Summary

The subject of the media is by no means the exclusive domain of reporters, newspeople, or media experts, inasmuch as each of us - every day - admits into his or her home a media guest. We let him in without hesitating to ask whether this guest is a friend or perhaps a thief, whether the aim of the visit is to tell us about things as they really are - or perhaps just to make a sales pitch on his company's behalf in the form of a news item. Znak's October issue provides readers with a discussion on how newspapers, the radio, and television portray the world to us. This discussion also focuses on the manner in which the mass media - which like to represent themselves, and be perceived by us, as champions of high standards of objectivity - affect our way of viewing reality. This topic is an altogether pressing one in that, as Jacek Gawłowski's picture on the cover suggests, the window through which we look out onto the world is the size and shape of a TV screen and a newspaper...

Does, then, the term "world" mean the same to a Polish television viewer as to those watching CNN or those who tune in to Al-Jazeera? Ryszard Kapuściński answers this and other related questions in a conversation addressing the situation of the media in the Third World. Thereafter, Wiesław Godzic and Paweł Huelle consider what kind of impact television experts have on our psyche and what the promotion of "reality TV" - a veritable Orwellian misnomer - is likely to lead to. Tomasz Lis talks about his understanding of the reporter's job and various practical facets of that profession. Jan Sowa takes up the workings of independent online media. By way of winding up the discussion, Stefan Bratkowski traces the diverse social roles that the media have played throughout history.

In the "Topics and Reflections" section we publish a text by Anna Wierzbicka that undertakes to translate the great metaphors of Christianity - those of the sacrifice and the Lamb - into the simplest terms, ones comprehensible in the world's every language. On the "Diagnoses" pages Stefan Wilkanowicz wonders how to reach out to people of homosexual orientation, with their experiences and painful ordeals, and how to offer help them without inciting a media frenzy. The issue also brings Halina Bortnowska and Piotr Kłodkowski's monthly columns; Janusz Poniewierski's "The Church - My Home", containing reflections on the Papal visit to Lourdes; and Małgorzata Łukasiewicz's "Rose Column", this time devoted to thoughts on novels by Theodore Fontane. In "The Society of the Caring" Stefan Wilkanowicz makes a plea for financial assistance on behalf of Znak's Christian Culture Foundation. After the summer break you will again find in Znak a column called "A Year 1984", created for and by university students.

POCZĄTEK STRONY