The mass media are one of the most powerful institutions in our society. While there are laws and codes of ethics that dictate how the media must and should act, those codes are not always followed or enforced. As such, we must all learn to become critical and savvy media consumers. News, entertainment media, advertising, public relations, TV, video games, magazines, social media, and other media all have a strong influence on how we see the world, an influence that often begins in infancy. To be engaged and critical media consumers, we all need to develop skills and habits of media literacy. These skills include being able to access media on a basic level, to analyze it in a critical way based on certain key concepts, to evaluate it based on that analysis and, finally, to produce media oneself. This process of learning media literacy skills is media education.

There are five key components of media literacy:

1. All media messages are constructed.
2. Media messages are constructed using a creative language with its own rules.
3. Different people experience the same media message differently.
4. Media have embedded values and points of view.
5. Most media messages are organized to gain profit and/or power.

Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the course, students should be able to:

• Critically analyze the messages and points of view employed in different media (e.g., advertising, news programs, websites, video games, blogs, documentaries).
• Analyze design elements of various kinds of media productions to observe that media messages are constructed for a specific purpose.
• Analyze media for purpose, message, accuracy, bias, and intended audience and gain understanding that media messages are constructed using a creative language with its own rules.
• As an individual or in collaboration, create a multimedia work or a piece of digital communication or contribute to an online collaboration for a specific purpose.