Newspaper headlines

Activity 7. A) Match each of the following words with its meaning

Chief drama reshuffle gag gems seek/sought swoop poll quit rig haul

1. jewels

2. goods stolen in robbery

3. to falsify

4. director, high-ranking official

5. raid, to raid

6. to look for, ask for, want

7. to silence, censor, censorship

8. exciting, dramatic event

9. election, voting, public opinion survey

10. to rearrange

11. to resign, leave

B) For each of the following headlines find the sentence below which expresses it as it would appear in an ordinary news article.

‘POLLS RIGGED’ CHARGES

TWO SOUGHT AFTER BREAK-OUT DRAMA

CABINET RESHUFFLE URGED

SERVICE CHIEFS GAGGED: TWO QUIT

GEMS HAUL SEIZED IN SWOOP

1. allegations have been made that election results were falsified.

2. police raided a house today and took possession of jewellery stolen in a recent robbery.

3. police are hunting two men who made a daring escape from prison by helicopter.

4. senior officers of the armed forces have been instructed not to talk to the media and? As a result two of them have resigned.

5. strong appeals have been made to the PM to make changes in his ministers.

C) Express the meaning of the following headlines:

EDITORS URGE END TO PRESS GAG

India seeks us aid

GEM SMUGGLERS GAUGHT IN PORT SWOOP

BANK RAID CASH HAUL FOUND: 3 CHARGED

HEAD QUITS OVER ‘RIGGED’ EXAM RESULTS

RAIL CHIEFS RESHUFFLED AFTER BIG LOSSES

GOVT DEFEATED IN POLL DRAMA

D) Match each of the following words with its meaning and express the meaning of the headlines suggested:

Move cash woo bid foil halt oust quiz plea ban back flee

1. to prevent

2. strong request, call for help, appeal

3. attempt, to attempt

4. stop

5. to prohibit, prohibition

6. fighting, conflict, to argue, to fight

7. support, to support

8. to force out of office, remove from high position

9. run away from, escape

10. to try to attract

11. action, step, to take action

12. to question, interrogate

DICTATOR OUSTED: PLEA FOR CALM

NEW MOVES TO HALT BORDER CLASHES

GOVT BACKS ARMS BAN TO WOO LEFT

KIDNAP BID FOILED: 3 QUIZZED, 2 FLEE

E) Instructions as above.

Split leak riddle probe axe lift curb baffled storm rap call envoy

1. mystery

2. to escape

3. diplomat

4. close, dismiss, cancel

5. remove (restrictions)

6. criticize, reprimand

7. at a loss to explain, mystified

8. restrict, restriction

9. divide, division

10. investigate, investigation

11. to demand, to appeal

12. angry argument

CABINET LEAK: CALL FOR PROBE

EU SPLIT OVER LIFTING OF TRAVEL CURBS

DEAD ENVOY RIDDLE: YARD BAFFLED

PM RAPS BBC IN JOBS AXE STORM

F) Make brief headlines from the following news stories:

1. Eighteen people were killed when the army tried to overthrow the government

2. A leading diplomat has been mysteriously murdered

3. The Prime Minister is trying to win the support of the coal miners’ trade union

4. The director of British Petroleum has been forced to resign

5. A member of Parliament was questioned by the police in an investigation into the use of illegal drugs

G) Express the following headlines in ordinary English

PEER DIES IN FLATS BLAZE DRAMA

BLAST TOLL RISING: WITNESSES SOUGHT

COMMONS STORM OVER DEFENCE CUTS

M – WAY DEATH CRASH: BRITON HELD

Activity 8. Read the article and do the assignments suggested.

NTV sends Parfyonov Packing

NTV fired star journalist Leonid Parfyonov in a dramatic decision that his colleagues and media experts decried Wednesday as the latest setback to press freedom. Parfyonov was fired for breaking his contract, which required him to "sup­port the policies of the company's lead­ership," according to the statement signed by NTV general director Nikolai Senkevich. His weekly current affairs program "Namedni," one of the station's top-rated shows, was cancelled. Parfyonov unleashed a public scandal by revealing to Kommersant an in­ternal memo ordering him to cut an interview with the widow of a slain Chechen separatist leader, Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, from his show's broadcast last Sunday because it could negatively influence the ongoing trial of two Rus­sians charged with the murder. The show went ahead without the five-minute segment, but Parfyonov said the decision forcing him to drop it amounted to censorship. And, he added bitingly in an inter­view given to Izvestja after that deci­sion bat before he was fired, "I do not need to be taught to love my Mother­land."

Some of the debate Wednesday swirled around whether Parfyonov had forced NTV s hand by going public, but Parfyonov told Ekho Moskvy that his contract only barred him from giving in­terviews to competitors, and whether or not his comments to Kommersant can be construed as such is unclear. "I was expecting it sooner or later," Parfyonov told The Associated Press, "everything was leading up to it." What complicates the picture fur­ther is that, in Senkevich's absence, the contentious memo was issued by Alexander Oerasimov, who, in addition to his position as deputy general man­ager for political and information pro­gramming, hosts a current affairs show of his own. called "'Lichny Vklad," which rivals "Namedni." Savik Shuster, host of the NTV talk show "Svoboda Slova" and perhaps the only independent voice left at the sta­tion, called Parfyonov's ouster "an enormous loss for the channel," The Washington Post reported. But he said Parfyonov has served as a "whistleblower" in a way that might help. "Now — at least for a short period — I don't think anyone will threaten my program," Shuster was quoted as say­ing. Among Moscow viewers, "Namedni" was the top social-political program for the last week in May, ac­cording to TNS Media ratings published Tuesday in Kommersant The week before, it came in second to Channel One's weekly news wrap-up "Vremya ". Taken overall, it was NTV's most popular program together with a series about the life of single women, "Balzakovsky Vozrast".

Such high market share means high advertising revenues, which NTV has now jeopardized along with its reputa­tion, said Yasen Zasursky, the dean of Moscow State University's journalism faculty. "It's a bad day for Russian televi­sion," he said, calling the decision proof of NTV's infamously bad man­agement He added that NTV's decision to sacrifice its best asset over a minor dis­pute damages its claim to being an in­dependent channel. Alexander Khinshtein, a United Russia State Duma deputy and a jour­nalist, acknowledged that there would be "noticeable damage" to the Krem­lin's reputation as well, since it is per­ceived as being behind all negative events in the media, according the web site Newsru com. The decision to fire Parfyonov was announced at 11 p m Tuesday night But many of the journalists who worked for him on "Namedni" and "Strana l Mir," a late-night news pro­gram he launched as a training ground for protégés, only learned the news from reporters seeking their comment. Where the newly unemployed Parfyonov will land is not clear He de­murred every time he was asked of his future plans Wednesday, saying he planned simply to rest. As for what will become of "Strana i Mir," he told Interfax that was "be­yond my control now ". Mikhail Seslavmsky, the head of the Federal Press Agency, met with Par­fyonov on Wednesday evening and told Interfax afterward that "if needed," his agency could offer finan­cial grants to help Parfyonov develop new projects because such a talented journalist "should not be lost ". NTV journalist Pavel Lobkov, who worked for "Namedm," played down the chances of a walk-out similar to the one led by Yevgeny Kiselyov when the private station was acquired by Gazprom-Media, a company partly owned by the state. "Leonid was always opposed to any kind of mass actions and believed that such issues aren't resolved on public squares," he was quoted by Interfax as saying. In his statement, Senkevich called Parfyonov "unconditionally one of the most talented journalists working in contemporary Russian television". But, he said, "this incident was not the first ". Parfyonov's relationship with sta­tion management had been rocky since Senkevich was brought in last spring to replace Boris Jordan, with whom Parfyonov had worked closely. Shortly after Senkevich was in­stalled, Parfyonov and his show took an extended leave of absence in February 2003, with "Namedm" producer Nikolai Kartoziya explaining that they could not "guarantee the quality of their product". Things were smoothed over, and "Namedni" returned to the air three months later, in May. In November, though, its journalists knocked heads again over a decision by Senkevich to yank a 'Namedni" segment on Yelena Tregubova, a jour­nalist whose account of a meeting with President Vladimir Putin he judged to be "vulgar ". Parfyonov, 44, had worked at NTV since 1993, making a reputation for having an ironic tone and, in contrast to Kiselyov, being apolitical. Despite their differences, Kiselyov said Wednesday that he was pained by Parfyonov's dismissal "Regardless of however difficult relations between us may have been, everyone loses from the loss of Parfyonov and 'Namedm,'" he told Ekho Moskvy. Ekho Moskvy's television observer, Yelena Afanasyeva, said press free­dom had not disappeared, though the trend was in that direction. "NTV still has space to, say, not open the news program with Putin's meeting some minister and instead be the first to show footage of a terrorist explosion in Grozny," she said "But that space is constantly shrinking ". Yelena Savina, a producer for NTV's evening news program "Segodnya," framed the firing even more starkly. "The Kremlin never trusted Par­fyonov We, as newspeople, under­stand that this serious attack is a warn­ing for us I see this as the first attack in a pre-planned campaign," she told Newsru.com.

By Caroline McGregor

Moscow Times, June 3, 2004

1. Find the English equivalents in the article suggested:

Преуменьшать значение, препятствие, руководство, самое рейтинговое шоу, развязать конфликт, лидер сепаратистов, истолковывать, вести программу текущих событий, увольнение, краткая сводка новостей, рисковать, имеющий дурную репутацию, возражать/сомневаться, неустойчивые отношения, долговременное отсутствие, успокаиваться (о конфликте), вернуться в эфир, отставка/увольнение.

2. Answer the questions:

   1. What is the official and unofficial pretext of Parfyonov’s dismissal?

   2. What is the essence of Parfyonov’s contract according to him?

   3. How did his colleagues accept his dismissal?

   4. What are the possible outcomes of Parfyonov’s dismissal for NTV and TV in general?

   5. Did he receive any proposal after the firing?

   6. Dwell on the relations of the “Namedni” team with the new authorities of the channel.

   7. Highlight the Savina and Kiselyov’s opinions.

Activity 9. Read the article, discuss it and render.