As an Organized Research Unit within the School of Cinematic Arts, the University of Southern California’s Institute for Multimedia Literacy (IML) develops educational programs and conducts research on the changing nature of literacy in a networked culture. The IML’s educational programs address students, teachers, and faculty across the educational spectrum, including K-12 teachers, student teachers, and higher education faculty. The IML supports faculty-directed research that seeks to transform the nature of scholarship within the disciplines.
For the past nine years, the USC Institute for Multimedia Literacy has developed strategies for building on traditional textual literacy, expanding the notion of literacy to include knowledge of authorship and analysis of visual, aural, dynamic, and interactive media. Since the founding of the Institute in 1998, many in the academic community have integrated the IML’s methodology into their teaching, learning, and research.