CULTURE, IDENTITY AND CITIZEN JOURNALISM IN… UDC 316.722-027.6:[323.269:070(497.2) CULTURE, IDENTITY AND CITIZEN JOURNALISM IN BULGARIAN ONLINE MEDIA Ivaylo Yoshkov Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, Bulgaria Abstract: The present paper analyses the role of citizen II. HISTORY OF THE IMMIGRATION RELATED ISSUES journalism within the websites of traditional media. It IN BULGARIA focuses on the representations of culture and identity in terms of Russophilia and the ongoing immigration crisis. Although the incoming refugees from Syria cause The analysis is based on comments, which appear to be much concern and confrontations in Bulgarian society, the only form of citizen journalism within the selected websites. the country has managed to deal with much bigger immigrant issues in the past. Actually this is the 9-th Keywords: Russophile, Russophobe, refugees, immig- refugee crisis which Bulgaria faces in less than 140 ration, media years. The first refugee crisis was in 1878, right after the I. INTRODUCTION Bulgarian liberation from the Ottoman empire. Between 200 and 300 thousand people from the The ongoing political crisis in the country (after the Bulgarian territory, remaining within the Ottoman early resignation of 2 governments and the unstable empire, fled to the liberated part of the country. They majority in the current parliament) combined with the were accommodated at the houses, left behind by immigration issues caused by the immigrants from muslims, who were fleeing back to the Ottoman Syria and the issues in Ukraine caused much empire. In the effort to help these people the polarization in the society. The online media became government gave every family 300 hectares infield. the scene of many arguments between Russophiles The second crisis was in 1903 after the Ilinden and Russophobes, people who are tolerant to the uprising. More than 150 thousand people fled to immigrants and people who are not and etc. Studying Bulgaria. The government accommodated as much the citizen journalism is the best way to define this refugees as possible, but many were returned to their polarization using the society itself as an information homes. Some of these refugees later emigrated to source. Canada. 111 КУЛТУРА / CULTURE, 13/ 2016 After the Second Balkan War 350 thousand people III. RUSSOPHILES VS. RUSSOPHOBES IN BULGARIAN HISTORY immigrated to Bulgaria. The government decided again to them 300 hectares infields and whole new villages The controversy between Russophiles and Russop- were built. This situation was very similar right after hobes in Bulgaria has even longer history than the the First World War, when as much as 120 000 people immigration issues. The first Bulgarian author to men- fled to Bulgaria, and after the Second World War, when tion that the only hope for Bulgaria to be liberated from 60 000 people immigrated in Bulgaria. the Ottoman Empire is to stay close to Russia, was Paisyi In all of the above mentioned cases Bulgarian Hilendarski, widely known as the father of history as a people were emigrating in Bulgaria from territories science in Bulgaria. He worked in the 18th century and which remained within other countries’ borders after many researchers consider him to be the first influential wars or other conflicts. There were also 3 occasions in figure in Bulgaria with Russophile views. which foreign refugees fled to Bulgaria. After the Russo-Turkish war (1877-1878), which In 1896 between 15 and 20 thousand Armenians liberated Bulgaria from the Ottoman empire, began he fled from Istanbul, Odrin etc. and immigrated in first period of Russophile vs. Russophobes Bulgaria. A little more people (about 25 thousand) fled controversies in the country. Most Bulgarians were to Bulgaria after the Greek civil war (1946 – 1949). thankful for the help, provided by Russia for the The country accommodated them in specially build liberation of Bulgaria. The government was heavily apartments in Sofia. Much more refugees (about 120 influenced by Russia, which made many people think thousand) came to Bulgaria in 1923 after the defeat of that the government was not following strictly the Russian White guards. Most of them where highly Bulgarian interests. From this point onwards until the educated so they easily found jobs and had no troubles Second World War Bulgarian policy was principally settling down. (although not always visibly) russophobic. This is quite As we can see Bulgaria has faced refugee issues easy to explain, since the tsar’s dynasty originated from before. But no matter if the refugees were Bulgarian or Austria. Even in the Second World War Tsar Boris foreign people, the government and the people helped decided to take the side of Germany. them to settle down and have a decent life. As a result The communist party, which ruled the country after of this, most of the refugees got easily assimilated in the Second World War changed the policy towards Bulgarian society. In cultural perspective this results in the belief that Bulgarian society is welcoming refugees Russia. For the next 45 years Bulgarian policy was and immigrants could find a warm reception in the entirely Russophile. Once again the party was heavily country. As we will see below, citizen journalism influenced by Russia. Industries were developed, but within the websites of traditional mass media gives the country became isolated from the West. many reasons to doubt this stereotype. Page Style The next change came in 1989. The communist All paragraphs must be indented. All paragraphs party resigned after a period of social protests and must be justified, i.e. both left-justified and right- strikes. The political landscape became polarised and justified. since then the socialist party (and recently the nation- 112 CULTURE, IDENTITY AND CITIZEN JOURNALISM IN… nalist party “Ataka”) is considered to be Russophile, and share its own content. At this time appeared many while the other parties are russophobic or neutral (the web platforms for shared content, known as social latter is actually a rare occasion). media – Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Blogs and many These changes in Bulgarian policy show why the others. Many authors claim that the need of sharing Russophiles vs Russophobes issue is so important for appeared because of the changing family structure in Bulgarian culture. The crisis in Ukraine and the war in the technologically advanced countries. Most of the Syria brought this controversy back in the public social web’s users live in small families with rare or agenda. totally lacking connections with relatives and friends which narrows the traditional social space of the IV. DEVELOPMENT OF CITIZEN JOURNALISM individuals. The Social Web changed the one way communi- We should define what the reasons for the cation model, used by traditional mass media and Web appearance of citizen journalism were and to what 1.0 websites. The audience was no longer a passive extent does this new kind of journalism exist in consumer of the information, it became an information Bulgaria. If we look back at the first online media web creator. It also gave users the opportunity to connect sites we will notice that they were very similar to the to each other and form “groups of interests”, discus- traditional press – one-way communication, which sions etc. The audience was no more a mass of not- relied mostly on written text and rarely on photos and connected-to-each-other people. It became a society of other formats. As the connection speed rose up and the interconnected active users, sharing large amounts of open-source software appeared, Internet evolved from content on random topics. the static Web 1.0 to the Social Web 2.0. It enabled Why is interactivity so important for the citizen- everyone to create and share information in a wide journalism and the change of the traditional com- variety of formats, without being a journalist. This munication roles? It is widely accepted that 3 major caused the rise of so called “citizen journalism” – made types of interactivity exist – navigational, functional for citizens by citizens, which changed the informa- and adaptive interactivity. tional habits of the society. The information flow is not one-way anymore and very often professional jour- A. Navigational interactivity. nalists use the audience as a source of information. Navigational Interactivity lets the users choose While there are different categorizations of the their own way in the structure of the website. This is web’s specificities, including between four (Bradoel; related to the current search habits of the audience. Dauze, 2001) and twelve (Дерменджиева,2005) Online readers are used to non-linear reading. specificities, most scientists agree that the most important of them is interactivity, which became much B. Functional interactivity more important with the beginning of the Social Web. Functional interactivity lets the users interact with The open-source browsers let the audience not each other using chat-rooms, forums, or e-mail. only to see the published content, but also to create 113 КУЛТУРА / CULTURE, 13/ 2016 C. Adaptive interactivity about 60 online newspapers in Bulgaria (Дерменд- Adaptive interactivity lets the audience to change жиева, 2001:111). These numbers increased rapidly the content. Users can share their own news, recording, and today most of the traditional mass media own a photos or other content. Journalists usually have to website. mediate this process according to the website’s ethical In the field of social media and networks, Bulgaria rules. Applications such as blogs, pod-casts, news or also follows the West’s trends. Facebook became photo publishing-platforms allow the users to share popular in 2007/2008, along with the micro-blog their own content. platform Twitter, the social media for video-sharing These are the main tools of citizen journalism. YouTube, blogs, podcasts etc. At first these new Using blogs, social networks and other tools, users can formats were used merely for entertainment.