What is Media Literacy?
For centuries, literacy has referred to the ability to read and write. Today, we get most of our
information through an interwoven system of media technologies. The ability to read many types of
media has become an essential skill in the 21st Century. Media literacy is the ability to access,
analyze, evaluate, and create media. Media literate youth and adults are better able to understand
the complex messages we receive from television, radio, Internet, newspapers, magazines, books,
billboards, video games, music, and all other forms of media. Media literacy skills are included in the
educational standards of every state—in language arts, social studies, health, science, and other
subjects. Many educators have discovered that media literacy is an effective and engaging way to
apply critical thinking skills to a wide range of issues.
Media Literacy Project’s approach to media literacy education comes from a media justice
framework. Media Justice speaks to the need to go beyond creating greater access to the same old
media structure. Media Justice takes into account history, culture, privilege, and power. We need
new relationships with media and a new vision for its control, access, and structure. Media Justice
understands that this will require new policies, new systems that treat our airways and our
communities as more than markets.
Media literacy skills can help youth and adults:
- Develop critical thinking skills
- Understand how media messages shape our culture and society
- Identify target marketing strategies
- Recognize what the media maker wants us to believe or do
- Name the techniques of persuasion used
- Recognize bias, spin, misinformation, and lies
- Discover the parts of the story that are not being told
- Evaluate media messages based on our own experiences, skills, beliefs, and values
- Create and distribute our own media messages
- Advocate for media justice
Information Literacy Defined
Information literacy is a set of abilities requiring individuals to "recognize when information is needed and
have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information." 1 Information literacy also
is increasingly important in the contemporary environment of rapid technological change and proliferating
information resources. Because of the escalating complexity of this environment, individuals are faced
with diverse, abundant information choices--in their academic studies, in the workplace, and in their
personal lives. Information is available through libraries, community resources, special interest
organizations, media, and the Internet--and increasingly, information comes to individuals in unfiltered
formats, raising questions about its authenticity, validity, and reliability. In addition, information is available
through multiple media, including graphical, aural, and textual, and these pose new challenges for
individuals in evaluating and understanding it. The uncertain quality and expanding quantity of information
pose large challenges for society. The sheer abundance of information will not in itself create a more
informed citizenry without a complementary cluster of abilities necessary to use information effectively.
Information literacy forms the basis for lifelong learning. It is common to all disciplines, to all learning
environments, and to all levels of education. It enables learners to master content and extend their
investigations, become more self-directed, and assume greater control over their own learning. An
information literate individual is able to:
Determine the extent of information needed
Access the needed information effectively and efficiently
Evaluate information and its sources critically
Incorporate selected information into one’s knowledge base
Use information effectively to accomplish a specific purpose
Understand the economic, legal, and social issues surrounding the use of information, and
access and use information ethically and legally
Technology literacy is the ability of an individual, working independently and with others, to responsibly,
appropriately and effectively use technology tools to access, manage, integrate, evaluate, create and
communicate information.
