Bidzilya Y. Press as a way of self identification in multicultural information and communication space of Transcarpathia.

The thesis deals with the research of printing media of Transcarpathia as an important social institution that affects the specific ethnic and civil identity of a multicultural region through the prism of tolerance and intercultural communication. The article analyses the stages of development of the Transcarpathian information continuum in the context of historic and political background under the rule of different states. The development of the periodical press in Transcarpathia since its birth (1845-1858) is divided into the following periods: 1) Dual Monarchy (1867-1919) 2) the time of the Czechoslovak Republic (1919-1938); 3) National autonomy and the Carpathian Ukraine (1938-1939) 4) the occupation of Horthy Hungary (1939-1944); 5) the Soviet regime (1945- 1991); 6) the period of independent Ukraine (since 1991). The study has introduced 298 periodicals into the history of journalism. These are 276 Ukrainian media and 22 more media belonging to the other ethnic and national communities that live in the area. In the historic context the article proves that all the media of Transcarpathia (both the ones that meet the informational needs of the state-forming nation, and ones that meet the needs of the other ethnic groups) function as the means of national identity that express various ethnic communities in the region. There is an established interdependence between the development and the rise of national periodicals and cultural as well as educational movement of the ethnic communities. It is proved that the periodical press of the Hungarian, Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Roma, German and some other ethnic communities in the Carpathian region has its own typological features influenced by the specific national culture.