Media Literacy Organizations

Introduction

The current digital age witnesses a paradigm shift in information and communication technology (ICT) giving rise to an innovative practice of literacy termed as computer literacy or web literacy (Livingstone, 2004). According to Kellner and Share (as cited in Gainer, 2010), most of the information is obtained from highly fashioned audio visuals and media layouts. People today usually prefer to retrieve electronic information over the traditional print sources. Keeping the shift in mind, it is just inadequate to educate students to read and write only with letters and numbers. Students and citizens need to be well aware about the growing technologies and media so that they can effectively access, scrutinize, evaluate and create media messages of all kinds. It has also become equally important for an individual to possess the necessary skills to handle different types of media available (Media Literacy Project, 2014). Media literacy as a discipline includes the critical thinking skills and offers a variety of methods and styles for the efficient scrutiny of media messages enclosed in any media presentation. It is defined by Dutch Culture Council (2005) as “the whole of knowledge, skills and attitudes that allow citizens to deal with a complex, changing and mediatised world in a conscious and critical manner. It is the ability to use media in an active and creative manner, aimed at social participation”. Media literacy enables students to develop a critical understanding of the nature of mass media, the tools used by them, and the impact of these tools. More specifically, it is education helps students to know how the media work, how they can produce meaning to the media and how they can organize and construct. Media literacy also aims to provide students with the skills to create new media products.