“Man in Danger” Media Festival in Łódź – the structure and motivations of the festival visitors / Festiwal Medialny w Łodzi „Człowiek w niebezpieczeństwie” – struktura i motywacje festiwalowych gości

Since the earliest times, people have celebrated a variety of holidays and performed different rituals, including festivals. The early ones were organized already in the ancient times (e.g. religious festivals), but it is only in the last few decades that they have gained real importance. Recently, the increasing number, variety and social and economic importance of festivals have made them an object of study in many sciences, such as sociology, anthropology, geography and event studies. The last of the mentioned disciplines is devoted to the study of different types of events, such as conferences, fairs, business meetings and festivals. Researchers conduct analyses of the structure and motivations of the event-goers, as well as the social and economic effects of events (Cudny et al. 2012). This article is a cross-disciplinary study, based on event studies and the geographical approach. Geographical studies of festivals are conducted as a part of human geography, in such sub-disciplines as cultural geography (treated as a part of human geography), urban and tourism geography. Broadly speaking, festival activity is an element of human culture. Culture is seen as a complex whole, comprising knowledge, beliefs, art, morality, laws, customs and other skills and habits, acquired by people as members of society (Kłoskowska, 2005). This is a very Institute of Tourism and Economic Development, University of Lódź – Branch in Tomaszów Mazowiecki, Poland. Email: algernon1@op.pl* Institute of Tourism and Economic Development, University of Lódź – Branch in Tomaszów Mazowiecki, Poland**