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CONTENTS NATION WORLD BUSINESS
Are You
Media-Literate?
WORLD
With the global information
explosion, humanity must
counter manipulation and
master mass communication
By Ricardo Saludo
STRATEGY POINTS
Media literacy is crucial for full human
development as well as the advancement of
harmony, governance and democracy.
Promoting critical thinking on media in Asia
must contend with conformity and authority,
plus the dominance of Western culture.
Media must play a major role in promoting
media literacy including user instructions for
citizens to use media intelligently.
I
t is an alarming feature of modern
socIeLy: wIuL we LIInk In 'our mInds`
is the creation of a media elite. It is the
deep anomaly of democracy: Yes, it is the
rule of the people, whose minds though
are manipulated, through media, by the
ruling class. I tremble before this modern
god called Media. So said Philippine Daily
Inquirer columnist and former Far Eastern
Economic Review correspondent Rigoberto
Tiglao in his June 6 article, Anastasia,
Flory Basa, Conchita, on how, in his
view, the Philippine press had, in his view,
distorted truth.
WIIIe some muy dIspuLe TIgIuo`s vIew,
the might of mass media to move or
manipulate minds in the millions has been
a global concern for at least half a century.
Recounted in a timeline of its
media education initiatives, the
United Nations Educational,
ScIenLIhc und CuILuruI
Organization (UNESCO) has
pushed media education since
1q61 wILI u puper on hIm
education, then a conference the
IoIIowIng yeur, und IuII-edged
programs since the 1970s.
L wusn`L uIwuys LIuL wuy.
Massachusetts educator and
coIumnIsL BIII WuIsI`s A Brief
History of Media Education
counts four phases of how schools treated
media. Before the 1960s, educators
Ignored LIe medIu. even conhscuLIng
newspapers brought to class. Then came
the inoculation phase: teachers showed
students samples of media to ridicule and
disdain them.

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Are you media literate?
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:NKcenSEI8KVUXZ - June 11-17, 2012
Afterward, schools used popular media
to make classroom subjects more
interesting, like showing parts of West
Side Story before letting students read
SIukespeure`s Romeo and Juliet, whose
theme of lovers from feuding families
inspired the 1950s hit Broadway musical.
InuIIy cume Loduy`s pIuse oI gIvIng
formal instruction for what is called media
literacy, information literacy, or media
and information literacy (MIL).
Media literacy empowers. Succinctly
dehned. media literacy is the ability to
access, analyze, evaluate and create
media in a variety of forms, as noted
by the Center for Media Literacy in
Malibu, California. The Alexandria
Declaration on Information Literacy
and Lifelong Learning, adopted
by UNESCO`s HIgI eveI
Colloquium on the subject in
Alexandria, Egypt, in November
2005, declared: Information
Literacy ... empowers people in
all walks of life to seek, evaluate,
use and create information
effectively to achieve their
personal, social, occupational and
educational goals.
Quite simply, with so much of
one`s personuI, socIuI, poIILIcuI
and economic advancement
determined by how well one can access
and use information, including the crafting
und dIssemInuLIon oI one`s messuges Lo
crucial entities like the government, MIL is
an essential capability for human beings,
as individuals, families, communities and
nations, to function in the world, build
harmonious and productive relations
with others, and express and address
one`s InLeresLs, needs und uspIruLIons. n
short, media and information literacy is
indispensable for full
human development.
Two decades before
the Alexandria
colloquium, the
January 1982
UNESCO conference
of nineteen nations
in Grunwald,
Germany, laid the
MIL groundwork.
The International
Symposium on
Education in the Public Use of Mass
Media produced the Grunwald Declaration
on Media Education. It was followed
another quarter-century later by the
First International Conference on
Media Education in the Middle East in
March 2007 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, with
both developed and developing
nations represented.
The problem and the solution.
The Grunwald Declaration spelled out
the problem and broadly pointed the
way forward: Rather than condemn
or endorse the undoubted power of
the media, we need to accept their
sIgnIhcunL ImpucL und peneLruLIon
throughout the world as an established
fact ... Political and educational
systems need to recognize their
obligations to promote in their
citizens a critical understanding of the
phenomena of communication.
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CONTENTS NATION WORLD BUSINESS
Why do you like the media?
105
84
143
27
97
84
138
50
107
130
30
14
33
40
52
4
31
21
99
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17
42
60
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105
67 67
160
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How do the media portray violence?
NCR LUZON VISAYAS MINDANAO
140
120
100
80
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40
20
0
f
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125
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86
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57
Too Much
Not a cause
for concern
The 1982 communique recommended
four broad strategies to promote
media literacy: 1) Institute comprehensive
media education programs, from
pre-school to adult level; 2) Train teachers
and intermediaries to better understand
media and teach about it and 3) Stimulate
research and development for media
education 4) Support international co-
operation in media education.
The declaration added: Media
education will be most effective when
parents, teachers, media personnel and
decision-makers all acknowledge they
have a role to play in developing greater
WHAT FILIPINO YOU
Results of 2004 Survey of Students in the Philippine
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THS THINK OF MEDIA
s percent of respondents who gave the listed answers
How do media portray sex?
How do media portray Filipino values?
Charts from Claiming the Media: Responding to Hegemonic Media in a Consumerist World, published
by Signis Media Education Project (2007), pages 20-22
Promoted
Well
Not Promoted
Well
Lack of
Values
Too Much
Not a cause
for concern
f
r
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q
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c
y
129
41
34
16
92
25
80
63
140
120
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0
NCR LUZON VISAYAS MINDANAO
NCR LUZON VISAYAS MINDANAO
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
f
r
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critical awareness among listeners,
viewers and readers. In short, promoting
media literacy is the task of everyone:
families, schools, and the media itself.
The Alexandria Declaration enunciated
similar strategies, along with programs
to increase the employability and
entrepreneurial capabilities of women
and the disadvantaged. It also stressed
that vigorous investment in information
literacy and lifelong learning strategies
creates public value.
Survival literacies for the 21st
Century. WILI Loduy`s expIosIon oI
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CONTENTS NATION WORLD BUSINESS
online media, the imperative to instruct
people in media literacy becomes even more
urgent and
demanding.
Besides
inaccuracies,
bias and
outright
deception in
traditional
media,
LIose sume IuIIIngs ure mugnIhed und vIruIIy
spread through the Internet. Highlighting
this more complex challenge to media
educators is The Role of Media Literacy
in the Governance Reform Agenda, a
2009 paper by former University of British
Columbia professor Johanna Martinsson,
now wILI LIe WorId Bunk`s Communication
for Governance & Accountability Program.
MurLInsson suId Loduy`s convergence oI
traditional and new media offers promising
opportunities for inclusion, participation,
and transparency ... paralleled by challenges
such as uneven access, misinformation, and
exposure to harmful content (page 3 in Bank
study). Plus old problems with the press:
state control of media, commercial pressures,
lack of journalistic standards, watchdog civil
society, poor media literacy (page 4).
For her list of traditional media issues,
Martinsson cited a 2007 UNESCO paper,
Understanding Information Literacy:
A Primer, by international library and
information consultant Forest Woody
Horton Jr., who has advised governments
as well as multilateral institutions. The
University of Lausanne Ph.D. listed survival
literacies for the 21st Century family:
BusIc or Core IuncLIonuI IILerucy uencIes
(competencies) of reading, writing, oralcy
[speaking] and numeracy; Computer
Literacy; Media Literacy; Distance Education
and E-Learning; Cultural Literacy; and
Information
Literacy.
Media literacy,
Horton
elaborated,
embraces
everything
from having the
knowledge needed to use old and new media
technology to having a critical relationship
to media content in a time when the media
constitute one of the most powerful forces
in society. That means thinking before
believing and following what one reads,
hears and sees.
The challenge of critical thinking. At
the Asia Media Summit 2012 in Bangkok on
May 29-30, one session specIhcuIIy dIscussed
media literacy. Along with this writer,
Building a Media-Literate Public featured
communications professor Kamolrat
Intrastate of Sukhothai Thammathirat
Open University, Universities Islam Sultan
Agung president Laode M. Kamaluddin
of Indonesia, Webster University
communications and journalism professor
Art Silverblatt, with Nathalie Labourdette,
training head of the European Broadcasting
Union (EBU), as moderator.
In his paper, International Media and
Informational Literacy A Conceptual
Framework, Professor Silverblatt
summed up the essence of MIL: critical
thinking. Media literacy, he explained,
promotes the critical thinking skills that
enable individuals to make independent
choices with regard to which media
programming to select, and how to interpret
the information they receive through the
Critical thinking enables people
to make independent choices on
which media programming to take
and how to interpret information
~ Professor Art Silverblatt
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EDUCATING MALAYSIANS ABOUT MEDIA
With state dominance in the schools and the press, civil society takes the lead in
media literacy in Malaysia, collaborating with as well as critiquing government
Diagrams from Claiming the Media: Responding to Hegemonic Media in a Consumerist World,
published by Signis Media Education Project (2007), pages 95, 113-114
channels of mass communication.
Herein may lie the challenge for media
literacy in Asia. With strong tendencies
toward conformity and authority,
us noLed SIIverbIuLL`s compurIson oI
Western and Asian traits (on page 7 of his
paper), Asians will need more prodding
than Westerners to critically assess and
question media, let alone assert their views
against dominant perspectives.
On top of this apparent submissive
streak among many in the region, further
obstacles to independent, critical thinking
and communication are authoritarian
states and media controls in countries like
China and Vietnam, and the dominance
of Western media, which promotes
news perspectives and lifestyle and
entertainment icons that millions of Asians
conform with or aspire to.
Warning the world of Western media
hegemony for decades has been
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
linguistics professor Noam Chomsky.
Among his seminal discourses was his 1989
lecture at the University of Minnesota,
Education Orientations
State
Business
Civil Society Organisations
Academia
Civil Society
State Business
Civil Society Business
State
Media education obtain legitimacy and/
or hegemonic control
Media education to commercial needs
Media education as critique of media
and media-ted hegemonic culture
(i) Media education to prepare professionals for
the industry
(ii) Media education as critique New Movable Text
Media Education
Media Education
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accessible in Part 1 and Part 2. Half an
Iour InLo LIe hrsL IuII oI IIs z-1Jz-Iour
talk, Chomsky observed how state efforts
to manipulate the public mind often arises
amid war.
And in the second part, about 40 minutes
from the start, the MIT savant explained
how the widely reported 2 million
Cambodians killed by the Khmer Rouge
wus grossIy InuLed Irom u body counL In
the thousands. Moreover, Washington
suppressed the same State Department
data, said Chomsky, along with reports of
similar carnage in East Timor, invaded by
U.S. ally Indonesia.
Media literacy in Asia. So how well
is Asia teaching its citizens to be media-
IILeruLe? A key resource Is Claiming the
Media: Responding to Hegemonic Media in
a Consumerist World, a 2007 seminal study
by the Signis, the World Catholic Association
for Communication, which groups Roman
Catholic media professionals and entities.
Through research, reporting and surveys,
the 260-page tome assessed media
literacy initiatives in the Philippines,
India, Malaysia, Thailand, Fiji and the
Solomon Islands.
Data and diagrams from the report are
replicated in this article. A 2004 survey
of Filipino students who received media
education, showed more critical appreciation
of media, including its portrayal of sex,
violence and values (see What Filipino
Youths Think of Media charts). Educators
also surveyed cited lack of media education
knowledge, low public interest, and poor
logistics as main hindrances. Notably, only
this school year did state schools begin
teaching media literacy.
Thailand had similar challenges, plus
high turnover among trained teachers
and little interest among education
poIIcymukers, reecLIng pubIIc dIsInLeresL.
In Malaysia, meanwhile, state dominance
in media and education limits government
efforts to promote critical thinking. Hence,
civil society plays a big role in media
literacy, both working with and critiquing
the state (see Educating Malaysians About
Media diagrams).
If things look tough in some countries, India
offers hope. By 1997, two decades after it
began with a Catholic communications
center in Hyderabad in 1976, media

In his 1989 Minnesota talk, MIT professor Noam Chomsky
warns of global dominance by Western media giants YouTube
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BUILDING A CITIZENRY OF CRITICAL THINKERS
Recommendations from 2009 World Bank Paper on Media Literacy
Support Media Watchdog Groups/Media Observatories
Promote media monitoring projects and networks to the larger development community.
Encourage monitoring and steer the focus toward issues on the governance reform agenda.
Publish and promote media monitoring results to increase awareness and educate citizens
about current media processes and practices.
Promote the Role of News Ombudsmen
Build awareness about the role of news ombudsmen and how they can help strengthen
accountability.
Encourage citizens to utilize the news ombudsmen function by actively providing feedback.
Encourage and support forums for the news ombudsmen to educate citizens about media
practices.
Build Media Literacy Skills through Mobilization, Forums, and Debate
Promote public forums to encourage dialogue among different actors, including regulatory
authorities, associations, educators, citizens, and media professionals.
Encourage other actors in the public sphere, such as regulatory authorities and associations, to
heighten public awareness about media literacy, laws, and regulations.
Involve citizens in discussions about codes of conduct to raise awareness and to ensure that
codes are followed.
Build capacity of civil society organizations on media literacy.
Encourage joint citizen/media projects, such as investigating reporting.
Publish forum discussions and make them accessible to the public.
Promote Media Literacy as Essential in Media Development Programs
Heighten awareness about the crucial role media literacy plays in development practice through
seminars, knowledge products, and other collaborative efforts among development practitioners.
Support activities to educate citizens about laws and benef ts of a free, plural, and independent
media system.
Encourage knowledge sharing and cooperation among development practitioners on media
literacy initiatives.
Support Research on Linkages among Media Literacy, Citizen Action, and Good
Governance
Support research activities, including workshops, to discuss and share good practice and
identify knowledge gaps for further research.
Encourage cooperation between academia and development practitioners to establish linkages
among media literacy, good governance, and citizen activism.
Support activities to measure impact of current media literacy initiatives in media
development projects.
Source: The Role of Media Literacy in the Governance Reform Agenda, by Johanna Martinsson,
Communication for Governance and Accountability Program, World Bank (2009), pages 8-10
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GUIDING THE PEOPLE
Results of Media Educators Survey in India
More than 7 years,
54%
Less than 3 years,
14%
3-5 years,
14%
5-7 years,
18%
Years of Experience in Media EducationEducation
Training Background of Educators
Charts from Claiming the Media: Responding to Hegemonic Media in a Consumerist World,
published by Signis Media Education Project (2007), pages 79-80
educuLIon wus ourIsIIng. EducuLor
Peter Gonsalves recounted: Today the
urgency is more pronounced, and the
need is being recognized by all
educators, youth leaders, and social
workers. And most media educators
surveyed said they had many years of
training and teaching experience (see
Guiding the People charts above).
Perhaps the one missing MIL player in
Asia and elsewhere is media itself, and
recommendations from the World Bank
paper (see previous page) include several
for media. This writer adds one more:
carrying media literacy messages in print,
broadcast and online media. These user
instructions would make people more
thoughtful just when they are using media,
with messages like: Know the news source.
Different views enrich understanding. In
conIcLs, IIsLen Lo boLI sIdes.
News carrying such reminders would
actually gain credibility and good
will. More important, it will advance
the very truth and fairness that is the
medIu`s munduLe. Do IL now - beIore
politicians decide there ought to be a
law on it.
4
29
32
54
100
90
80
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
formal training informal training self trained no training
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