The New Ethos: ���Media & Information Literacies���

Part I

Bonnie  Stewart  University  of  Prince  Edward  Island  

@bonstewart  

What does it mean to be literate ���in the 21st century?

h:p://www.flickr.com/photos/michaelheiss/2871996129/  

UNESCO Definition of ���Media Information Literacies (MIL)

Knowledge, attitudes, skills, & practices��� required to

access, analyse, evaluate, use, produce, & communicate ���

information & knowledge in

creative, legal, & ethical ways

Extend beyond information & communication technologies to encompass ���

learning, critical thinking & interpretive skills

Backdrop: Changing Culture

knowledge scarcity

knowledge abundance

open systems

public, institutional values

market values

closed systems

INTRODUCTION •  Information abundance = context of MIL •  Networks = structure of MIL •  New Ethos = key to understanding MIL ���LEARNING IN THE NEW ETHOS

•  Identities = pathways to MIL •  Learning as participation

Literacy, 400 BCE = Threat to Knowledge

Literacy, 1500 CE = Control of Knowledge  

Literacies, 2014 BCE = Management & Synthesis of Knowledge  

Information Abundance

h:p://www.flickr.com/photos/silaHx/9886617776/sizes/c  

Channels of Abundance = Networks

Oh good. ���So technology is the answer to

everything?

NO.

Networks are not about online/offline binaries

h:p://www.flickr.com/photos/zigazou76/5824384001/sizes/z/  

Technologies do not necessarily change the ways we approach learning

h:p://www.onlineuniversiHes.com/blog/2012/08/teaching-­‐with-­‐tablets/  

New tech + old approaches������������

new literacies

Participatory culture = new ethos

“Paradigm cases of new literacies have both new “technical stuff” (digitality) and new “ethos stuff”…what is central to new

literacies is not the fact that we can now “look up information online” or write essays using a word processor rather than a pen…but rather, that they mobilize very different

kinds of values and priorities and sensibilities.”

- Knobel & Lankshear (2007)

It’s not tech but what we DO with it – ���and each other – that makes us literate

h:p://www.flickr.com/photos/rofi/2647699204/    

Being ‘of’ the web = literacies of networks

Institutions Networks

product-focused process-focused mastery participation

bounded by time/space always accessible hierarchical ties peer-to-peer ties plagiarism crowdsourcing authority in role authority in reputation audience = teacher audience = world

So. ���How do we learn ���

Media & Information Literacies in this ���new ethos?���

���Hang tight. ���

Part II is on its way. ���J