Evolution of English-language TV news programs in Independent Uzbekistan



Gained its independence and started actively integrating to global community, joining international organizations and linking diplomatic relations with foreign countries, the Republic of Uzbekistan launched its public diplomacy through television quite successfully. The central television channel of the country, Uzbekistan, started broadcasting weekly First Channel News, FCN in late 1990s. News on social, political, cultural issues and other types, prioritized considering the interests of a target audience, that is diplomatic corps of Uzbekistan, guests of the country and the rest of English-speaking contingent, have gone on air once a week since 1997. Stories had carried mostly formal character and followed the good old style inherited from classical journalism. Media formats of FCN had not varied widely and for past 20 years format of the program had not faced big changes.

In 2006, Yoshlar TV channel, which was and is the second largest television broadcaster in the country, went on promoting reforms and development in Uzbekistan via an English-language TV program. Concluded after some period, Yoshlar’s Journal was more open to new media formats, including space bridge, diagrams, interview and visual graphics, which actually made it different from other news or analytical television projects. Viewing some of the series of the Journal, specialists can notice that TV program team tried hard to have a specific ton of voice and style that would be as close to native as possible.

Another English-language show on Yoshlar is UZEX News, specializing on commodity rate, has covered only official releases of Uzbekistan Commodity Exchange. Weekly, descriptive and short-in-period, UZEX News gives a quick picture of the latest trends on Uzbekistan markets in a well-structured, comprehensive and fluent English, according to the results of a sociological survey conducted among foreigners who were shown the program.

Starting from 2013, Poytakht News program on Tashkent TV channel started providing the foreigners and diplomats segment with the news in the lingua franca. This news program reaches its audience more frequently than previous examples, twice a week. It addresses both traditional and new media formats and methods of news casting. Anchoring is characteristic to all news programs cast in English language in Uzbekistan, making them widely different from Euronews that focuses on dynamic and quick reporting.

Another television show that was directed to English speaking audience in Uzbekistan, guests of the country, representatives of Tashkent’s diplomatic corps was Poytakht Interview. This television project aimed at demonstrating international cooperation between Uzbekistan and other countries, as well as the international organizations, such as United Nations agencies, global unions, international banks and financial institutions, etc. The show included a talk between a host journalist and guest expert in the studio. Guests usually represented foreign countries or international establishments. Broadcast on Tashkent TV channel, Poytakht Interview used the same studio and styles, creating sophisticated logical relevance to Poytakht News program.

In addition, there is a privately-owned new TV channel — Uzreport TV, where some of the news programs and analytical stories are broadcast in English language. Relevantly new, with its launch in 2014, Uzreport has hired plenty of fluent-in-English personnel, who have been reporting about mostly economic news. Uzreport news do not have a big difference from other TV channels in terms of media formats and the language, though training sessions conducted for nongovernmental media representatives by foreign specialists is believed to come with their results.

Contrasting foreign TV channels, the news broadcaster with complex news reporting and presenting strategy and commercial interests with Uzbekistan’s national TV news programs, which are mostly directed to national interests representation, propaganda of the country’s wise and constantly-working policy, several conclusions can be made in terms of the language and style of these two news market players.

Currently TV news programs are demanding pay essential amount of attention to headlines, as they consider it to be important attention grabbing tools. So since last year there was an establishment of specialized TV news channel. Having opened just previous year new channel Uzbekistan24 has already gained its popularity, as it is trying to respond audience’s needs. English-language news is broadcasted on a program “News24”. News24 program, as well as other news programs cast in English gives much accent on anchoring. Secondly, sentence structures are carefully set and news writers follow particular standards (even have not developed through many years and by high caliber internationally hired specialists), while one can notice some calques and minor grammar and stylistic errors with young perspective journalists.

Seeing the long evolution and development of Uzbekistan broadcast media there are proposals as part of conclusions that,

a) Strengthening editorship in local newsrooms, particularly News24 TV program, as there are common mistakes that decrease the level of comprehension and make a negative impact on audience perception.

b) Improving the quality and purity of news with the instrumentality of modern writing and anchoring technologies, as they help viewers digest the information delivered in a better context and environment.

The solutions, in their turn, raises the issue of personnel development for English-language news writing and broadcasting, that addresses the training and retraining of journalists, editors and linguists in Uzbekistan. Borderless broadcasting of news and widening opportunities of reaching audiences not only through technical equipment, usage of modern technologies, digital broadcasting and online television, but through multilingualism on television content are what global community and modern inhabitant of the Earth require today.

Building better and more qualified teams would let Uzbek channels later be prepared for opening TV channels that air completely in English language on a twenty-four hour basis as the main part of the evolution.

References:

1. Alexander, Jeffrey C. (1981) ‘The Mass News Media in Systemic, Historical, and Comparative Perspective’, in E. Katz & T. Szecskö, (eds.) Mass Media and Social Change. London: Sage (Sage Studies in International Sociology; 22)
2. Strunk Jr, William. The Elements of Style — Pearson, 1999
3. Genette, Gerard. Paratexts. Thresholds of interpretation. — Cambridge University Press, 1997
4. Kevin, Deirdre; Pellicanò, Francesca; Schneeberger, Agnes. Television News Channels in Europe — European Audiovisual Observatory, 2013