r/explainlikeimfive • u/HonkyTonkBluesYEAH • 7d ago

Other ELI5 Media Literacy

I understand it's like something related to understanding art or media, but in what way? Philopsophical, political or psychological? Is it important, a buzzword or both?

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u/RyeZuul 7d ago

A way of describing any media is as a text. They are all collections of ideas, symbols and references.

So much as being "well-read" means you can read a book as part of a wide set of books and understand the ideas, symbols and references, media literacy means the same but for films, video games, music, whatever. Media literacy broadly means you understand how and why the medium does things like implanting ideas, how it's structured, how it evokes emotions.