Dictionary of Media Literacy
Dictionary of Media Literacy
By Art Silverblatt and Ellen M. Enright Eliceiri, eds.
Published by Greenwood Press, 1997.
This is a 6" X 9.5" hardbound book of 234 pages including the index and contributors' bios.
As the preface states, "The Dictionary of Media Literacy is a compilation of significant concepts, issues, organizations, people, and international developments in the field of media literacy."
The entries fall into two major categories, which are not separated: concepts and groups and individuals. The majority of the entries seem to fall into the category of groups and individuals, with numerous small, local initiatives described, as well as academics working in the field in various places around the world (the international scope is worth noting).
A sampling of the individuals included are Henk Hoekstra of the International Catholic Organization for Cinema and Audiovisuals, Denise Newfield of the Department of English at the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa, and Manuel Pinto, a former journalist who now teaches Media Eduation at the Teacher Training Center of Minho University in Braga, Portugal, each of whom is described in a paragraph or two.
The entries for concepts are often the longer entries, but not always. "Pleasure Perspective" is given a short paragraph, but it finishes with See Also references to Affective Response Analysis, Autobiographical Analysis Approach, and Identification Analysis. A sampling of other concepts and topics explained are Discourse Analysis, Communications Ecology, Narratology, Jolts, and Intertextuality.
The work represents an impressive collection of information, but seems to suffer a little from a limited vision of the scope of the discipline of media literacy. For example, there is no entry in the book for George Lakoff or for his conceptualization of the concept of framing. Admittedly, in 1997 Lakoff had not yet emerged as a popularizer of concepts useful in media literacy thinking, nor, perhaps, is he as important a thinker as many consider him to be, but by 1997 he had begun to apply his ideas from linguistics and cognitive science to questions of public rhetoric and media. The Dictionary would probably benefit from a somewhat wider scope, so that useful ideas from socio-linguistics could be included.
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