How can youth media production promote civic and political understanding and activism? A review and an interview with Steve Goodman.
There’s been a fair amount of debate recently about the civic dimensions of media, and of media literacy. Claims about the liberating or empowering potential of digital media date back to the origins of the internet, but they resurfaced quite strongly in the 2000s with the emergence of ‘Web 2.0’. Some enthusiasts argued that social media would promote political debate, participation and activism, and ultimately lead to a revival in democracy. Others who looked more closely at the evidence – including Shaku Banaji and myself – were somewhat more sceptical. In the late 2010s – in the world of Trump and Brexit, with violent nationalism and fundamentalism running rampant, and political debate increasingly polarized and confrontational – this seems like a distant dream. In this context, some have argued that media educators need to take a more interventionist approach: Paul Mihailidis, for example, has proposed that we should move beyond media criticism, and seek to promote what he calls ‘civic intentionality’.
- : https://davidbuckingham.net/2018/11/23/the-challenge-of-youth-media/
- : David Buckingham