Is Ireland’s Polish community in Ireland still strong enough to support its own local media? Anna Paluch speaks with the editor of Polski Express, Anna Pas, about how the Polish media in Ireland is changing to meet new expectations
Metro Éireann: During my journalism course we were taught that even if the people watch television and listen to the radio, they like to read about the same news in newspapers. Here in Ireland, immigrant newspapers app-eared naturally along with the peak influx of Polish migrants about three years ago. Polski Express was one of them. How did you see your ‘mission’ then, to find your place in a demanding market?
Anna PaÅ›: Polski Express has been published since 2006, and from the very beginning its aim was to appeal to a specific group of readers. They were young, educated people with quite good English and open to integrate with the society they found themselves in.
In this sense Polski Express was different from other Polish newspapers already existing – we were far from thinking that we were living in a ghetto, writing only about Polish events, only about Polish initiatives. Our idea was to show that we can find our place in this country through things that we all enjoy. That is, we all understand music and art, we go to the cinema, we sit near different people. It is not about shutting down in our own small world.
Therefore from the very beginning in Polski Express we did not deal too much with issues closely related to immigrant lives – all the arrival formalities, how to cope with the social welfare office or find a first job. Those topics were attended to in our other paper, the weekly Å»ycie w Irlandii (Life in Ireland), while Polski Express from the foundation was a lifestyle magazine, with a lot of space for culture and social issues, interesting for Poles in Ireland and the British Isles. If it was in English, it would probably be interesting for other nationalities as well.
ME: Was the paper much different at the beginning? I mean, over the years your readership has changed.
AP: True, during those three years many things have changed, our target reader had changed, or at least our idea about him/her. Four or five years since they arrived, many Polish people have started families. Statistically, young Polish males were around 25 years old when they came here. Meanwhile, this single man probably met somebody, so we have more and more families, more children, people are getting promoted at work, etc. Therefore in Polski Express we have articles on pregnancy, maternity, job-seeking or behaviour in recruitment agencies – all those changes are reflected in our magazine.
ME: The second paper you mentioned, Życie w Irlandii, it was closed last year?
AP: Yes, we were publishing it from July 2006 to June 2008. As I mentioned before, Å»ycie had a bit different profile. There were two similar papers at that time already. Å»ycie was a weekly, let’s say ‘information/guidance’ paper, and apart from it there was Kurier Polski and Gazeta Polska. Later on GÅ‚os Polski appeared, it is more tabloid-like.
In June last year, as we observed in sales, there was less demand for providing newcomers with information, and that is what those papers did. Fewer and fewer people needed newspapers with job and accommodation ads, with information on how to deal with formalities. Those who were already here had this knowledge. With regard to those arriving later, sociologists have the idea of ‘chain migration’ which is relevant; those new people are coming to someone who is already here, and this person helps in the first stage. As well, there was decrease in the number of newcomers, and all this brought us to a decision on the Å»ycie closure.
ME: How do you see the future of Polski Express?
AP: I think there will be changes in the Polish media market along with the profile change of those who are staying here. There are still people who were a bit less successful here, working without knowledge of English, they were keeping close to their own friends and relatives, and it seems to me that the recent financial crisis will make them go back.
But there is still a large group of people who have ‘started their roots’ here – their home is here, they have children in schools, they are studying, they have a job that brings them satisfaction. These people will stay and will be looking for something for themselves and they are our exact target readers.
This process has already started and will get deeper. As a magazine, Polski Express presents something more universal and up-to-date. Besides, it is free and thus more available, and on the internet as well.
When we started this work it was fun, but it was a great challenge for us. We write for people who’ve arrived here not only to earn the money, but because they are young, open and adventurous. And we try to write in this perspective, to discover Ireland and find more behind the stereotypes of Guinness, whiskey or St Patrick’s Day.
