Abstract
Notions about childhood, media, and well-being have changed considerably with the sociocultural and technological changes across the world. In this chapter, I show how the concept and practice of media literacy become more complex with these changes and argue that media literacy is an important contributor to child well-being. I look at some of the contemporary challenges for media literacy, broadly divided in two categories – one, challenges emerging from the complexities of multiple divides, and two, pedagogical challenges. I outline some priority areas that media literacy programs need to address today: putting critical thinking and critical literacy at the heart of media literacy; recognizing the need for convergent literacies including the ability to create with media; maintaining regional, cultural, and contemporary relevance of the programs; nurturing the activist mind-set for proactive media engagement; exposing young people to the vast potential and different possibilities that digital media have brought with them; and reconceiving the role of adults with reference to media literacy. I conclude that because of rapidly growing sophistication and complexity of new media forms, and the sustained struggle to retain democratic and open nature of media, media literacy will remain a crucial factor in ensuring child well-being. At the same time, it will remain an area where we might never quite have the satisfaction of having accomplished our goals.
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Pathak-Shelat, M. (2014). Media Literacy and Well-Being of Young People. In: Ben-Arieh, A., Casas, F., Frønes, I., Korbin, J. (eds) Handbook of Child Well-Being. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9063-8_143
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