The Role of Mass Media in Constructing the Regional Identity: the Media Geographic Approaches
This article presents the theoretical aspects of media and communication research in space and time. The authors of the article pay attention to the role of mass media in constructing a region and a regional identity and demonstrate how the media geographic categories work as determinants in understanding the place of mass media in shaping the region as a whole in the context of globalization and glocalisation. Media geography as a separate line of humanitarian research concerns the interrelations of media and spaces in their different forms and at different levels (personality, community, nation state), behavior patterns of media in constructing space, the role, the place and significance of media in socio-spatial relations etc. Having used the main thesis of media geography that all forms of communication are laid out and implemented in space and time, and spaces are constructed and represented by mass media, the authors make an attempt to interpret the theories of spatial production, which to a certain extent should be understood as the theories of communication and mediatazation. Furthermore, they analyze the theoretical and practical approaches of a number of foreign scholars to the role of mass media in the region's construction. The concept of space in the social context with the emphasis on “location” in the process of the formation and strengthening of the regional identity through media products is considered in detail. The authors focus their attention on the regional market of concepts related to the political, economical and social life of the region, and on the role of the regional newspapers as public space where the main images of the region are revealed and the capabilities of main media in managing the regional processes come to light. The authors draw a conclusion that the regional media market fills every person's life with concepts which are capable of influencing their national (and regional) identity.