Media Awareness Network – The Impact of Stereotyping on Young People (focus on Aboriginal people)

Description & Relevancy

This article on the Media Awareness Network examines the negative impact of stereotypes in media on aboriginal people, as the Harding study in this module did. It also highlights positive changes in some avenues of Canadian media to show new sensitivities and support for cultural diversity.

The broader Media Awareness Network website promotes critical thinking in young people about the media and compliments the information Sandra has recently posted on critical thinking and media.

Links

• Article
• Media Awareness Network (about)

The Center for Media Literacy is dedicating to promoting media literacy education as a framework for incorporating the following skills into media studies:  accessing, analyzing, evaluating, creating and participating with media content.

Critical Viewing and Critical Thinking Skills article found on this site is applicable to Indigenous media.

As Indigenous people use media more and more to revitalize and document their history and culture, it is important that when viewing these media products that are about or are produced by Indigenous  people, that they are viewed with a critical eye.   “Critical Viewing and Critical Thinking Skills” written by David Considine’s, is posted on the Center for Media Literacy site.  Considine states that deconstructing media representations means that one has to let go of “seeing is believing” or “what you see is what you get”.   He also stressed the need to understand what we see. In his article, he outlines 5 elements for reading media which can help people view media products  more critically.

Other links on this website that are of interest:

What is Critical Viewing?

Where Media Literacy Fits in the World of Education

Teaching Media Literacy: Yo! Are you Hip to This?

Center for Media logo [Online Image]. (n.d.). Retrieved November 17, 2009, from CML website. http://www.medialit.org/default.html

The Roundtable discussion of the pros and cons of the Internet for Indigenous peoples is located on the Earthwatch Institute’s website.   The discussion features Dr. Sharon Bohn Gmelch and Reuel Daniels from Union College, Robyn Kamira from the Maori tribal groups of Te Rarawa and Te Aupouri,  John Afele, originally from Ghana, is the director of the International Program for Africa at the University of Guelph, Ontario, and Rodney Bobiwash, who was a member of the Anishnabek Nation, on the north shore of Lake Huron, Canada.

The Earthwatch Institute’s mission statement is “To find solutions to sustainability and open minds through the practice of scientific field research.”  Other interesting articles found on this site include:

A Loss for Words By Michael Krauss – “Over half of the world’s 6,000 languages will not survive our children’s generation. Can we protect our cultural diversity?”

The Accidental Empire by Nini Bloch – “Globalization may not be intended to create an empire based on Western culture, but it is having that effect all the same. A look at the past gives us insight on how cultural diversity weathers hegemony.”

Earthwatch logo [Online Image]. (n.d.). Retrieved November 17, 2009, from Earthwatch website. http://www.wadsworth.com/anthropology_d/special_features/ext/earthwatch/rt.html