave information of the critical situation in French. In Longwy, Nantes, thousands of young people went on strike against unemployment. The police shot tearsmoke into the crowd. Rocher, the secretary of federal communist party claimed that “the power replies by tearsmoke and truncheon to those who demand bread and work and protect their own rights” (2).
In Sanghai thousands of young people who were sent to the country for the purpose of re-education, stroke against the party committee. Their behaviour was exclaimed to be causeless and unbearable - nothing changed. As answer to the flat refusal of the committee the strikers stopped the trains and blocked traffic. .
The life of politics in Hungary was peaceful that day. Népszabadság gave information about party leaders’ visits to different parts of the country. . . .
Economics. On the particular occasion of the 30th anniversary of the formation of the Council of Mutual Economical Aid ( COMECON ) a celebration was held in the House of Soviet Culture and Science. Papp László, the chairman of the committee of Technical Improvement, claimed that ’’Hungary has taken place in the work of COMECON in an active way.’’(4) We also strived for developing our economic contacts both with the capital states and developing countries without discrimination, on the footing of reciprocal equality.
Here come the news which I found rather colourful after the serious politics and economics..
There was a natural gas explosion in Zsana which caused Fire. Hundreds of firemen had attempted to defend it for the 16th day, unsuccessfully. The only hope was laid in the army, they would assault the equipment with cannons. “However, the Cameron-type explosion-obstructive equipment was made of steel; so the firemen and the army could only weaken its position” (7). T. E. did not tell how the action resulted.
The last item in Népszabadság was sport. A Budapest-Championship was held in the soul of European Championship in the Olimpiai Csarnok. Champions would be ordained in 13 items: Woman and man of 60, 400 and 1500 metres running; 4X100 metres of relay-race, pole jumping, shot putting, long jump and high jump.
CSONGRÁDI HÍRLAP is a local paper which means it is popular only in Csongrád county. It deals mainly with the happenings of the towns within the county; however it also gives information about foreign affairs and country-wide politics.
Csongrádi Hírlap consists of 10 pages which are 42X30 cm large Its title can be found on the top of the first page. The paper was printed in black, even the illustrations were black and white.
The main subjects of Csongrádi Hírlap were local news, internal politics, foreign affairs, sports, crossword-puzzles and TV programmes.
The editorial article was located in the left of the first page. The first page gave information about local economics and public life events. The second page consisted of 10 articles of foreign affairs. The 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th pages informed the reader about local news of economics, commerce and events of public interest. The rest of the paper was to entertain the audience.
The editorial article written by Bedõ Nándor gave a general overview about how a higher life standard could be reached. He claimed that “ Our society has come over the witchcraft of quantity” (1), now quality was emphasized. “We have to find durably expedient solutions to our up-to-date businesses. This cannot be achieved elseway but by a more high standard working behaviour that is more productive.’’ (1). .
A Hungarian-Yugoslavian electricity-industrial argument took place in Szeged. Schiller János, leader of the Hungarian delegation claimed that “ the energy exchange and the reciprocal help in case of operating troubles are regular through the transmission lines between the two countries “ (1).
The page of foreign affairs informed the reader about the general tensions in Sanghai, as well as about the strikes in France. . .
Local news. An assembly of co-operative farms of Csongrád county took place on Friday. The Kinizsi Tsz. closed the year 1978 with good production results. The Lenin Tsz. closed the year with deficiency; the yield of fodder production stayed behind the planned amount - so the sustainment of livestock could be managed only by buying import fodder. The Május 1. Tsz. surpassed the norms in plant production but in animal breading only 10 million forints of benefit was realised instead of the planned 12 million forints.
A memorial celebration was held in the House of Soviet Culture and Science for the 30th anniversary of the forming of COMECON.
In Zsana the situation was unchanged. Thousands of firemen had been fighting against the fire caused by the natural gas explosion -resultlessly.
In Szeged a celebration of conferring of doctor‘s degree took place in József Attila University. 76 students of lawyers, 26 arts students, 29 students of natural science took their doctor’s degree over.
Csongrádi Hírlap gave a list of names who had been born, died and married on the 10th February, 1979 in Csongrád county. 84 babies were born including myself, 13 couples got married and 103 people died on that particular day.
Sport. On Saturday and Sunday the 3-week-long fight for the Cup of Csongrádi Hírlap in handball would come to finish in Szeged Sports Hall. Only two teams of men were fighting for the gold medal: Szegedi Volán and Szegedi DVSC. . In women’s regard Békéscsaba Elõre Spartacus and Szegedi Konzerv SK would possess the best chances.
CONCLUSION
NÉPSZABADSÁG was a mass circulation newspaper; it has been read in every region of the country. Csongrádi Hírlap was also a mass circulation newspaper but only in the relations of the county.
The structure of contents of the two daily papers was similar.
Csongrádi Hírlap obviously took several news over from Népszabadság, most of which were in connection with foreign affairs and home politics, for example: visits of statesmen and the 30th anniversary celebration of COMECON.
Both papers commented on the gas explosion of Zsana . This catastrophe must have been the most significant event of that time which occupied the public sentiment and rose the most concern of people in the country.
The editorial articles of the newspapers were written on different subjects; though both of them expressed a general state of affairs of the country with a desire for improvement.
The differences between Népszabadság and Csongrádi Hírlap followed from the fact that Népszabadság gave a global overview on the happenings of the country and Csongrádi Hírlap reduced its attention to the problems concerning Csongrád county.
I wonder if people were buying these papers because it was a fashion or a symbol of status; or because they were interested in the content of them. The lack of real information has been somewhat disturbing for me during the writing of this research paper; however, this quality of newspapers must have satisfied Hungarian people in 1979 because neither Népszabadság nor Csongrádi Hírlap has gone bankrupt since.
The aim of my research is to represent the day of my birth on 10th February in 1979. This paper introduces the happenings that occupied people on that particular day, based on the articles of two daily papers: Népszabadság and Csongrádi Hírlap. I chose Népszabadság because it has been the most popular daily paper in Hungary ever since. . Csongrádi Hírlap mainly focused on the events of Csongrád county where I was born. I examined two daily papers, because I wanted to see which one emphasised which aspect.
As 10th February in 1979 was a free Saturday, the structure and content of the papers differed from those on other weekdays. These newspapers were written to a wider layer of people; they included also entertaining articles and more sports news in order to amuse both young and old.
A history textbook (Konrád, Salamon. Történelem 4.) claims that by the late 70s the economic and social situation of the country was going regularly from bad to worse; the over-indebtedness became alarming. The leadership of the country considered the financial balance, solvency and sustaining the life standard to be in the centre. The Party apparatus directed the country without asking people, so the latter turned away from politics. They took care only of their personal prosperity and if they worked hard they succeeded.
As both newspapers begun with the slogan: Proletarians of the World, Unite!, it is not a surprise that the articles on politics were written according to the Hungarian Socialist Labour Party.
METHOD
I surveyed Népszabadság and Csongrádi Hírlap issued on 10th February in 1979 according to three aspects.
First I analysed the two newspapers separately in accordance to form, structure and content, then compared them and examined the overlaps and differences between them.
® FORM
Newspaper readers seek for either the usual type of papers or the unusual attention-attracter papers. I checked the sizes of the newspapers and the location of the articles....
® STRUCTURE
I examined the structural proportion of the articles in both newspapers - how much they commented on politics, economics and sports.
® CONTENT
I analysed the content of both newspapers and what the editorial articles were about; as those would call the attention of the readers to the actual problems. I investigated what home news and news from abroad could be found in which paper, and whether there were any overlaps between them
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Népszabadság was the central newspaper of MSZMP, and as such it had a wide circulation.. Its significance used to be nation-wide; not only because it did not have many competitors, but because it rose questions of public interest. It gave a global view about the country. It talked to everyone using a language within the capacity of ordinary people.
Népszabadság consisted of 12 pages which were the size of 60X40 cm. The title was located on the top of the first page, it got the hugest emphasize. The titles of articles were composed with letters according to the size and importance of them. The outlook of the newspaper was rather serious; it was set in black and white; it contained few illustrations, as the task of a political daily paper is not to entertain but to inform people.
The main subjects of Népszabadság were internal politics and foreign affairs; in particular consideration for socialist countries and economics. It also included advertisements, TV and radio programs, sports and crossword puzzles..
The editorial article of the paper was situated on the left of the first page so that the reader could catch it first. The first and second pages commented on foreign affairs through 15 articles. On the third and fourth pages Hungarian politics took part - articles about the Party and visits of statesmen to certain areas of the country.. The fifth and sixth pages informed the reader about the state of Hungarian economics and commerce. On the following pages news was to be found being rather mixed, talking to people who were interested in interesting information, including deaths of famous people, disasters, accidents, sports and TV programs. Népszabadság also dealt with legal guidance, opinions of readers and advice for gardeners. A whole page was given for advertising purposes and one - the last one - for commenting on sports news.
The editorial article is usually the first item that one would read. According to Kapajag Imre the most up-to-date information to be communicated is that the Minister of Commerce opened a self service restaurant in Óbuda. The writer of the article considers the step a significant one for the future. The presence of the Minister was symbolic as the Ministry had announced the self service program 10 years earlier. The changing demands of customers, the troubles of staffnumber in commerce, the growing of foreign tourist traffic incited the craft to initiate new methods. So, however slowly, self service system was more and more spreading.
Foreign affairs took place in the first two pages; the situation abroad was rather vivid those days - social tensions were to face with in several countries.
The correspondent of Népszabadság gave information of the critical situation in French. In Longwy, Nantes, thousands of young people went on strike against unemployment. The police shot tearsmoke into the crowd. Rocher, the secretary of federal communist party claimed that “the power replies by tearsmoke and truncheon to those who demand bread and work and protect their own rights” (2).
In Sanghai thousands of young people who were sent to the country for the purpose of re-education, stroke against the party committee. Their behaviour was exclaimed to be causeless and unbearable - nothing changed. As answer to the flat refusal of the committee the strikers stopped the trains and blocked traffic. .
The life of politics in Hungary was peaceful that day. Népszabadság gave information about party leaders’ visits to different parts of the country. . . .
Economics. On the particular occasion of the 30th anniversary of the formation of the Council of Mutual Economical Aid ( COMECON ) a celebration was held in the House of Soviet Culture and Science. Papp László, the chairman of the committee of Technical Improvement, claimed that ’’Hungary has taken place in the work of COMECON in an active way.’’(4) We also strived for developing our economic contacts both with the capital states and developing countries without discrimination, on the footing of reciprocal equality.
Here come the news which I found rather colourful after the serious politics and economics..
There was a natural gas explosion in Zsana which caused Fire. Hundreds of firemen had attempted to defend it for the 16th day, unsuccessfully. The only hope was laid in the army, they would assault the equipment with cannons. “However, the Cameron-type explosion-obstructive equipment was made of steel; so the firemen and the army could only weaken its position” (7). T. E. did not tell how the action resulted.
The last item in Népszabadság was sport. A Budapest-Championship was held in the soul of European Championship in the Olimpiai Csarnok. Champions would be ordained in 13 items: Woman and man of 60, 400 and 1500 metres running; 4X100 metres of relay-race, pole jumping, shot putting, long jump and high jump.
CSONGRÁDI HÍRLAP is a local paper which means it is popular only in Csongrád county. It deals mainly with the happenings of the towns within the county; however it also gives information about foreign affairs and country-wide politics.
Csongrádi Hírlap consists of 10 pages which are 42X30 cm large Its title can be found on the top of the first page. The paper was printed in black, even the illustrations were black and white.
The main subjects of Csongrádi Hírlap were local news, internal politics, foreign affairs, sports, crossword-puzzles and TV programmes.
The editorial article was located in the left of the first page. The first page gave information about local economics and public life events. The second page consisted of 10 articles of foreign affairs. The 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th pages informed the reader about local news of economics, commerce and events of public interest. The rest of the paper was to entertain the audience.
The editorial article written by Bedõ Nándor gave a general overview about how a higher life standard could be reached. He claimed that “ Our society has come over the witchcraft of quantity” (1), now quality was emphasized. “We have to find durably expedient solutions to our up-to-date businesses. This cannot be achieved elseway but by a more high standard working behaviour that is more productive.’’ (1). .
A Hungarian-Yugoslavian electricity-industrial argument took place in Szeged. Schiller János, leader of the Hungarian delegation claimed that “ the energy exchange and the reciprocal help in case of operating troubles are regular through the transmission lines between the two countries “ (1).
The page of foreign affairs informed the reader about the general tensions in Sanghai, as well as about the strikes in France. . .
Local news. An assembly of co-operative farms of Csongrád county took place on Friday. The Kinizsi Tsz. closed the year 1978 with good production results. The Lenin Tsz. closed the year with deficiency; the yield of fodder production stayed behind the planned amount - so the sustainment of livestock could be managed only by buying import fodder. The Május 1. Tsz. surpassed the norms in plant production but in animal breading only 10 million forints of benefit was realised instead of the planned 12 million forints.
A memorial celebration was held in the House of Soviet Culture and Science for the 30th anniversary of the forming of COMECON.
In Zsana the situation was unchanged. Thousands of firemen had been fighting against the fire caused by the natural gas explosion -resultlessly.
In Szeged a celebration of conferring of doctor‘s degree took place in József Attila University. 76 students of lawyers, 26 arts students, 29 students of natural science took their doctor’s degree over.
Csongrádi Hírlap gave a list of names who had been born, died and married on the 10th February, 1979 in Csongrád county. 84 babies were born including myself, 13 couples got married and 103 people died on that particular day.
Sport. On Saturday and Sunday the 3-week-long fight for the Cup of Csongrádi Hírlap in handball would come to finish in Szeged Sports Hall. Only two teams of men were fighting for the gold medal: Szegedi Volán and Szegedi DVSC. . In women’s regard Békéscsaba Elõre Spartacus and Szegedi Konzerv SK would possess the best chances.
CONCLUSION
NÉPSZABADSÁG was a mass circulation newspaper; it has been read in every region of the country. Csongrádi Hírlap was also a mass circulation newspaper but only in the relations of the county.
The structure of contents of the two daily papers was similar.
Csongrádi Hírlap obviously took several news over from Népszabadság, most of which were in connection with foreign affairs and home politics, for example: visits of statesmen and the 30th anniversary celebration of COMECON.
Both papers commented on the gas explosion of Zsana . This catastrophe must have been the most significant event of that time which occupied the public sentiment and rose the most concern of people in the country.
The editorial articles of the newspapers were written on different subjects; though both of them expressed a general state of affairs of the country with a desire for improvement.
The differences between Népszabadság and Csongrádi Hírlap followed from the fact that Népszabadság gave a global overview on the happenings of the country and Csongrádi Hírlap reduced its attention to the problems concerning Csongrád county.
I wonder if people were buying these papers because it was a fashion or a symbol of status; or because they were interested in the content of them. The lack of real information has been somewhat disturbing for me during the writing of this research paper; however, this quality of newspapers must have satisfied Hungarian people in 1979 because neither Népszabadság nor Csongrádi Hírlap has gone bankrupt since.
W 092 F
Introduction
In the 1970s the most easily accessible source of information was the newspaper. In Hungary the best known daily papers were Népszabadság, Magyar Hírlap, Szabadföld and here in Transdanubia Dunántúli Napló. Like all others, Dunántuli was a paper of the Socialist Workers' Party, no freedom of speech was allowed; this could only publish news stories that favoured the Party and the Soviets. Dunántúli was a reasonably informative newspaper, including moderately important news. Few articles were written in the way most readers would imagine an ideal news-item to be written; they did not always report on the most recent and relevant news. However, there were some news values demonstrated in the articles. This paper will examine how two of these values, negativity and facility, were represented and presented in certain articles published in Dunántúli Napló on 4 December, 1976. It was a Saturday, when people stayed at home or even if they went to work they finished earlier than on weekdays, so they had more time to read newspaper. First, however, a general view of the report news will be given.
Method
This issue of Dunántúli Napló contained 8 pages, out of which on the first, the second, the third, and on the fifth we could find national and international news; in the rest of the paper there were cultural ("When was Father Christmas alive?", "Forefathers in Rudabánya”) and literary columns and reports about what happened in our town, in Pécs, and in its neighbourhood in the last twenty-four hours. The paper also included advertisements, but not as many as now. The ratio between home and foreign news stories was 2:1. Most world news articles share common feature: they rejected everything that was anti-Soviet and was related to Western societies.
Result and Discusion
In the following paper I am going to deal with the negativity of the news stories, which were published on 4th and 5th December in 1976. The news story reported that in Cuba Fidel Castro became the Chairman of the Council of State on that day, had one of the biggest coverage. Kádár János the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Worker's Party, Losonczi Pál the president of the Presidium of Hungarian People's Republic, and Lázár György, President of the Council of Ministers of the Hungarian People's Republic, sent him a telegram of congratulation.
I read through the two newspaper and I obtained a statement that this issue as well as the others are characterised by favouring the Soviets and disapproving of the West.
What the Hungarian news reports shared was that they mostly reported on the condition and development of our Hungary's heavy and light industry at that time. Like the articles about the coal, gas and oil consumption and about young miners in Mecsek, what I will also observe this report in detail.
The articles about Fidel Castro's installation ceremony and about the West-European Union's General Assembly were all dominated by a news value which, according to Allan Bell, is called negativity. "Damage, injury and death. Conflict between news, war reporting, is one of the earliest historical forms of news and a stimulus for the growth of the news media." In general, reporting on conflicts between people or countries, political parties or religious groups is considered to be examples of negativity. The bigger the damage or injury is, the more negative the article writing is, and the bigger coverage it gets. You can often read news stories dominated by negativity because many catastrophes, disasters and conflicts occur in everyday life. Journalists can make advantage of this common characteristic of people's.
On the fifth page of the paper there were two articles characterised by negativity. The first was long report in two columns, including ten proportioned paragraphs. The other was shorter also in two columns in four paragraphs. One of them reported about the installation ceremony; the other described the recommendations of the West-European Assembly. Real aims, undiminished development, about the national economic plan in 1977 and about the guiding principles of estimates.
Negativity in the first article had two levels: opposition to the Soviets and disagreement between China and Cuba. In order to inform the readers about all the details, the reporter used one named source, Castro's speech, but there was no other detail about where he had obtained this information. Although the only fact included to the title was the ceremony, the news story also summarised Castro's ideology. The installation was the most significant international, current event. Fidel Castro, who was helping to build socialism, was the secretary of the Cuban Communist Party and delivered a speech of thanks on 4 December.
The ideological ground of the Cuban revolution was the Marxism - Leninism. Castro favoured the Soviet's consistent peace policy. He convicted China's tragic distortion under Mao's Pekingan leadership, which betrayed the concern of the national revolution and lead astray the Chinese nation. " A Mao-féle pekingi vezetés elárulta a nemzeti forradalom ügyét és félrevezette a kínai népet."(4) China's big fault was that they supported the NATO, the army of the west of the capitalism; and they abused Soviets openly and attacked Cuba treacherously.
Instead of simply stating that China and Cuba could not agree about the idea or ideology of the national revolution, the author of the article also wrote about the causes of the disagreement; thus the article became more effective and informative. As a result the affair was made more complicated and more severe.
The other short article was about the West European Union's General Assembly, which on Thursday had come to its end in Paris. In this Western political circle the anti-Soviet atmosphere was predominant. The only fact included in the title was the end of this assembly, but the news story also summarised the consequences of the meeting and the recommendation, which was made public. By giving details about the meeting and about the western politics , negative factors or elements was highlighted more efficiently; reader were told that it was four day long and that this community propound a certain west European leaders political strategies more plainly. The writer of this article, whose name was not given, also considered it important to mention that in western leader orbits the aim is still to keep awake the anti-Soviet atmosphere, and they want to achieve a politically one-sided west European collective military structure. The news-writer also used specific vocabulary to express the negativity of the events. For example: deformed, one-sided politics, miss-shaped, right-sided media, propaganda slogans. "a NATO megõrzését és össszetartásának megóvását nyilvánítja az europai tartós béke egyedüli katonai biztosítékának".(3) The east European countries were desperate for Western aid, it seemed well past time to say goodbye to all that.
What was common in these article was that they all reported on events doing harm to many people and including political conflicts. The main value in them was negativity, it was emphasised by not merely listing what had happened but by giving important details, referring to different sources and using words that mean or suggest something negative.
Besides negativity facility ("The degree to which a story contains the kinds of facts and figures on which hard news thrives: locations, names, sums of money, numbers of all kinds.” 1) was a frequent news value represented in the articles of this particular issue of Dunántúli Napló. The more numbers, data, names and references are included in an article, the higher the facility-level, and the more precise the news-item becomes. Using many data makes the article more informative and authentic; the reader can grab the essence more easily.
In this newspaper all articles were based on well-authenticated news, but three of them could be considered as more facile than the rest; each of the three reported on Hungarian matters. One of them appeared on the fifth page in three column including about 500 words. It summarised the young people's life in coal-basin of the Mecsek. It also informed the readers about the ratio between the planed and the real productions. This article provide an inspection to young coal miner's life on workers lodging. The writer gave information about the reason for the increased need for more money , because the salary off the minors is little and the substance of the buses which carry them to Béta-bánya, where they work, deteriorate rapidly year by year. Inspite that they won the Hungarian People's Republic's outstanding brigade right.
However, this was the only article in which there were locations, names mentioned, referred to the salary of the workers (five thousand forint), and the exact source of news also has been indicated. The report mentioned the important strategies of factory life. For example, specialist help new workers adaptation so it is easier them to accept their life in coal-mine. But this young have not got opportunity for entertainment because their is no place instead of their workers longing where they play chess or card. "Aztán arról is lehetne beszélni, hogy a fiataloknak kevés szórakozási lehetõség kínálkozik."(2)
Five name were also mentioned who were asked about their life their work and what kind of changes they want. " Szeretnénk bányászegyenruhát. Rangot adna. Szeretnénk, ha a szocialista brigádok betartanák az évnyitón tett ígéreteiket." "több fiatalnak kellene vezetõ beosztásban lennie."(2) Three of them were cutter working in Zobák-puszta, the 4th hewer in Béta-bánya, the 5th was the member of KISZ KB the leader of the youth in Mecsek Colliery. Photo was given of them and the author of the article also named himself, Lombosi Jenõ, which made the news story believable, valid and provided the readers with a rather satisfactory amount of information.
The other report I mentioned earlier that was also facile is on the title-page, and it is about the Central Factory Unit of the Glovesfactory in Pécs, which finished a difficult but successful year.
Conclusion
Considering all these facts one can conclude that the examined articles published on 4 December, 1976 in Dunántúli Napló reported both world or home news; and although these were not always free from political pressure, they represented a news value; two of them were negativity and facility. The writer provided information from many sources in order to increase the level of these values, so that events could be believed easily. Perhaps it would be fascinating to examine how these values are demonstrated in an issue of Dunántúli Napló since the methods might be completely recent. If I would summarise my thoughts, I can say that most of the articles are about the greatness of communism and its ideology, and also the disapproval of the Western world.
In the 1970s the most easily accessible source of information was the newspaper. In Hungary the best known daily papers were Népszabadság, Magyar Hírlap, Szabadföld and here in Transdanubia Dunántúli Napló. Like all others, Dunántuli was a paper of the Socialist Workers' Party, no freedom of speech was allowed; this could only publish news stories that favoured the Party and the Soviets. Dunántúli was a reasonably informative newspaper, including moderately important news. Few articles were written in the way most readers would imagine an ideal news-item to be written; they did not always report on the most recent and relevant news. However, there were some news values demonstrated in the articles. This paper will examine how two of these values, negativity and facility, were represented and presented in certain articles published in Dunántúli Napló on 4 December, 1976. It was a Saturday, when people stayed at home or even if they went to work they finished earlier than on weekdays, so they had more time to read newspaper. First, however, a general view of the report news will be given.
Method
This issue of Dunántúli Napló contained 8 pages, out of which on the first, the second, the third, and on the fifth we could find national and international news; in the rest of the paper there were cultural ("When was Father Christmas alive?", "Forefathers in Rudabánya”) and literary columns and reports about what happened in our town, in Pécs, and in its neighbourhood in the last twenty-four hours. The paper also included advertisements, but not as many as now. The ratio between home and foreign news stories was 2:1. Most world news articles share common feature: they rejected everything that was anti-Soviet and was related to Western societies.
Result and Discusion
In the following paper I am going to deal with the negativity of the news stories, which were published on 4th and 5th December in 1976. The news story reported that in Cuba Fidel Castro became the Chairman of the Council of State on that day, had one of the biggest coverage. Kádár János the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Worker's Party, Losonczi Pál the president of the Presidium of Hungarian People's Republic, and Lázár György, President of the Council of Ministers of the Hungarian People's Republic, sent him a telegram of congratulation.
I read through the two newspaper and I obtained a statement that this issue as well as the others are characterised by favouring the Soviets and disapproving of the West.
What the Hungarian news reports shared was that they mostly reported on the condition and development of our Hungary's heavy and light industry at that time. Like the articles about the coal, gas and oil consumption and about young miners in Mecsek, what I will also observe this report in detail.
The articles about Fidel Castro's installation ceremony and about the West-European Union's General Assembly were all dominated by a news value which, according to Allan Bell, is called negativity. "Damage, injury and death. Conflict between news, war reporting, is one of the earliest historical forms of news and a stimulus for the growth of the news media." In general, reporting on conflicts between people or countries, political parties or religious groups is considered to be examples of negativity. The bigger the damage or injury is, the more negative the article writing is, and the bigger coverage it gets. You can often read news stories dominated by negativity because many catastrophes, disasters and conflicts occur in everyday life. Journalists can make advantage of this common characteristic of people's.
On the fifth page of the paper there were two articles characterised by negativity. The first was long report in two columns, including ten proportioned paragraphs. The other was shorter also in two columns in four paragraphs. One of them reported about the installation ceremony; the other described the recommendations of the West-European Assembly. Real aims, undiminished development, about the national economic plan in 1977 and about the guiding principles of estimates.
Negativity in the first article had two levels: opposition to the Soviets and disagreement between China and Cuba. In order to inform the readers about all the details, the reporter used one named source, Castro's speech, but there was no other detail about where he had obtained this information. Although the only fact included to the title was the ceremony, the news story also summarised Castro's ideology. The installation was the most significant international, current event. Fidel Castro, who was helping to build socialism, was the secretary of the Cuban Communist Party and delivered a speech of thanks on 4 December.
The ideological ground of the Cuban revolution was the Marxism - Leninism. Castro favoured the Soviet's consistent peace policy. He convicted China's tragic distortion under Mao's Pekingan leadership, which betrayed the concern of the national revolution and lead astray the Chinese nation. " A Mao-féle pekingi vezetés elárulta a nemzeti forradalom ügyét és félrevezette a kínai népet."(4) China's big fault was that they supported the NATO, the army of the west of the capitalism; and they abused Soviets openly and attacked Cuba treacherously.
Instead of simply stating that China and Cuba could not agree about the idea or ideology of the national revolution, the author of the article also wrote about the causes of the disagreement; thus the article became more effective and informative. As a result the affair was made more complicated and more severe.
The other short article was about the West European Union's General Assembly, which on Thursday had come to its end in Paris. In this Western political circle the anti-Soviet atmosphere was predominant. The only fact included in the title was the end of this assembly, but the news story also summarised the consequences of the meeting and the recommendation, which was made public. By giving details about the meeting and about the western politics , negative factors or elements was highlighted more efficiently; reader were told that it was four day long and that this community propound a certain west European leaders political strategies more plainly. The writer of this article, whose name was not given, also considered it important to mention that in western leader orbits the aim is still to keep awake the anti-Soviet atmosphere, and they want to achieve a politically one-sided west European collective military structure. The news-writer also used specific vocabulary to express the negativity of the events. For example: deformed, one-sided politics, miss-shaped, right-sided media, propaganda slogans. "a NATO megõrzését és össszetartásának megóvását nyilvánítja az europai tartós béke egyedüli katonai biztosítékának".(3) The east European countries were desperate for Western aid, it seemed well past time to say goodbye to all that.
What was common in these article was that they all reported on events doing harm to many people and including political conflicts. The main value in them was negativity, it was emphasised by not merely listing what had happened but by giving important details, referring to different sources and using words that mean or suggest something negative.
Besides negativity facility ("The degree to which a story contains the kinds of facts and figures on which hard news thrives: locations, names, sums of money, numbers of all kinds.” 1) was a frequent news value represented in the articles of this particular issue of Dunántúli Napló. The more numbers, data, names and references are included in an article, the higher the facility-level, and the more precise the news-item becomes. Using many data makes the article more informative and authentic; the reader can grab the essence more easily.
In this newspaper all articles were based on well-authenticated news, but three of them could be considered as more facile than the rest; each of the three reported on Hungarian matters. One of them appeared on the fifth page in three column including about 500 words. It summarised the young people's life in coal-basin of the Mecsek. It also informed the readers about the ratio between the planed and the real productions. This article provide an inspection to young coal miner's life on workers lodging. The writer gave information about the reason for the increased need for more money , because the salary off the minors is little and the substance of the buses which carry them to Béta-bánya, where they work, deteriorate rapidly year by year. Inspite that they won the Hungarian People's Republic's outstanding brigade right.
However, this was the only article in which there were locations, names mentioned, referred to the salary of the workers (five thousand forint), and the exact source of news also has been indicated. The report mentioned the important strategies of factory life. For example, specialist help new workers adaptation so it is easier them to accept their life in coal-mine. But this young have not got opportunity for entertainment because their is no place instead of their workers longing where they play chess or card. "Aztán arról is lehetne beszélni, hogy a fiataloknak kevés szórakozási lehetõség kínálkozik."(2)
Five name were also mentioned who were asked about their life their work and what kind of changes they want. " Szeretnénk bányászegyenruhát. Rangot adna. Szeretnénk, ha a szocialista brigádok betartanák az évnyitón tett ígéreteiket." "több fiatalnak kellene vezetõ beosztásban lennie."(2) Three of them were cutter working in Zobák-puszta, the 4th hewer in Béta-bánya, the 5th was the member of KISZ KB the leader of the youth in Mecsek Colliery. Photo was given of them and the author of the article also named himself, Lombosi Jenõ, which made the news story believable, valid and provided the readers with a rather satisfactory amount of information.
The other report I mentioned earlier that was also facile is on the title-page, and it is about the Central Factory Unit of the Glovesfactory in Pécs, which finished a difficult but successful year.
Conclusion
Considering all these facts one can conclude that the examined articles published on 4 December, 1976 in Dunántúli Napló reported both world or home news; and although these were not always free from political pressure, they represented a news value; two of them were negativity and facility. The writer provided information from many sources in order to increase the level of these values, so that events could be believed easily. Perhaps it would be fascinating to examine how these values are demonstrated in an issue of Dunántúli Napló since the methods might be completely recent. If I would summarise my thoughts, I can say that most of the articles are about the greatness of communism and its ideology, and also the disapproval of the Western world.
W 091 F
Dunántúli Napló is a Hungarian county daily newspaper which came into existence in the last two years of the second World War. The paper is popular amongst people living in the south of the country for two reasons: not only does it inform the reader in detail of the local news, but also that of national and international news as well. Seven years ago its name changed slightly from Dunántúli Napló to Új Dunántúli Napló owing to the new Hungarian regime, its only name change in fifty three years. The shape or the size of the paper has not been altered, only the numbers of pages amplified giving a more overall view of political, economical and cultural events.
Greater understanding of the actual regime can be achieved by examining the structure of the newspaper and analysing the text with the help of different news values such as consonance, unexpectedness or personalization. However, this paper will restrict its scope of investigation to the definition, identification and interpretation of three news values as represented in a Hungarian newspaper in the seventies. It will provide a text analysis of home and international news as well as of features and interviews in the April 14, 1973 edition of DN.
This paper can be divided into two parts: one shows the events that happened on that day or the preceding day in the country. Some examples are the following in this issue. This Saturday, as any other day in April must have been capricious: sleet, rain, clouds and a temperature of seven to twelve degrees centigrade. The lottery was drawn on Friday 13, in Dunaszekcsõ. The article notifies the reader of the process through the newspaper man (Rab Ferenc) who was present at the time. With the collaboration of five local inhabitants the numbers of ten, twenty-two, thirty-two, seventy-five, seventy-eight were drawn from the globe. Under the headline of “Megnyilt Walter Engel fotókiállitása” the reader is informed of an Austrian-Hungarian venture, as a result of which a photo exhibition was opened on Friday at Doktor Sándor Mûvelõdési Központ in Pécs. On the same page (page 4) in another column, the attention is drawn to the police who were still looking for eyewitnesses of an accident which took place at the end of the previous year. One of the front page stories is about a delegation of the Austrian Communist Party which was met by Kádár János in Budapest. Most importantly, more than one article can be found in this edition of DN in the center-fold and on the front page as well, about the preparations for the national elections of the council members which would take place on the following Sunday.
The other part is about the events in the world. This international news section is located on the second page of the newspaper. The main article on this page concerns Italy. The people in Milan went on strike, to express mass indignation against the fascist provocation which took place two days before. Another negative story was about an earthquake in Catanzaro in Italy. The earthquake caused only financial damage. Regarding Romania, one is informed of the return of the Romanian president, Nicolae Ceausescu, from Holland where he stayed for three days on an official visit. In West Germany, Chancellor Brandt was elected to become the president of the Social Democrat Party.
This issue of DN consisted of 8 pages and carried 48 news stories in all. Five of these were front page stories, 21 inside front cover foreign news stories with the rest of the stories on pages 3 to 6. Almost half of the news stories are foreign news. The front page story of Acél György's remarks at the national pioneers’ leaders conference was without an illustrative element. In the foreign news section (24 óra a nagyvilágban) and in the national news section respectively, two and five stories were shown with photographs. The news elements included reports of meetings, of the approaching council elections and of several other events in the world and in the country.
The articles on the second page of Dunántúli Napló are devoted to report about conflicts between certain countries, terrorist actions and clashes between political parties. The news value represented by these articles is negativity. Although fundamentally negative news is likely to appear on the front page of a newspaper, in this particular paper these articles are placed on the second page, as the first page is reserved for domestic news on political issues. There were at least three negative stories on the second page of the April 14, 1973 issue of DN . The longest one was a twelve paragraph long report on the UN Security Council’s discussion brought about by Lebanon’s proposal to terminate Israelis membership in the UN because of the country’s continuous aggression in the Middle East area, “a Biztonsági Tanács nem hagyhatja büntetlenül Izrael megismétlõdõ agresszióit ”. The story went on to disclose further details of the matter in question.
The story was negative in the way that it revealed the details of a serious disagreement between two Middle East countries. The story was probably an adaptation of news agency reports, however it was only indicated by the fact that the opinions of representatives of the member countries were reported from four different cities. The sources of the news items were not apparent as there were no direct quotations of the words of the different delegates and Ministers of Foreign Affairs. Negativity was the most apparent news value in this article but recency also contributed to the story because the event reported was one that had happened in the last 24 hours. However, unambiguity did not complement the story because the sources of news items were not impeccable.
There were numerous short, clear-cut, factual stories on the very same page. For these reasons they could be considered unambiguous, but neither one revealed the source of news items. One short story told about a rare, outstanding moment of medical history: a woman who had two wombs gave birth to two healthy babies on the very same day. ( Egy nõ két méhébõl-két gyerek ) This short news was complemented by another news value, that is, unexpectedness. „The unpredictable or the rare is more newsworthy than the routine.” (adapted version of Allan Bell’s 1991 analysis of news values).
Proximity is a news value which occurs in almost every article connected to local news. Newspaper men are aware of the public's bigger interest in incidents, developments which took place geographically close by and are essentially linked to the inhabitants' local community life.“ The minor accident is reportable in the settlement where it happens, not a hundred miles away.”(adapted version of Allan Bell's 1991 analysis of news values ). However, this news value can be presented together with proximity, negativity and facility as well as with many others.
A three paragraph long article at the bottom of the fifth page (DN April 14, 1973 Tömeg verekedés a pécsi nagypiacon) told about a brawl in the crowd at the Pécs Flea Market. A totally drunk man, Barics J. of Hásságy fell on the ground. A few customers were pulling and tossing him, to get him back on his feet. This scene was misunderstood by Barics’s companions, as they thought that Barics had been insulted. In a few minutes several people got involved in a mass fight that could only be finished by the police. Barics got injured during the fight, he was taken to hospital by ambulance.
The news value proximity was very well represented by this article. Hásságy is a village near Pécs and the Flea Market has always been a popular shopping place among the habitants of the town and the nearby villages. The reported event could only be placed in the DN because this news item only bore importance within this area.
Headlines of a newspaper also have a determining role in newspaper writing. Their functions are to capture the reader’s attention, to focus their attention on the issues, and in order to fulfil these aims they must synthesise the contents of the issues. DN applied several letter types and sizes to grab the reader’s attention: it used large-sized, coloured letters for the title of the newspaper. The headlines were printed in bold type to make it possible to get an outline of the contents for the reader who only skimmed through the newspaper. Longer or more important articles (eg. A Biztonsági Tanács elõtt Libanon panasza) were divided by sub-headlines still printed in bold type, but with smaller letters.
On the second page, in the foreign news section (24 óra a nagyvilágban), the presentation of the short stories was not a success, because too many letter types, highlighting and division devices had been applied. This method resulted in a somehow chaotic page. Headline placing and the choice of letter types turned out to be more successful on the rest of the pages; the look of these pages was neat and the column-placing was tidy.
Photos obviously have an important, illustrating function in newspapers. DN often used photos to throw light on those aspects of the news that did not become apparent only by the written text or to introduce an author or the subject of the article. There were photos on all pages.
The sources of news items in most cases were not clear. There were only three articles that were signed by their authors, one or two were signed only by the author’s initials and the majority of the articles carried no byline at all. The tendency throughout the whole newspaper was the disguising of sources. This tendency was not balanced by the few direct and the many more indirect quotations in the articles. Source disguising raises a serious problem, that is, ambiguity. News stories are supposed to be clear-cut but clarity cannot be achieved without revealing sources of news items. But the writing method of this paper was forced on journalists by the Hungarian regime that restricted the freedom of the press.
The day in question was a relatively uneventful one in Hungary, judging by the pages of Dunántúli Napló. The range of stories on offer was fairly undramatic in content, covering such subjects as the visit to Budapest by a delegation of Austrian communists, the opening of a photo exhibition, the results of a lottery draw and an appeal by the police for eyewitnesses to an accident. The most significant articles were the ones which concerned preparations for the national elections. Unfortunately, the reporting of some of these events, as well as some of the actual layout of the newspaper, left a lot to be desired. Some of the shortcomings included lack of bylines, unattributed sources, ambiguity in stories and occasionally cluttered layout. However, many of these flaws resulted from government control of the press and the subsequent pressure endured by journalists. Yet despite these problems, it can still be said that the newspaper contains good examples of the news values proximity, recency, negativity and even, sometimes, unambiguity.
Greater understanding of the actual regime can be achieved by examining the structure of the newspaper and analysing the text with the help of different news values such as consonance, unexpectedness or personalization. However, this paper will restrict its scope of investigation to the definition, identification and interpretation of three news values as represented in a Hungarian newspaper in the seventies. It will provide a text analysis of home and international news as well as of features and interviews in the April 14, 1973 edition of DN.
This paper can be divided into two parts: one shows the events that happened on that day or the preceding day in the country. Some examples are the following in this issue. This Saturday, as any other day in April must have been capricious: sleet, rain, clouds and a temperature of seven to twelve degrees centigrade. The lottery was drawn on Friday 13, in Dunaszekcsõ. The article notifies the reader of the process through the newspaper man (Rab Ferenc) who was present at the time. With the collaboration of five local inhabitants the numbers of ten, twenty-two, thirty-two, seventy-five, seventy-eight were drawn from the globe. Under the headline of “Megnyilt Walter Engel fotókiállitása” the reader is informed of an Austrian-Hungarian venture, as a result of which a photo exhibition was opened on Friday at Doktor Sándor Mûvelõdési Központ in Pécs. On the same page (page 4) in another column, the attention is drawn to the police who were still looking for eyewitnesses of an accident which took place at the end of the previous year. One of the front page stories is about a delegation of the Austrian Communist Party which was met by Kádár János in Budapest. Most importantly, more than one article can be found in this edition of DN in the center-fold and on the front page as well, about the preparations for the national elections of the council members which would take place on the following Sunday.
The other part is about the events in the world. This international news section is located on the second page of the newspaper. The main article on this page concerns Italy. The people in Milan went on strike, to express mass indignation against the fascist provocation which took place two days before. Another negative story was about an earthquake in Catanzaro in Italy. The earthquake caused only financial damage. Regarding Romania, one is informed of the return of the Romanian president, Nicolae Ceausescu, from Holland where he stayed for three days on an official visit. In West Germany, Chancellor Brandt was elected to become the president of the Social Democrat Party.
This issue of DN consisted of 8 pages and carried 48 news stories in all. Five of these were front page stories, 21 inside front cover foreign news stories with the rest of the stories on pages 3 to 6. Almost half of the news stories are foreign news. The front page story of Acél György's remarks at the national pioneers’ leaders conference was without an illustrative element. In the foreign news section (24 óra a nagyvilágban) and in the national news section respectively, two and five stories were shown with photographs. The news elements included reports of meetings, of the approaching council elections and of several other events in the world and in the country.
The articles on the second page of Dunántúli Napló are devoted to report about conflicts between certain countries, terrorist actions and clashes between political parties. The news value represented by these articles is negativity. Although fundamentally negative news is likely to appear on the front page of a newspaper, in this particular paper these articles are placed on the second page, as the first page is reserved for domestic news on political issues. There were at least three negative stories on the second page of the April 14, 1973 issue of DN . The longest one was a twelve paragraph long report on the UN Security Council’s discussion brought about by Lebanon’s proposal to terminate Israelis membership in the UN because of the country’s continuous aggression in the Middle East area, “a Biztonsági Tanács nem hagyhatja büntetlenül Izrael megismétlõdõ agresszióit ”. The story went on to disclose further details of the matter in question.
The story was negative in the way that it revealed the details of a serious disagreement between two Middle East countries. The story was probably an adaptation of news agency reports, however it was only indicated by the fact that the opinions of representatives of the member countries were reported from four different cities. The sources of the news items were not apparent as there were no direct quotations of the words of the different delegates and Ministers of Foreign Affairs. Negativity was the most apparent news value in this article but recency also contributed to the story because the event reported was one that had happened in the last 24 hours. However, unambiguity did not complement the story because the sources of news items were not impeccable.
There were numerous short, clear-cut, factual stories on the very same page. For these reasons they could be considered unambiguous, but neither one revealed the source of news items. One short story told about a rare, outstanding moment of medical history: a woman who had two wombs gave birth to two healthy babies on the very same day. ( Egy nõ két méhébõl-két gyerek ) This short news was complemented by another news value, that is, unexpectedness. „The unpredictable or the rare is more newsworthy than the routine.” (adapted version of Allan Bell’s 1991 analysis of news values).
Proximity is a news value which occurs in almost every article connected to local news. Newspaper men are aware of the public's bigger interest in incidents, developments which took place geographically close by and are essentially linked to the inhabitants' local community life.“ The minor accident is reportable in the settlement where it happens, not a hundred miles away.”(adapted version of Allan Bell's 1991 analysis of news values ). However, this news value can be presented together with proximity, negativity and facility as well as with many others.
A three paragraph long article at the bottom of the fifth page (DN April 14, 1973 Tömeg verekedés a pécsi nagypiacon) told about a brawl in the crowd at the Pécs Flea Market. A totally drunk man, Barics J. of Hásságy fell on the ground. A few customers were pulling and tossing him, to get him back on his feet. This scene was misunderstood by Barics’s companions, as they thought that Barics had been insulted. In a few minutes several people got involved in a mass fight that could only be finished by the police. Barics got injured during the fight, he was taken to hospital by ambulance.
The news value proximity was very well represented by this article. Hásságy is a village near Pécs and the Flea Market has always been a popular shopping place among the habitants of the town and the nearby villages. The reported event could only be placed in the DN because this news item only bore importance within this area.
Headlines of a newspaper also have a determining role in newspaper writing. Their functions are to capture the reader’s attention, to focus their attention on the issues, and in order to fulfil these aims they must synthesise the contents of the issues. DN applied several letter types and sizes to grab the reader’s attention: it used large-sized, coloured letters for the title of the newspaper. The headlines were printed in bold type to make it possible to get an outline of the contents for the reader who only skimmed through the newspaper. Longer or more important articles (eg. A Biztonsági Tanács elõtt Libanon panasza) were divided by sub-headlines still printed in bold type, but with smaller letters.
On the second page, in the foreign news section (24 óra a nagyvilágban), the presentation of the short stories was not a success, because too many letter types, highlighting and division devices had been applied. This method resulted in a somehow chaotic page. Headline placing and the choice of letter types turned out to be more successful on the rest of the pages; the look of these pages was neat and the column-placing was tidy.
Photos obviously have an important, illustrating function in newspapers. DN often used photos to throw light on those aspects of the news that did not become apparent only by the written text or to introduce an author or the subject of the article. There were photos on all pages.
The sources of news items in most cases were not clear. There were only three articles that were signed by their authors, one or two were signed only by the author’s initials and the majority of the articles carried no byline at all. The tendency throughout the whole newspaper was the disguising of sources. This tendency was not balanced by the few direct and the many more indirect quotations in the articles. Source disguising raises a serious problem, that is, ambiguity. News stories are supposed to be clear-cut but clarity cannot be achieved without revealing sources of news items. But the writing method of this paper was forced on journalists by the Hungarian regime that restricted the freedom of the press.
The day in question was a relatively uneventful one in Hungary, judging by the pages of Dunántúli Napló. The range of stories on offer was fairly undramatic in content, covering such subjects as the visit to Budapest by a delegation of Austrian communists, the opening of a photo exhibition, the results of a lottery draw and an appeal by the police for eyewitnesses to an accident. The most significant articles were the ones which concerned preparations for the national elections. Unfortunately, the reporting of some of these events, as well as some of the actual layout of the newspaper, left a lot to be desired. Some of the shortcomings included lack of bylines, unattributed sources, ambiguity in stories and occasionally cluttered layout. However, many of these flaws resulted from government control of the press and the subsequent pressure endured by journalists. Yet despite these problems, it can still be said that the newspaper contains good examples of the news values proximity, recency, negativity and even, sometimes, unambiguity.
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