Media goes pop!

As mentioned in the introduction (see: Outpost Dispatch Volume I Issue 1), Rusyn media more often than not concentrate on the 19^th-century aspects of Rusyn culture, such as folk festivals and village histories. A rare and notable exception is one of the latest additions to the Rusyn-language press, a magazine called MAK – Mladosc, Aktivnosc, Kreativnosc (Youth, Action, Creativity), published in Novi Sad, Serbia, and sharply focused on a young audience. The magazine originated back in 1972, but was relaunched in September 2001 with a new editorial board.

The magazine has had a rocky run, thanks to funding problems. Although MAK is intended to be a monthly magazine, only three issues were published between September 2001 and April 2002. A fourth issue appeared in February 2003 after Rusyn young people founded a non-partisan youth group called Pact Ruthenorum in September 2001 and adopted it as their official organ. The latest, fifth, issue appeared in June 2003.

The very first issue of MAK dove right into the most pressing problem of the Rusyns of Serbia – the question of national identity. The cover highlighted the issue’s theme: “Crisis of National Identity: Rusyns, Serbs, Ukrainians.” Inside, articles addressed not only the Rusyn-Ukrainian question but also the issue of assimilation into the majority, Serb, population. MAK took no editorial stand on the Rusyn-Ukrainian question, however the magazine is published exclusively in the Vojvodinian form of the Rusyn language.

In its five issues, the magazine has addressed the lack of a separate Rusyn state; the census in Yugoslavia; the potential of the internet; the events of 11 September 2001 in the United States; drug use among Rusyns; Rusyn attitudes towards sex; the Rusyns’ genetic makeup; and tricky questions about religion.

One striking feature of the magazine is its coverage of music and musicians, which sets it apart from of other Rusyn-language publications. Folk music does not exist here, only rock and punk. MAK’s music coverage includes interviews with the Croatian rock bands Hladno Pivo and Let 3, and the Belgrade rock band Negative, all of which visited Ruski Kerestur recently. Ivan Sabadoš’s “Rock’n’Roll na Humnje” (Rock’n’Roll in the Backyard; see: Outpost Dispatch Volume I Issue 1), however, is MAK’s most impressive music-related article. It appeared in the magazine’s third issue, and discussed Ruski Kerestur’s punk rock movement in the early 1990s.

The fact that MAK addresses the topic of sex is another way it has set itself apart from the pack. The third issue featured an extensive article by Aleksandra Dudaš called “U Meno Naroda” (In the Name of the Nation; see: Outpost Dispatch Volume 2 Issue 1). She thrusts Rusyns’ attitudes towards sex into the spotlight, seeking out comments from an entire spectrum of people – from a 28 year old gay-rights activist to the 42 year old director of the Ruske Slovo publishing house to a 64 year old writer and a 72 year old lawyer.

MAK is also an important proving ground for young journalists. In the fourth issue, Mirko Hornjak Kole’s article “Novinarstvo na Čarno” (Black Market Journalism, see elsewhere in this issue) provides an overview of the development of Rusyn fanzines, primarily in Ruski Kerestur, but also in Kocur. Fanzines were an important part of journalism education for Rusyn young people, and many people associated with fanzines in the past are leading figures in the Rusyn-language media in Serbia today.

According to a June 2002 editorial by Ruske Slovo editor Ljubomir Ramač, the inclusion of young journalists in the Rusyn-language media, and the Serbian media overall, is crucial to resolving the problem of self-censorship among journalists. Ramač writes that self-censorship is a "remnant of recent times" which is "difficult to correct" in journalists who have been working in the field for decades. It is worthwhile to point out self-censorship among journalists is a problem common to virtually all Central and Eastern European societies in transition.

Training young people in the ways of "real" journalism will not only get them more involved in the media, but will also offer a major opportunity to combat self-censorship, since training new journalists is easier than trying to break the bad habits of older ones, he writes. Unfortunately, Ruske Slovo (and other media outlets throughout the province) are finding it impossible to hire "young blood" due to a lack of funding. The same problem exists throughout the Rusyn communities of Eastern and Central Europe as a whole.

There is a Rusyn connection to one other groundbreaking magazine in Serbia, namely that country’s first “straight-friendly” gay magazine, Dečko. The connection was made in the second issue of MAK, which featured an interview with Atila Kovač, Dečko’s founder. Kovač, 28 years old, is half Rusyn, half Hungarian. He is one of the few visible gay-rights activists in Serbia and Montenegro. Apart from his magazine, he has published articles and prepared a television program about homosexuality in Yugoslavia. In 2000, he organized a symposium for Amnesty International which received national and international attention. He also runs a non-governmental organization, the New Age Rainbow, which deals with gay-rights issues.

Kovač has never made much of an issue about his Rusyn roots publicly, however, and many in the Rusyn community may have been unaware. They, together with anyone else who read the interview in MAK, certainly know now that Kovač is both gay and Rusyn. Given the delicate relationship between the Rusyns and their greatest son, Andy Warhol, the topic of homosexuality is of particular interest. The documentary Absolut Warhola features comments by several people, among them Warhol’s relatives, who either deny or have no idea he was gay. The interview with Atila Kovač, therefore, was significant for the Rusyn-language press not only in Vojvodina, but throughout the world.

Schizophrenia is a major feature of Rusyn culture, and the Rusyns of the former Yugoslavia are no different. MAK, especially taken together with Dečko, gives the impression that Serbia’s young Rusyns are no different from their cohorts across Europe. On the one hand, this is little more than a Potemkin village, for now, at least; on the other, the mere existence of MAK (and Dečko) proves that modernizing forces are at work. These forces must be promoted if the Rusyns hope to defeat the threat of assimilation. The Rusyn-language media elsewhere in the world would do well to learn the lesson MAK provides – and Outpost Dispatch certainly is making a point of trying.

It is important to point out that MAK is significant for one other reason – it was the first of the Rusyn-language media in Serbia to start a website.

The internet is perhaps the most important tool we have to transform and propagate Rusyn culture, to defend against assimilation and to create a true Rusyn pop culture. The Rusyn presence on the internet began with the Carpatho-Rusyn Knowedge Base (www.carpatho-rusyn.org) in 1995 and was quickly followed by scores of other websites. However, there is still much that can be done, doubly so since the majority of materials on the internet concerning the Rusyns deal with the 19^th century aspects of the culture – folk songs, village histories, gene-alogy, etc. The intersection of high technology and 19^th -century culture is yet another example of the cultural schizophrenia prevalent among the Rusyns today.

In the first issue of MAK, one of the most internet savvy of all Rusyns, Gavrijil Koljesar, said that the significance of the internet to the Rusyns is the fact that it has made Rusyn-language materials available to anyone with an internet connection anywhere in the world. The internet in this way has become a major part of the lives of young Rusyns living abroad temporarily as well as those in emigration who want to maintain contact with their roots. This is therefore one of the Rusyns’ – and other small and dispersed groups’ – greatest weapons against the process of assimilation.

Researchers point out a score of benefits which dispersed groups can reap. One is that the internet can “enhance participation and can feed the imagining of a community” thereby buttressing national identity against assimilation. It can also empower individuals to explore the outer limits of their identities, insofar as the large degree of anonymity allows many to say and do things they would not normally do in the presence of their community. In this way, it encourages the development of subcultures. The ease of communication across the internet also encourages closer linkages among communities. Even groups like the Rusyns, who have only limited access to mainstream media, can present their stories to the world in a very effective manner.

Using another example of a nation which has no state, one researcher says that “In the deterritorialized space of the Internet, Kurds express territorial claims for Kurdistan. In transnational on-line communication, they imagine the construction of a nation. In the virtual cyberspace, they (re)create and sustain a community, real in its emotional and political consequences.” The same goes for the Rusyns.

One of the most important aspects of the Rusyn internet presence is Rusyn on-line media. The Rusyn Society of North America’s Hlasnjik is available on the internet, as are Rusyn-language publications from Croatia, Hungary, Serbia and Montenegro and Slovakia. The Carpatho-Rusyn Society’s English-language magazine The New Rusyn Times also has a modest presence on the internet. Outpost Dispatch is perhaps the most ambitious media-related project Rusyns have undertaken on the internet, appearing exclusively in electronic format on the internet.

The most impressive Rusyn media website is actually not related to a publication. The Rusyn Internet Radio Station (RIRS) will mark its third anniversary in April 2004. RIRS is the world’s first exclusively Rusyn-language radio station, though it exists only on the internet. For its first 100 broadcasts, it aired folk and traditional music together with a news and information program culled from Novi Sad’s Ruske Slovo, Radio-Television Novi Sad and Slovakia’s Radio Prešov each weekend. However, today it has an all-Rusyn music format, 24 hours a day. The website also includes videos, television programs and even a feature film in electronic format, available for viewing on demand.

For all its advantages, there is one major disadvantage of the internet: it is feeding the Rusyn cultural schizophrenia. The technology is being used almost exclusively to promote Rusyn folk culture, folk songs, etc., while little is being done with pop culture. Even more serious is the fact that precious little is even being done with current events. There is no reason why the internet should not be used to propagate the more traditional aspects of Rusyn culture, but even a cursory inspection shows that the amount of pop culture and current events on the internet is nothing as compared to amount of folk culture.

One major step forward came in August 2003, with the lauch of the Rusyn International Media Center at www.rusynmedia.org. The site aims to gather news by and about Rusyns from around the world in a central location. Materials are posted in their original language, and selected articles in other languages are also posted with English-language summaries. The site also includes extensive background information on the Rusyns’ history and current situation.

The most glaring omission in the Rusyn presence on the internet is the absence of websites for many of the Rusyns’ modern institutions, which would help broadcast a modern identity to the world. Some of the most important institutions of modern Rusyn culture, such as Prešov’s Aleksander Duchnovyč Theatre, are not represented on the internet at all; neither the recently-established World Forum and World Council of Rusyn Youth nor the already well-established World Congress and World Council of Rusyns have presences on the internet. These organizations must devise extensive websites, as they are the primary organs of this stateless people.

Given the ultrademocratic nature of the internet, Rusyns have at their disposal a major tool which, if used effectively, could lead to major revolutions within Rusyn culture and society. Although progress is being made every day, it remains to be seen if this tool can and will be used effectively.