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Aspen Media Literacy Conference Report - Part II:
Procedings and Next Steps Patricia Aufderheide, Rapporteur The Aspen Institute Wye Center Media literacy, the movement to expand notions of literacy to include the powerful post-print media that dominate our informational landscape, helps people understand, produce and negotiate meanings in a culture made up of powerful images, words and sounds. I. Definition A media literate person- and everyone should have the opportunity to become one- can access, analyze, evaluate, and produce both print and electronic media. The fundamental objective of media literacy is critical autonomy relationship to all media. Emphases in media literacy training range widely, including informed citizenship, aesthetic appreciation and expression, social advocacy, self-esteem, and consumer competence. The range of emphases will expand with the growth of media literacy. Just as there are a variety of emphases within the media literacy movement, there are different strategies and processes to achieve them. Some educators may focus their energies on analysis-- perhaps studying the creation and reception of a television program like The Cosby Show, and thus its significance for a mulicultural but racially divided society. Others may emphasize acquiring production skills--for instance, the ability to produce a radio or television documentary or an interactive display on one's own neighborhood. Some may use media literacy as a vehicle to understand the economic infrastructure of mass media, as a key element in the social construction of public knowledge. Others may use it primarily as a method to study and express the unique aesthetic properties of a particular medium. There have been and will be a broad array of constituencies for media literacy: young people, parents, teachers, librarians, administrators, citizens. And there are a variety of sites to teach and practice media literacy: public and private schools, churches, synagogues, universities, civic and voluntary organizations serving youth and families, mass media from newspapers to television. But no matter what the project, constituency or site, media educators share some beliefs. Media educators know that understanding how reality is constructed through media means understanding three interacting elements: the production process (including technological, economic, bureaucratic and legal constraints), the text and the audience/receiver/end-user. In a slightly different formulation of the same understanding, they understand some basic precepts in common:
Finally, media literacy educators in principle agree on a pedagogical approach. No matter what the setting or project, but particularly for formal learning, media educators insist that the process of learning embody the concepts being taught. Thus, media literacy learning is hands-on and experiential, democratic (the teacher is researcher and facilitator), and process-driven. Stressing as it does critical thinking, it is inquiry-based. Touching as it does on the welter of issues and experiences of daily life, it is interdisciplinary and cross-curricular. II. Building on Experience It is ironic and also understandable that the United States is the premier producer of international mass media, but that media literacy education is only beginning in this country. The United States has a culture fascinated with individualism and with tote potential of technology to solve social problems. Its culture is also pervaded with commercialism such that as one participant argued, it simultaneously produces a "culture of denial" about the cultural implications of commercialism. Media literacy is thus an especially difficult challenge in the United States. The U.S. experience until recently has been that of a blizzard of idiosyncratic projects, typically driven by the passion of individual teachers and organizers. These include the regional media arts center Appalshop's efforts to rescue regional self-images; the Foxfire teaching experiment; the network building of the National Telemedia Council; individual media literacy courses in schools and universities; programs with teenagers, people in housing projects and prison; civic initiatives in support of the First Amendment; public forums on media influence in conjunction with the industry organizations; the adoption of a Girl Scouts merit badge for media literacy; citizen activism around children's television legislation; cable access programs and practices; youth ministry programs in churches and synagogues; teacher education at the school and district level; and public television programs and outreach activities. Corporate projects and materials, in search of markets for new technologies, have also explored media literacy. This diversity reflects, among other things, the decentralized nature of U.S. education. In the last several years, leaders in various media literacy arenas have coalesced around basic definitions, approaches and goals for media literacy. This emerging process has been reflected, inter alia, in the creation of the National Association for Media Education, and indeed in the conference itself. The experience of other nations, as well as the history of individual efforts within the United States, may be important to the growth of media literacy here. A. The Canadian Experience In Ontario, Canada, teachers built on English and Australian media literacy programs and practices, as well as on academic work in cultural studies. Recently media literacy became a mandated and funded element for grades 7-12, within language arts programs. Integrating it into formal schooling gave it unparalleled legitimacy. Currently Canadian media education organizations are lobbying in other provinces to repeat the Ontario initiative. Elements of the Ontario success story include:
B. The German Experience In Germany, media literacy or "media competency," as it is termed, is a voluntary program in the schools, mostly for grades 5-10. It has a broad mandate, with the following specific goals:
Germany's media education is beset with the usual limitations of a voluntary program, including poor teacher preparedness (at most a third of teachers get university training in media). Textbooks and ample support materials do exist, although they are not typically tailored to particular age groups or subjects. Media competency classes are now extending beyond an initial focus on electronic media to all information technologies, from books to computers. Also relevant is a mandatory curriculum in computer-information technology, exemplary in its integrative approach joining technological with socio-political concerns. C. Initiatives in the United States Within the United States, both in-service and pre-service programs for teachers have attempted to put media literacy on the curricular agenda. In-service efforts are de-centralized and diverse, offered variously by such groups as Educational Video Center in New York, Strategies for Media Literacy in San Francisco, Center for Media and Values in Los Angeles, Southwest Alternate Media Project, the National Council of Teachers of English and other. The 1993 Institute on Media Education, supported by Harvard Graduate School of Education and drawing on the expertise leading U.S. media literacy activists, is an example of training that also deepens institutional commitment to the approach. As well, an adaptable and successful model for teacher training is the experience of the National Writing Project for English teachers, a project of the National Council of Teachers of English. The Project is an in-service, intensive teacher training summer program that is community-Based and stresses learning by doing. This voluntary program reaches veteran teachers who want to learn better both how to write and teach, and both builds on and creates a community of reference for them. Perhaps the most sustained institutional effort at pre- service training within formal schooling has been at Appalachian State University, where North Carolina's largest teacher training institution requires competence in media literacy and offers courses to that end. The success of that program reflects some useful strategies:
III. The Current Landscape A. Challenges For those who want the heterogeneous experiences of local U.S. individuals and groups to grow into a movement, there are dramatic challenges in the current landscape, not least of which are the rapidly evolving technological possibilities. Several key things have until now been lacking:
B. Opportunities Some of these very problems might also provide opportunities. For instance:
IV. Toward a Media Literacy Movement If media literacy is to become a nationwide movement with a coherent image and clear mandate, permitting widely flexible goals, it must take steps to meet some basic needs. A. Needs The growing movement for media literacy in the United States has several kinds of clear and urgent needs:
B. Approaches Participants in the leadership conference took several steps toward building a media literacy movement in the United States. In terms of data: Nodes of task forces, which would involve people not present at the conference, were created to address fact-finding in the areas of teacher training, networking, and the creation of an operating foundation for media literacy. In terms of publicity: Two major actions were taken. First, participants endorsed in principle and set in motion the creation of a mission statement, which could become a common platform for diverse projects in media literacy. As well, a prize for model curricula in media literacy was proposed, through the National Council of Teachers of English. In terms of infrastructure: The National Telemedia Council and the National Association of Media Education were encouraged in their respective networking efforts. It was recognized that the movement's diversity was part of its strength, and that networking among efforts was a highly constructive step. It was also recognized that task force efforts, including the creation of a common mission statement, would lead to establishing other institutions, such as an operating foundation. In terms of productive relationships: the conference participants endorsed in principle a test site for media literacy in the schools, in New Mexico. New Mexico now has a media literacy requirement on the books. Thus, this project can become a place to garner publicity, establish relationships and build networks.
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