Social Networking and Other Digital Media as a Tool for Teaching and Learning About Diversity

• In Event: Examining the Role of Digital Media in Teaching/Learning About Issues of Identity/Diversity

Abstract

This paper describes how students in six university courses used social networking, video sharing and other electronic media to support their learning and advance the conversation on difference and diversity within a media literacy framework. A focus on various issues in the media is at the core of the study. The participants focused on issues outside their general experience and noted their learning via self-assessment. A sense of appreciation for learning beyond the classroom walls and the creation of community permeated the findings. Future students will benefit greatly from the interrogation of digital media in various forms and the subtle fostering of negative and positive representations of race, language, culture, sexual orientation, religion, disability and ethnicity.

Authors

• Lillian Vega Castaneda, California State University - Channel Islands

• Mario E. Castaneda, Pepperdine University

• Rosario Diaz Greenberg, California State University - San Marcos