Today’s Russian TV Reality (Based on Audiovisual Materials Devoted to the European Migrant Crisis)

In recent years, migration from the Middle East and Africa to Europe has acquired a large scale, thereby having become a typical phenomenon of the world’s political life. This problem is being widely discussed in Russian daily news TV programs. Thus, it is an important segment of today’s Russian TV reality. The paper proves that the reality created by television differs from real life. From this assumption, a new approach is suggested to studying the Russian information space in which each television message forms the TV reality in various aspects. The results of the quantitative and qualitative analysis of TV news about the European migrant crisis, which is carried out by the author on the basis of 56 TV spots from the news programs on two Russian TV channels, reveals some general tendencies in TV coverage of the problem. News spots (both daily and weekly) devoted to the problems of refugees from the Middle East and Africa are informative. They differ in genres, but the problem report prevails. This provides grounds to claim that such TV spots are often central in news programs. However, along with the external balance of news programs about migrants, one can notice one-sidedness of the thematic aspects being covered: the materials (with few exceptions) are considered from the political perspective. Therefore, the audience is able to comprehend migratory processes only from the political point of view, which is not quite right. On the whole, the neutral connotation of news about refugees in EU countries prevails on both TV channels. Negative and positive estimates occur, but they are less pronounced, which is justified and natural. The essential amount of materials about the European migrant crisis is accompanied by comments of the top Russian officials. The position of Russia on integration of migrants into the European Union is presented as clear and thought over. Studies of this sort will allow to further consider any subject which is a segment of the TV reality. Objective data on the contents of TV news may contribute to identification of the existing problems and help to find their optimal solutions.