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Челябинский гуманитарий. 2022. № 2 (59). С. 73-77. ISSN 1999-5407 (print). Chelyabinskij Gumanitarij. 2022; 2 (59), 73-77. ISSN 1999-5407 (print).
Original article
DOI 10.47475/1999-5407-2022-10212
THE IMAGE OF THE CLOSED NUCLEAR ENERGY CITY AS REFLECTED IN THE USER-GENERATED ONLINE CONTENT: THE CULTURAL ANALYSIS OF THE OZERSK'S «VKONTAKTE» SOCIAL NETWORK INTEREST GROUPS
Мaria L. Shub
Chelyabinsk State Institute of Culture, Chelyabinsk, Russia, shubka_83@mail.ru
Abstract. The article's primary focus is the user's content analysis (social media posts and comments) of the social network «VKontakte». In particular, we center on interest groups of the closed nuclear energy city of Ozersk (groups «Overheard in Ozersk,» «The daily Ozersk,» «Ozersk Broadcasting»). We used narrative and content analysis as our research methods. The analyzed content has several specific features: the scale of communication (users' activity in generating messages), its thematic consistency (narrative sticking to 5-6 main topics), empathy level (emotional reaction to network content, partial perception of published information), privacy (posting of the personal content) and activity of audience response (user's active participation in discussion of important aspects of city life). Based on the analysis of the user content, it is possible to conclude that empathetic communication is dominant in a discussion. It involves active, partial, emotional, comprehensive involvement of the inhabitants in all aspects of their birthplace life.
Key words: network communication, closed nuclear energy city, urban identity.
For citation: Shub M. L. (2022). The image of the closed nuclear energy city as reflected in the user-generated online content: the cultural analysis of the Ozersk's «VKontakte» social network interest groups. Chelyabinskij Gumanitarij, 2 (59), 73-77, doi: 10.47475/1999-5407-2022-10212.
Научная статья УДК 930.85
ОБРАЗ ЗАКРЫТОГО АТОМНОГО ГОРОДА В ЗЕРКАЛЕ ПОЛЬЗОВАТЕЛЬСКОГО КОНТЕНТА: ОПЫТ КУЛЬТУРОЛОГИЧЕСКОГО АНАЛИЗА ТЕМАТИЧЕСКИХ ГРУПП Г. ОЗЕРСКА В СОЦИАЛЬНОЙ СЕТИ «ВКОНТАКТЕ»
Мария Л. Шуб
Челябинский государственный институт культуры, Челябинск, Россия, shubka_83@mail.ru
Аннотация. Статья посвящена анализу пользовательского контента (постов и комментариев к ним) социальной сети «ВКонтакте», в частности тематических групп закрытого атомного города Озерска (группы «Подслушано в Озерске», «Озерск каждый день», «Говорит Озерск»). В качестве исследовательских методов использовались методы нарративного и контент-анализа. Проанализированный сетевой контент обладает рядом специфических черт: интенсивность коммуникации (высокая активность пользователей в генерировании сообщений), ее тематическое однообразие (сведение информационной повести к 5-6 основным темам), эмпатийность (наличие эмоциональной реакции на сетевой контент, неравнодушное восприятие публикуемой информации), приватность (публикация контента личного характера) и активность аудиторного отклика (активное участие пользователей в обсуждении важных аспектов жизни города, выраженное в большом числе комментариев, сопровождающих посты). На основе проделанного анализа пользовательского контента социальной сети можно сделать вывод о доминировании стратегии эмпатийной коммуникации, основанной на активной, неравнодушной, эмоциональной, всесторонней включенности жителей во все стороны жизни своей малой Родины.
Ключевые слова: сетевая коммуникация, закрытый атомный город, городская идентичность.
Для цитирования: Шуб М. Л. Образ закрытого атомного города в зеркале пользовательского контента: опыт культурологического анализа тематических групп г. Озерска в социальной сети «ВКонтакте» // Челябинский гуманитарий. 2022. № 2 (59). С. 73-77. doi: 10.47475/1999-5407-2022-10212.
© Шуб М. Л., 2022
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Introduction
Inherently, closed nuclear cities were and still are shut off not only territory-wise but also informationally. Restrictions apply to both internal and external communications. Only after the USSR collapsed, a massive, almost total control of any forms of communication of ZATO (zakrytye administrativno-territorial'nye obrazovaniya -a closed administrative and territorial entity) residents has become known to the public. This control included correspondence, telephone, and in-person conversations: «The authorities were keen to know people's views on the regime, ongoing political and economic events, life in the USSR in comparison with the pre-revolutionary period and with other countries (especially with the USA), and on life and work in the closed city in general. The authorities paid particular attention to the issues of the people's trust with the official mass media information» [4. P. 80]. Until the late 1980s, no mass edition and circulation newspapers were published in closed cities because they were considered a potential source of classified information leaks. The only available local «publications» were bulletin-board newspapers (large-sized handwritten/handmade local news posters). It was the people's internal news source, warnings about violations of security rules, etc.
Thus, in the Soviet years, on the one hand, the closed cities informational environment was strictly regulated, determined by the regime of secrecy, on the other hand, primarily due to the centralized media, it still allowed the residents of such settlements, although formally, to overcome communication isolation and to maintain informational connections with the external environment. In any case, this environment played an essential role in the functioning of the socio-cultural domain of the closed city, which «was an information-centered system starting from the importance of the data coming from abroad through counterintelligence channels, ending with the nuclear community hierarchy based on the classified information access level» [4. P. 78].
Precisely because of the informational component's significant role in the closed city functioning, we propose to include it in the structure of the ZATO's socio-cultural environment. Such inclusion was offered by V.S. Tolstikov, along with the culture of production, everyday life culture, educational systems, artistic creativity, and physical culture [6].
Main content: findings and discussion
The information space (the totality of various information flows or the information itself, and communication channels, or the ways of its dissemination) of the modern closed city maintains a connection with the Soviet past (through the strictly regulated content and a reasonably high level of uniformity and predictability of the information plan), but at the same time significantly distances itself from the Soviet legacy by increasing individualization of media consumption, the emergence of new types of mass communication, by moving of the informational exchange focus into the web.
Among the new features of the information space, we would like to highlight the public involvement in generating and evaluating information, that is, the emergence of what is now commonly referred to as usergenerated content. As a consequence of the immediate response of the city's population to the events and, in general, to the ongoing societal matters, the user-generated content is an effective tool for the public sentiment surveying (loyalty to the authorities, a measure of social aggression, potential for creative activity, etc.).
This paper will examine one type of user-generated content - the interest groups' online content (posts and comments) of one of the Southern Urals closed nuclear cities of Ozersk. The research was carried out by the methods of content and narrative analysis as part of large-scale cultural research of the local identity of residents of the industrial cities of the Southern Urals.
We based our research on the interest groups' content analysis in the social network «VKontakte». The interest groups were initiated and moderated by the residents of Ozersk city district - «Overheard in Ozersk», «The daily Ozersk», «Ozersk broadcasting». The master sample (total number of analyzed posts for six months in 2021) consists of 28762 posts.
In general, the online user-generated content of a closed nuclear city is characterized by the following features:
1. The volume of communication. In all three groups analyzed, users are remarkably active in creating their posts and writing comments on other users' posts. For example, the «Overheard in Ozersk» group on its own made public twice as many posts (15224) in six months of 2021 than «The Typical Chelyabinsk» group in the entire year of 2020 (7014). At the same time, the Chelyabinsk group boasted 302859 subscribers, while the Ozersk group registered 55030 users only. Thus, online content generating per user in a small closed city is twice as high as in the over a million populated Chelyabinsk.
There are several reasons for this kind of virtual communication volume level. The first one is the informational isolation of closed nuclear cities. It is a Soviet times' legacy and an obligatory condition for a municipality created around secret production. The absence of a free and extensive information exchange with the external environment inevitably leads to the escalation of this kind of exchange within a closed society. Nowadays, when the closed city bans on local means of communication have been lifted, social networks play the role of the central platform for communal dialogue. An active part in the collective discussion of one's native city issues helps to overcome a
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feeling of informational vacuum, of a life «behind barbed wire». It creates a sense of eventful life and knowledge of what is happening on the news.
The second reason is distinctive, acquired back in the Soviet era, attitude of the residents of «forbidden cities» toward their home. According to N.V. Melnikova, «identifying themselves with a closed city, the citizens were imbued with a sense of their significance and exclusivity. <...> Furthermore, one can say that its residents did not perceive a closed city as provincial (in this case, the traditional «capital-region-province» model does not apply). We encounter a pronounced locodicy of the inhabitants of closed cities - a desire to comprehend their place of living as the «center of the world,» as a place connected to the center of being» [5. P. 59]. Hence, the communication volume and intensity, the desire to participate in the discussion of significant and everyday events, expose rules' violators, thank compassionate people, share one's joy, and experience sympathy. All this is nothing but a manifestation of resident's characteristic, emotional attitude towards their hometown as an exceptional, unique place among other cities.
2. A thematic uniformity. On the whole, despite the impressive volume of online content, it appears very monotonous thematically (especially considering the number of posts per number of topics). It is also linked with the closed status of nuclear cities, the ban on coverage of a whole range of issues, and the impenetrable nature of this kind of settlement's life. L.G. Krotova characterizes the specifics of local TV newscasts of the closed city of Zheleznogorsk as follows: «This is the content of the general newscasts of Zheleznogorsk TV networks, and all TV editorial boards - life's trivia, and occasional cultural and sports event and the local administration political events, and, on a good day, a major event (emergency or an official important visit)» [1, P. 24].
The same could be stated about the content of the groups in Ozersk in the social network «VKontakte». The post titles range from «Help! My cat is missing», «Invitation to a bike trip», «Shoplifting in Ozersk» to «I like a tall brunette guy who works at the DNS computer store». The newsworthy events of different groups duplicate each other, and it is not unusual to see posts about the same event by three or more users within the same group (major traffic accidents, city festivals, etc.).
In general, the most popular posts include the following themes:
- a variety of classifieds (buying, selling, lost and found items, the opening of various businesses, cultural events previews, etc.);
- exposure of violations and crimes (shoplifting, local authorities negligence, road rage, inappropriate behavior in public);
- animal-related and other kinds of volunteering (search for the owners of missing animals, sharing various volunteering tips, invitations to a neighborhood clean-up);
- private posts (searching for people, mourning events, various congratulations);
- various expressions of gratitude and appeals for help.
It is quite natural that the professional realm is not reflected in the posts and their comments. Occasionally, there are reports about changes in the passing of the checkpoint procedures or scanning of the passes, etc.
The posts of Ozersk's citizens rarely contain «a closed city dweller's subcultural rhetoric», which was quite widespread back in the Soviet times: «The Soviet nuclear program information realm was permeated with the various coded information, aliases, and decoy terms. The special information coding was created, some of which were used in the top-secret data protection (we would call those codes «official»). And then there were other terms spontaneously emerging in the everyday narrative. People adapted to life in this coded information space, using the official codes, coming up with their own ones, overcoming and ignoring semantic obstacles» [5. P. 29].
In broad terms, not only the social groups of the closed city online content thematic uniformity should be noted, but its mundane character and the prevalence of everyday issues. For instance, among tens of thousands of different posts in the groups mentioned above, only 72 posts on the arts and 15 posts on the «spiritual issues» (moral choices, modern culture's Soviet past nostalgia, the need for social tolerance) went public.
3. The empathetic character of communication. This feature is primarily connected to the previous one and the particular attitude of the closed city dwellers towards their hometown. It is precisely because of perceiving their city as a unique one, essentially different from the others: as a place not as much limiting their freedom, but enabling special conditions for living, the situation where a people's partiality for their hometown, for its people and for all the everyday dealings which happen behind the closed doors is made possible. This personal involvement is expressed chiefly in the social narrative prevalence of online communication. The most significant number of posts is centered on the help to people or animals, environmental volunteering, calls for social justice, attempts to influence authorities' inaction, exposing of the law violations, willingness to return lost items sans a finder's fee, etc. There are often photos of locked cars with their lights on posted, followed by something like: «Bro, turn the lights off. You are killing your battery»1. There are many posts with users looking for someone they liked («I'm looking for a girl I saw applying lipstick in her car at Lenina and Kuznetsova streets») or with planned memorials and funerals.
1 Henceforward the spelling, punctuation, and style of the user's comments are preserved.
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Regardless of the mundane content, its humanistic nature is quite apparent: the city is perceived as a living space filled with people, their problems and concerns, desires and aspirations, involving every citizen and leaving no one indifferent.
4. A high level of the user's response. One of the manifestations of empathetic communication is the user's activity in generating online content and responding to it with comments. The presence of user response (not just moderator's activity) to the posted information turns a social networking group from a traditional data bank into a space of live communication and opinions exchange. Each post (even of the most private and local nature) is accompanied by dozens of entries - except only 24 instances of all the posts analyzed in all three interest groups.
Aside from the comments on quantitative indicators, their qualitative parameters are worth mentioning as well. As a rule, they are emotional, analytic, evaluative in terms of content, expressive in terms of the linguistic means used, expressing a shaped opinion of their author on a particular issue. Even of the most mundane nature, every message is considered an occasion for a reasoned, substantive discussion based on facts and/or the user's personal experience.
The most active Ozersk's interest groups commentators could be broadly divided into few categories and corresponding roles:
1. «An expert» (the most common type of a commenter). A user exhibiting the utmost competence in all matters - not only those that he/she initiated but also in the discussions created by others. The «experts» are often intolerant of their «colleagues» in communication, sneering at others' ignorance or errors: («The whole Ozersk already knows about it, only you are so <...>, you just missed everything», «Everything is clear anyway. The contest is already completed, with six winners picked instead of three, and photos were deleted at once. There were some people who viewed the contest as extremist», «There's no need to trim the poplars. Did you know that their fluff absorbs toxins in the air, thus making it pure for breathing?»).
2. «A truthseeker». A user whose communicative objective is to reveal the truth (often in the urgent social issues discussion), restore social justice, fight against law offenders, etc. As a rule, their comments contain such semantic constructions as «To be honest...», «I have nothing to fear so I will state that...», «There're many people who won't like what I'm going to say ...».
3. «A peacemaker». A user who is focused on leveling the intensity of debates, aimed at reconciling the disputing parties. As a rule, he/she does not speak out about the actual cause of the dispute (the information agenda) but calls for civility and tolerance of others' opinions («... if one thinks about it, you are both right...», «Why fight? Everyone has a right for their interpretation!» etc.).
4. «A pandit». A critical observer, a skeptic about the ways of urban life. Their most frequent objects of criticism
are:
- the city authorities' actions («Who are you addressing? No one wants to listen. Nothing good's been done in the city for a long time. All 'those people' just don't give a damn»);
- various businesses («The security have gone too far. They save parking space for each other, on top of that they bang on the car when you back up»);
- drivers («So, everyone parked here against the rules»);
- general public («They have gone off the rails! They damaged two bikes as they couldn't steal them!»).
5. «A daydreamer» The user posting aesthetically pleasing content with characteristic comments (photos of the sunset, flowers, kittens, etc.). The representatives of this category are not interested in life's minutiae - they do not comment on such posts, giving preference to the content about nature, animals, beautiful things, etc.
6. «An informer». A user who posts information only and does not enter into a discussion of pressing issues, leaving, as a rule, one comment reflecting his/her point of view: «This accident occurred between the buildings 54 and 57 on Pobeda Ave. (you can see the school №32 fence in the background)», «Foxes are especially aggressive at this time of the year», «This parking is prohibited by law. The driver is liable to pay 2,000 rubles fine», etc.
5. The personal (private) nature of communication. We must also mention that users consider urban social media as a forum for comprehensive communication, not ignoring even the most personal issues (the moderator does not ban those). It indicates the thematic universality of the researched social networks, the open nature of dialogue, a kind of «community» of networks, with the underlying rule «Life is an easier experience in the company of the others» at their base. The most common online content private issues are:
- memorial posts (funerals and upcoming mourning events);
- recreational posts (past or upcoming vacations, search for fellow travelers);
- daily life posts (menus, shopping, homegrown plants, etc.);
- search posts (missing people, looking for a person one likes, former classmates, etc.).
Conclusion
Based on Ozersk's «VKontakte» interest groups analysis, we conclude that the strategy of empathetic communication is dominating this social network's interactions. It is centered on the people's active, emotional,
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informal, comprehensive involvement in all areas of city life, their desire to make public statements about themselves, their hobbies, opinions, to indicate their concern about their hometown issues and their neighbors. This strategy could be identified as an outlet of sorts, an alternative to a formal, strictly regulated, and content-limited communication of the top-secret industry environment. This strategy involves most social network users: employees of the city's backbone enterprise and its infrastructure.
The researched network communication's hallmark features represent a particular case of a special type of local identity, especially characteristic of the closed cities. Due to various circumstances (territorial isolation, population's intellectual elitism, high level of social well-being, etc.) residents of «forbidden cities» perceive their cities as unique and exceptional, and themselves - as their chosen residents [5]. Thus, it essentially explains a high level of communicative activity of Ozersk's residents and its content and emotional involvement.
References
1. Krotova, L. (2010). SMI zakrytogo administrativno-territorial'nogo obrazovaniya [Mass media of a closed city]. Intellektual'nyjpotencialXXIveka: stupenipoznaniya [The intellectual potential of the XXI century: stages of cognition], 3, 22-24 (In Russ).
2. Melnikova, N. (2008). Zakrytyj atomnyj gorod kak subkul'tura [The closed nuclear city as a subculture]. Ural'skij istoricheskij vestnik [Ural Historical Journal], 1 (18), 54-61. (In Russ).
3. Melnikova, N. (2016). Kanaly svyazi i informacii v sovetskom atomnom proekte [Communication and information channels in the Soviet atomic project]. Vestnik Voronezhskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Seriya: Istoriya. Politologiya. Sociologiya [Proceedings of Voronezh State University. Series: History. Political science. Sociology], 3, 78-81. (In Russ).
4. Melnikova, N. (2016). Informacionnye kody sovetskogo atomnogo proekta [Information codes of the Soviet atomic project]. Vospitanie i obuchenie istorii v shkole i vuze: istoricheskij opyt, sovremennoe sostoyanie i perspektivy razvitiya. Ezhegodnik. XX Vserossijskie istoriko-pedagogicheskie chteniya [Upbringing and History Education at School and University: Historical Experience, Current State and Development Prospects. Yearbook. XX All-Russian historical and pedagogical readings]. Yekaterinburg, 29-36. (In Russ).
5. Tolstikov, V. (2012). Sociokul'turnaya sreda zakrytyh gorodov Urala [The social and cultural environment of the closed cities of the Urals]. Vestnik YUzhno-Ural'skogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta [Bulletin of the South Ural State University], 10 (269), 119-123. (In Russ).
Информация об авторе
М. Л. Шуб - доктор культурологии, доцент, доцент кафедры философии и культурологи культурологического факультета.
Information about the author
Maria L. Shub - Doctor of Cultural Studies, Associate Professor, Associate Professor of the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Studies of the Cultural Faculty.
Статья поступила в редакцию 13.06.2022; одобрена после рецензирования 21.07.2022;
принята к публикации 21.07.2022.
The article was submitted 13.06.2022; approved after reviewing 21.07.2022; accepted for publication 21.07.2022.
Автор заявляет об отсутствии конфликта интересов. The author declares no conflicts of interests.
