New trends in the activities of the periodical press of Tuva during the Perestroika period

The article discusses new features of the activities of the periodical press in Tuva in the late 1980s - 1991. The main sources of the article are the records of the local authorities that were involved in the registration of the media, the materials of content analysis of the newspapers and survey of journalists and editors. The article shows that the transformation of the press in the second half of the 1980s began with an appeal to new topics -the study and expansion of using of Tuvan language, national customs and traditions, increasing social problems. In the beginning of 1990, the Children newspaper in Tuvan language started to come out again after closing in 1959. That was initiated by the Tuvan national intellectuals and supported by the local authorities. After the 1990 release of the USSR law on the press and the adoption by the First Congress of People's Deputies of the RSFSR of the Declaration of Sovereignty, changes became more widespread and irreversible. Communist party and state control over the press of Tuva had been lost, and it began to acquire the character of a "fourth estate". Editors and local authorities became the founders of the former Soviet and new national newspapers, the content of publications became increasingly polemical and critical, themes of interethnic relations and national sovereignty of Tuva were raised and developed. New editions of universal and thematic content were emerging. However, many of them, having faced with material and financial difficulties during the crisis, stopped their publication. They remained in the history of the Tuvan press only as the separate scattered issues.The newspapers prioritized coverage of the work of the people's deputies councils and the draft laws which they developed, election campaigns at various levels, activities of new parties and socio-political movements, social and economic problems and ways to overcome them, issues of the Tuvan language and revival of traditional ethnic culture, topics of interethnic relations and repressions, and problematic appeals of citizens. A major determining factor in the development of the Tuvan press during this period was the interest of the readership in the ethno-cultural specificity of the region. Thanks to the active position of journalists, a number of important national draft laws were discussed in the press in the form of dialoguef, the status of Tuvan as the State language was legalized, and a national-regional component was included in the regional education system. During the aggravation of inter-ethnic relations in 1990-1991, the Tuvan press rebutted and criticized the biased coverage of events in the central and regional press, implementing the new function of the press to protect the national dignity and honor of the people of Tuva. The author declares no conflicts of interests.

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