Media (Re)Construction of Collective Memory: October and November as a Support for the Contemporary Czech National Identity

The bachelor thesis "Media (Re)Construction of Collective Memory: October and November as a Support for the Contemporary Czech National Identity" focuses on relation between mass media, collective memory and national identity. In accordance with social constructionism theory, the terms collective memory and national identity are understood as social constructs whereas mass media is considered to be one of the social construction agents. The aim of this work is to analyse a variety of media interpretations on significant Czech history events - October 28, 1918 and November 17, 1989. Analysed are newspaper commentaries published in order to commemorate these events during the eleven- year period from 1998 to 2009. As a resource for the analysis I have chosen three Czech daily newspapers - Hospodářské noviny, Lidové noviny and Mladá fronta DNES. The research method used is media qualitative content analysis. The work objective is to examine the typical media discourses based on national history which are constructed in a way to support contemporary Czech national identity. Not only does this thesis consist of research, it also includes methodology and theoretical framework