Nina Žnidaršič; Visiting Fellowship 2023/24
Biography:
Since 2020, I have been a PhD student and young researcher at the Social Communication Research Centre at the Faculty of Social Sciences in Ljubljana. In my PhD thesis Autonomy of Journalism and the Journalist's Action in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia [Avtonomija novinarstva in novinarjevega delovanja v Socialistični federativni republiki Jugoslaviji], I research the social and political influences on journalism, journalistic autonomy and journalists' ability to act and work autonomously in this period. I completed my undergraduate studies in Journalism (2018) and my postgraduate studies in Sociology (2020) at the same faculty, and in parallel studied Philosophy and Sociology at the Faculty of Arts in Ljubljana.
Between 2020 and 2022, I was involved in the research project The Role of Communication Inequalities in Disintegration of Multinational Society [Vloga komunikacijskih neenakosti v dezintegraciji večnacionalne družbe] (Slovenian Research Agency), in the framework of which I and Jernej Amon Prodnik, PhD, conducted research interviews (37) with journalists who worked professionally in the SFRY. Later, as part of my PhD project, I independently conducted research interviews with former journalists in Croatia (Zagreb) and Serbia (Belgrade). In my PhD thesis I combine a critical analysis of archival material (Archives of the Republic of Slovenia, Archives of Yugoslavia in Belgrade) with an oral history approach in the form of research interviews with former journalists.
During my PhD studies, I presented my papers at several national and international doctoral and scientific conferences: Central and Eastern European Communication and Media Conference (2021), symposium Contradictions of Media and Journalism in Socialist Yugoslavia [Protislovja medijev in novinarstva v socialistični Jugoslaviji] (2022) at the Institute of Contemporary History in Ljubljana (2022), doctoral conference New Perspectives in Humanities and Social Sciences at the Faculty of Arts in Ljubljana (2023), ECREA – European Media and Communication Doctoral Summer School at the Roskilde University in Denmark (2023), doctoral summer school and scientific conference at the Centre for Cultural and Historical Research of Socialism in Pula, Croatia (2023).
My research interests focus on the study of journalism in socialist Yugoslavia, journalistic autonomy, different forms of information and communication systems (e.g. in socialist projects) and the history of political and social ideas and their normative exploration.
Visiting fellowship October and December 2023
Motivation:
In the academic year 2023/2024, I will complete my PhD project Autonomy of Journalism and the Journalist’s Action in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia [Avtonomija novinarstva in novinarjevega delovanja v Socialistični federativni republiki Jugoslaviji] and begin with the systematic writing of my doctoral monograph and presenting the conclusions of three years of research. The completion of the complex research I am conducting as part of my PhD project was the main motivation for applying for the Visiting Fellowship at the Institute of Contemporary History in Ljubljana. My main areas of research are journalism, sociology and philosophy. The cooperation with the historians at the Institute, who deal with socialist Yugoslavia and its various phenomena in a professional, research-oriented and epistemological way, brings me a different disciplinary perspective on my PhD topic and opens up the possibility of thematic horizons that I have not yet reached/seen. I therefore see the research collaboration as an opportunity to improve the quality of my research work, the interpretations of the results of my PhD thesis and my professional development.
Publications:
Žnidaršič, Nina. (2022). The Journalist’s Action in Socialist Yugoslavia: Understanding the Formulation ‘Journalist as a Socio-political Worker’. Prispevki za novejšo zgodovino 62(1), pp. 82–102.
Žnidaršič Nina, Kaluža Jernej (2023). Strpnost kot sestavni del solidarnosti: primer socialistična Jugoslavije [Tolerance as an Element of Solidarity: the case of Socialist Yugoslavia]. Dialogi 59(5/6), pp. 144–158.
