Home - Polish Cultural Institute

The two-day Conference Media and Politics offers three sessions: "Freedom Movements and the Press", "Transatlantic Media Wars", and "The Changing Shape of Today's Media". Opening Remarks will be delivered by John Schulz, Dean, College of Communication, Boston University, and the keynote addresses by Adam Michnik, Editor-in-Chief of Poland's leading daily newspaper, Gazeta Wyborcza; Michael Naumann, Publisher, Die Zeit; and Orville Schell, Dean of the Berkeley School of Journalism. Panelists from Europe and America include such distinguished figures in journalism as Jane Kramer, European Correspondent of The New Yorker, Sylvie Kauffmann of Le Monde, John Darnton, who reported on the Solidarity movement for The New York Times, the legendary Veton Surroi from Kosova, author Jonathan Schell, and many others.

The exhibition Poland on the Front Page: 1979-1989 presents 53 blow-ups of front-page stories on Poland from The New York Times, Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, from the historic first visit to Poland of Pope John Paul II, the Gdansk Shipyard strikes and the birth of Solidarity, through the imposition of martial law, the Round Table talks, and finally the almost-free elections of 1989 that ended Communist rule. Juxtaposed with these pages from American newspapers are those of the official Polish media during the same decade (Trybuna Ludu, Zycie Warszany, Rzeczpospolita) and the independent Gazeta Wyborcza. The coverage of the American and Polish press depicts two different realms, but by the end of the decade the stories converge. The exhibition depicts the evolution of journalism in Poland.