Media literacy for justice

CHICAGO — The corrosive effects of today’s relentless tide of media are pernicious. We are conditioned in many ways by our media environments to accept and not question, making it crucial that young people master the skills necessary to access, analyze, evaluate, and create media. In “Media Literacy for Justice: Lessons for Changing the World,” published by ALA Neal-Schuman, Belinha S. De Abreu and her fellow contributors propose that a key solution to our society’s crisis of misinformation, misrepresentation, and misunderstanding lies in melding social justice aims with media literacy concepts and skills. They showcase reflective activities and lesson ideas that can be adapted for educational settings from higher education to the K-12 spectrum, community centers, and libraries. Featuring a Foreword by Yohuru Williams (Racial Justice Initiative, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, St. Thomas University, Minneapolis) and a Preface by Asha Rangappa (former FBI agent and Senior Lecturer, Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs), this resource:

• spotlights the work of school library media specialists, classroom teachers, academic educators, and representatives of non-profits from around the world;
• presents ten chapters which explore such timely issues as how to deal with controversial topics in the classroom, the effects of misinformation/disinformation on civics in society, why the media underrepresents certain people in their programming, the digital divide and where libraries fit in, how injustice exacerbates public health issues, and global conceptions of social justice and media literacy examined through various world events; and
• provides information about additional resources like social action/advocacy organizations, classroom resources, and films that will assist readers as they reflect upon, teach, and discuss media literacy and social justice.

Examination copies are available for instructors who are interested in adopting this title for course use. An e-book edition of the text will be available later in 2022.

De Abreu, PhD. is a global media literacy educator and served as an international expert to the Forum on Media & Information Literacy for UNESCO’s Communication & Information Section. Also author of “Teaching Media Literacy, Second Edition,” she is the founder of the International Media Literacy Research Symposium which has been held in the USA and Portugal and the World Media Literacy Forum. She serves as the President of the International Council for Media Literacy (IC4ML), formerly known as National Telemedia Council (NTC), which produces The Journal of Media Literacy. Her other publications include “Mobile Learning through Digital Media Literacy.” She is also the recipient of the 2021 National Association for Media Literacy Education Research Award. For more information, visit belinhadeabreu.com.

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