Integration of the concept of «media war» into the educational process of students, who pursue higher education in the speciality «Journalism»

Abstract

The situation of geopolitical media war and the high level of the concept’s actualization in the Ukrainian society in recent years has led to the need for changes in the content and context of the educational process of students, who pursue higher education in the speciality «Journalism». On the one hand, the communication phenomenon of media wars and information security requires a separate representation in the system of academic disciplines, on the other hand, the overwhelming majority of disciplines and the material studied within them require theoretical and practical reinterpretation and updated presentation, taking into account the circumstances of information counteraction. In this paper I introduce the integration of the concept of «media war» and related concepts into the educational process of future journalists in several aspects related to the ethical and legal specifics of journalism in the context of media wars, creative and functional parameters, audience categories and media literacy. A typology of media wars was created taking into account the scope of their deployment, and the necessity of presenting this phenomenon in the educational process in the broadest understanding and in all manifestations, in particular was proved, but as far as possible from the political context. Namely, we are talking about the integration into the educational process the information about media wars in the maximum number of spheres of society’s life: foreign and internal politics, geopolitics, religion, social life, science, culture, education, sports, business (including brand wars) etc. It is focused on the features of media war as a variety of applied socio-communicative technologies (ASCT), providing for a clearly defined practical purpose of communication and a pre-developed integral system of interrelated ways, means and tools to achieve a predetermined result. Integration of such an approach into the journalistic activities is potentially fraught with going beyond the framework of journalistic ethics and loss of audience trust. Therefore, the system of journalistic disciplines within the educational process should ensure the formation of a conscious attitude among the students towards journalistic activities in a situation of current media wars, as well as social responsibility in relation to their professional activities, taking into account the additional threats and dangers associated with the problem of finding a balance – on the one hand, with the involvement to ensure the information security of the state and society, and  on the other hand, not to cross the border of effective dissemination of information and propaganda.