In recent years, Hungary has been frequently criticized about press freedom issues by organizations including Human Rights Watch, Freedom House and others. In the current situation, it is thus imperative to understand how media literacy is positioned in public education. The objective of this paper is to analyze the 2012 education curriculum on…

Why is it important for us to consider the history of media literacy? Beyond forging connections of the past to the present, exploring the history of the field can deepen intellectual curiosity and understanding for those who work in media literacy education, ignite interest in others, and drive investigation into understanding the relationships…

The Elizabeth Thoman Archive at the Harrington School of Communication and Media, University of Rhode Island, has the last complete kit of one of the milestones in the early chronology of media literacy, the 1972 Media Now curriculum. This curriculum was the first of its kind, using self-contained lesson modules that were part of a larger series…

"New media" does not change the essence of what media literacy is, nor does it affect its ongoing importance in society. Len Masterman, a UK-based professor, published his ground-breaking books in the 1980's and laid the foundation for media literacy to be taught to elementary and secondary students in a systematic way that is…

Contemporary propaganda is ubiquitous in our culture today as public relations and marketing efforts have become core dimensions of the contemporary communication system, affecting all forms of personal, social and public expression. To examine the origins of teaching and learning about propaganda, we examine some instructional materials produced…

German approaches to media literacy education are concerned with the questions, how the variety of media can be used in a meaningful way for learning and teaching and what educational tasks result from the extensive use of media. Considering these questions there are various conceptual ideas, research and development projects as well as…

A decade into a new millennium marks a coming of age for media literacy education (MLE). Born from teaching the critical analysis of media texts, MLE has evolved into helping individuals of all ages "develop the habits of inquiry and skills of expression that they need to be critical thinkers, effective communicators and active citizens in…

In 2005, the author and several colleagues were awarded a five-year grant to create the Center of Excellence for the Advancement of New Literacies in Middle Grades at the College of Charleston. From 2006-2011, they have worked collaboratively with over 200 middle school teachers in underperforming local schools to assist them in stimulating their…

An important challenge for media literacy education in the next decade will be to cultivate a commanding voice in the cultural conversation about new and emerging communication media. To really have a stake in the social, economic and educational developments that emerge around new digital media in the U.S. and globally, media literacy educators…

NAMLE was founded (as the Alliance for a Media Literate America) 10 years ago with a mission "to expand and improve the practice of media literacy education in the United States." There have been many successes since then, and some disappointments. The expansion of media literacy education into schools has fallen into the latter…

Media Literacy Education has definitely come a long way. The author remembers mentioning Media Literacy at a Prix Jeunesse presentation in New York City in the early-mid 1990s-- all the participants looked at him as a weirdo and politely ignored his comment on the necessity for TV producers to include or at least reflect upon media…

This essay reviews the progress achieved in media literacy education over the past decade and emphasizes the importance of assessment, interdisciplinarity in furthering developing the field. The author says that it's nearly impossible to predict what may be possible for the future of the field over the next 10 years. In another publication, she…

There are those who agree with Tom Pettitt that we are entering into a period where text based literacy is no longer the only measure of intelligence, nor is it the only form of valuable communications and knowledge acquisition for today's media-centric children. As Prensky states, today's youth speak "digital" as their primary language. While his…

Graphic novels are "hot." They show up everywhere from book stores to TV shows. Educators, too, are discovering the possibilities for graphic novels across the curriculum. Among the possibilities, educators can explore the graphic novel as a bildungsroman, a coming of age story--an old genre in the literary canon appearing in a new medium. The…

When the author started working with teachers and students on classroom multimedia productions a little over 10 years ago, he had not yet encountered the term "media literacy", nor did he realize he had joined a long standing international movement of media literacy educators. Serendipitous exposure to "old-media" texts by Neil Postman and Noam…