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Summary: This article provides an overview of the notion of an event, and suggests new research - perspectives. It highlights the specific features of the event in contemporary thought and, in particular, its relationship with the media. Taking as their starting point the problematics of the social construction of events, the authors suggest that certain philosophical work might usefully be taken into account, and that false polarities such as that between sociological and semiological interpretations should be transcended, in order to gain greater insight into the process of the symbolic constitution of the event.

Summary: This paper, based on the Irish example, reports on the role of a news agency, Agence France Presse, in the construction of an event. The author shows how the agency, under constraints of time and thematic production, selects and classifies subjects. It thus reduces situations to events by highlighting the themes likely to have news value. In the final instance it is, however, the agency's clients, the media, which re-cast the news in relation to the context in which it is to be received.

Summary: How was the CSG bill, a major priority on the Rocard government's political agenda, constructed as a political entity? Drawing upon empirical data from the prime minister's information and publicity service, it is possible to analyse the process of its composition and recomposition. Alongside overwhelming events such as the Gulf crisis and, to a lesser extent, the 'high school and suburban crisis', the controversial CSG relied essentially for its construction on the government's definition of the political situation. The frames of interpretation applied to the CSG by the media were aimed at reducing the controversy in terms of political tactics and parliamentary games, while the subject itself presented specific difficulties of interpretation.

Summary: As part of the discourse engendered by our culture, there is no reason for media discourse to receive special treatment - despite journalists' claims concerning the peculiar nature of their work. An anthropological viewpoint shows us that in the construction of their discourse, journalists are constrained in the same way as makers of myths: it is an attempt to define reality by means of narrative structures which, in order to give meaning to the unexpected, resort to culturally deep-rooted symbols. The analysis of the media event - the former king's visit at Easter - which mobilized the Romanian press in 1992, shows the power of the symbols which the media exploit while maintaining the illusion of simply recounting concrete events.

Summary: What happens in a radio studio at the moment of going on the air? This article examines the modalities of going on and off the air at France Culture. It describes the radio producer's twofold task: slhe has to introduce a third party, the listener, into the group of participants in the studio, and to construct a place for that listener in the conversation. The study shows the contemporary form of interaction on the air, and the frame of reference mobilized. We see how radio professionals employ vari- ous means to achieve the 'live' involvement of speakers, and in so doing define, in a sense, the cultural programme at France Culture.

Summary: The origins of chain letters, which are now circulated for ludic, humanitarian or profit motives, can be found in age-old religious traditions. This study of the genre shows how these letters became gradually secularized and identifies contemporary forms using such modern methods as fax machines, photocopiers and electronic mail. Thus the ancient 'celestial letters', which were still very much alive in the sixteenth century, became letters sent with the blessing of Saint Anthony, or of mere bishops and parish priests. As the letters became commonplace they also came to he seen as either a miraculous cure or a clever way to make money. With further secularization, wholly ludic chain letters appeared, and then bogus advertising photocopies claiming that recipients have won a fabulous prize - a 'gift from heaven'.