Watching the Cameron
Russell TED Talk for me just reinforced that notion that all of the commercial
media that we are subjugated to is heavily altered, and is a product in and of
itself. It really shows how important media literacy is, because it is used in
such an obscuring way that being able to decipher what is real and what is not
is becoming more and more difficult. I think that’s how it ties in with Neil
Postman’s concerns with “crap detection”. Critical is the key word in Critical
Media Literacy. Being able to critically decipher what is real and not real in
digital media is extremely important if we want our students to be able to
learn and gain information. I think these quotes from the reading really back
up this.
“Through the inclusion of some groups and
exclusion of others, representations benefit dominant and positively
represented groups and disadvantage marginalized and subordinate ones.”
“Thus, knowing what sort
of corporation produces a media artifact or what sort of system of production
dominates given media will help to critically interpret biases and distortions
in media texts.”
“The USA now has two
national media literacy membership organizations that hold national conferences
every 2 years, support a variety of media literacy activities, and have about
400 members each.”
A silver lining is that
the same critical thinking that was used for print media is still useful when
addressing digital media. And a deep knowledge of reading and writing abilities
are very valuable with media literacy. As for my own teaching I would have to
go with Critical media literacy. It builds on these approaches, analyzing media
culture as products of social production and struggle and teaching students to
be critical of media representations and discourses, but also stressing the
importance of learning to use the media as modes of self-expression and social
activism.
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