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L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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Available online at www.jmle.org
The National Association for Media Literacy Education’s
Journal of Media Literacy Education 10 (2), 1 - 10
Media Literacy, Democracy, and the Challenge of Fake News
Lance E. Mason
Indiana University Kokomo
Daniel G. Krutka
University of North Texas
Jeremy Stoddard
College of William & Mary
ABSTRACT
In this essay, the authors offer a context for discussions about fake news, democracy, and considerations for
media literacy education. Drawing on media ecology and critical media studies, they highlight the longer
history of fake news and how this concept cannot be separated from the media technologies in which
cultures grow. They discuss current iterations of this phenomenon alongside the effects of social media and
offer a preview of the contents of this special issue on media literacy, democracy, and the challenge of fake
news.
Keywords: media literacy, fake news, media ecology, social media
Democracies rely on informed citizens. The media forms from which citizens learn
about political happenings have shifted and mingled over time from pamphlets and
newspapers to radio and television to cable news and social media. Our media
environment has never been so complex. While media literacy advocates and educators
have sought to organize curriculum which might prepare citizens to be informed for
democratic participation (Bulger & Davison, 2018; Stoddard, 2014, Mason & Metzger,
2012), many schools have been slow to implement such curriculum. While these issues
were not new, the candidacy and presidency of Donald Trump have pushed them into the
foreground. He regularly uses Twitter to engage in partisan politics, threaten nuclear war,
malign political opponents, dehumanize groups of people, and label mainstream media
outlets as fake news. While politicians and citizens carelessly use the term, educators must
wrestle with complex issues around not only information literacy, but also young people’s
understanding of the wider effects of media forms on their knowledge and beliefs.
Our aim in this introduction is to consider the concept of fake news for media
literacy and democracy more broadly, while offering a framing and context for the
L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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research articles and essays in this special issue. In recent times, the term fake news has
been used to describe fictitious articles that spread easily among social media sites like
Facebook. In his first presidential press conference, Donald Trump arguably weaponized
the term by declaring media outlets like CNN as fake news. As editors of the special issue,
we want to take this opportunity to explore both the reasons for its ascent and how it
contributes to understanding the changing media landscape that has been deeply
influenced by new media technologies, and consider what this means for educators
seeking to address media literacy in light of the challenges presented by fake news.
In this introduction, we will consider fake news from perspectives not always
included in the current debate for how to respond as educators, which includes strategies
for identifying fake news (e.g., news literacy) and analyzing information media as texts
(e.g., media literacy). We go beyond these models by utilizing more critical perspectives
and through examining media engagement from the conceptual grounding of media
ecology. Media ecologists study media as environments that structure human interaction.
Neil Postman (2000) explains:
A medium is a technology within which a culture grows; that is to say, it gives
form to a culture’s politics, social organization, and habitual ways of thinking.
Beginning with that idea, we invoked still another biological metaphor, that of
ecology….We put the word “media” in front of the word “ecology” to suggest that
we were not simply interested in media, but in the ways in which the interaction
between media and human beings gives a culture its character and, one might say,
helps a culture to maintain symbolic balance. (pp. 10-11)
Media ecologists study how media forms influence personal actions, interpersonal
engagement, and broader societal changes. This places an emphasis on considering how
new media technologies create new possibilities for social and political engagement, while
affecting existing media dynamics in both positive and negative ways. Our analysis will
also employ Herman and Chomsky’s (1998/2002) critical analysis of media, which
identifies the power interests involved in locating, crafting, and disseminating media
messages as a key factor in understanding why certain ideas and messages are given heavy
attention by the media, while others are ignored. Together, these perspectives provide the
grounding for understanding the rise of fake news as a concept and how it limits or
promotes understanding of the changing dynamics between media and democracy, while
also considering how media literacy education might respond to these changes.
In the Cambridge English Dictionary (n. d.), fake news is defined as “false stories
that appear to be news, spread on the Internet or using other media, usually created to
influence political views or as a joke.” However, media scholar Brian McNair (2018)
offers another definition: “Intentional disinformation (invention or falsification of known
facts) for political and/or commercial purposes, presented as real news” (p. 38). Both
definitions identify intention as part of what distinguishes fake news from other long-
standing media concerns such as journalistic or editorial errors. These two definitions
usefully encapsulate the concept, though the growing concern with the power to influence
ideas through mediated communication can be more robustly understood by putting the
term in its historical context and subsequently exploring the changing media landscape.
Further, the term fake news has been used effectively by President Trump and other
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members of his administration to attempt to delegitimize journalists and any journalism
outlet that publishes stories they disagree with or that are critical of them. This use of the
term has potential long term effects on how the public view or trust journalists and news
outlets and is historically grounded in authoritarian regimes that want direct lines of
communication to the public and their supporters in particular (Levi, 2017).
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MEDIA MANIPULATION
The term fake news is far from a new idea. It appears to have emerged in the late
19th century, although similar terms such as false news have been around since the 16th
century (Merriam-Webster, n.d.), and the ability for news to distort public opinion for
political or pecuniary ends has long been understood. In the late 19th century, yellow
journalism was a term used to describe exaggerated or outright fabricated stories and –
like today’s fake news – was connected to profit motives by news organizations. Yellow
journalism has been blamed for stoking the fervor that led to the Spanish-American War
and was arguably the forerunner of what became tabloid journalism. While concerns with
yellow journalism faded during the progressive era, concerns of media manipulation
arguably reached an apex in the 1920s with the publication of Walter Lippmann’s (1922)
Public Opinion. Lippmann, drawing on his experiences writing for the War Department
and the State Department during World War I, was shaken at how easily the public had
been manipulated into supporting a war it initially opposed. Since that time, scholars and
public intellectuals have chronicled the power of media to mold mass opinion in support
of various political agendas.
New mass media technologies have always presented novel opportunities for those
in positions of power to influence citizens. Hitler used the intimate, one-way
communication of the radio to rally German citizens behind his nationalistic, imperial
agenda. Similarly, Franklin D. Roosevelt hosted radio-based “fireside chats” to convince
Depression-weary American citizens to support New Deal reforms. Radio also provided a
new avenue for advertisers, who leveraged the new technology to reach massive audiences
simultaneously, which helped to increase the role of consumerism in American culture.
The proliferation of the television introduced new possibilities for persuasion that
were capitalized on by both advertisers and politicians. Businesses were now able to add
moving visuals to their sales pitches. Over time, politicians began to take advantage of the
multi-sensory features of television to create favorable sense-impressions while
minimizing substantive policy stances that might offend potential voters. Meanwhile, the
mass nature of television news limited perspectives and variety. It also facilitated what
Daniel Boorstin (1961) called pseudo-events such as press conferences, photo
opportunities, and other staged events that are planned specifically to be covered by the
press.
Although media manipulation is an old story, the term fake news has not been a
key term in media discourse until recently. Concerns about this concept can be understood
within the context of the emergence of new technologies intersecting with current
sociopolitical and economic dynamics. For decades in the U.S. and Europe, promoters of
neoliberal corporate capitalism have rejected any notion of the public or common good,
which led to lax enforcement of the public interest doctrine for mass media established by
the Communications Act of 1934. This doctrine was ultimately abandoned in the mid
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1980s. With the lack of regulatory enforcement, media companies began operating under
an overt profit motive. Cable news and talk radio began to segment news audiences into
ideological camps. An emphasis on profits has decimated local news coverage, while
leading to such things as canned news, or pre-packaged news segments designed for mass
dissemination among local affiliate new stations. This also presented new opportunities
for political manipulation. In one documented example, the Bush administration produced
canned news stories promoting several of their policy goals, including supporting the
invasion of Iraq (see Barstow & Stein, 2005). Such stories were designed to appear as
objective news coverage and were shown on local news stations as regular segments, but
they were designed by Bush administration officials with the aim of bolstering specific
policy positions. Similarly, the Sinclair Broadcast Group requires local news stations
across the country to air right-leaning “must run” segments, including “Terrorism Alert
Desk” stories that serve to stoke fear and serve political aims (Ember, 2017). The Trump
Administration has also produced short videos where he describes a current initiative,
meeting, or policy made to look like he is being interviewed - with the goal of promoting
his agenda. These videos are released by the White House and then often shared with or
without comment on cable news and through social media - an example of what is referred
to as free media coverage or earned media.
NEW MEDIA AND THE RISE OF FAKE NEWS
The emergence of the Internet and social media have dramatically altered media
coverage and perception, and understanding contemporary concerns about fake news
require considering the novel social dynamics introduced by new media technologies. In
2017, two-thirds of Americans reported receiving at least some of their news via social
media and this percentage rises to three-fourths on the platform where President Trump
often posts: Twitter (Shearer and Gottfried, 2017). Social media has been taken up for
various political purposes. Platforms have been effectively utilized by marginalized
groups seeking freedom or justice; perniciously by totalitarian groups aiming to censor,
misinform, or distract; and for different purposes by citizens connecting with fellow
activists or disconnecting from those with different views (Tufekci, 2017). Moreover,
these new media technologies both increase the volume of news while allowing niche
marketing on an unprecedented scale, often presenting ideologically bifurcated readers
and viewers with entirely different universes of discourse, which has fueled political
polarization.
While social media companies capture public attention, newspapers have
experienced shrinking add revenue due to pressures from diminished sales because of
competition from the Internet. Many agencies have either closed or contracted, which has
led to diminished local news coverage and less in-depth reporting. It has also increased the
likelihood of reporting factual errors or passing along public relations material as news
without thoroughly vetting it for bias or inaccuracies. Newspapers increasingly depend on
Internet ad revenue, leading to heightened pressure for headlines or stories that are
hyperbolic or sensationalistic. Such stories are more likely to go viral, generate clicks, and
thus contribute to the company’s bottom line.
Media dynamics surrounding the emergence of the Internet and social media have
also heightened the impact of media manipulation. For example, in his book Trust Me, I’m
L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator, Ryan Holiday (2012) explains how he
exploits the new media environment to create buzz around products for his various clients.
In a process he calls trading up the chain, Holiday explains how he plants a story with a
small blog with low reporting standards, which becomes the source for a larger, more
reputable blog, which subsequently may get picked up for coverage by mainstream
outlets. One may question why major news organizations would cover unverified
information from a blog. Holiday explains that news outlets, in their desperation for
readers and clicks, are now more likely to practice what he calls “iterative journalism” (p.
167), which is repeating unverified stories from less reputable sources under the pretense
that the story is still in process and the facts are incomplete. Yet this is part of the
manipulation. Reporters often know the stories are bogus so they rarely investigate further
and instead content themselves with the temporary increase in clicks. Moreover, media
aggregators seeking attention will pull quotes from informal conversations on audio
podcasts or radio shows and then highlight and frame these quotes as news with neither
the context of the conversation nor consideration of the difference between conversation
and written forms.
Moreover, astroturfing is a phenomenon in which entire grassroots groups are
manufactured in order to give the pretense of popular support for an issue or cause.
Common activities include creating commercials or hiring actors to protest either for or
against some organization or legislation, the latter intended to garner news coverage,
YouTube clicks, and shares through social media. These techniques among others
leverage the potential of social media users to spread stories and generate buzz, while
heightening the public’s suspicion of news coverage in general. Beyond commercial
ambitions, authoritarian leaders have utilized these same strategies to mislead, confuse, or
exhaust citizens from engaging with social issues (Tufekci, 2017).
McNair (2018) asserts that fake news “is a discourse about journalistic bias as
much as it is about the fabrication of facts; an attempt to subvert the legitimacy of an
information source who claims to be ‘objective’ but is, in the eye of the accuser, biased
against their side of a particular issue” (p. 25). Media factions now expend a great deal of
energy pointing out the bias and factual errors of the other side. This performs a useful
watchdog function, although in an already segmented media environment, it also
contributes to political polarization while eroding public trust in the media, which
according to Gallup (2016), has been steadily falling for the past 40 years. Corrections or
refutations are also now less likely to penetrate deeply into public consciousness partly
because of ideological segmentation (meaning that those who would most likely be
enlightened by the information are least likely to receive it), but also because of the
volume of information now available to consumers, which tends to overwhelm any sense
of coherency that would connect one story to subsequent ones. Self-selection of media
sources and motivated reasoning, or the selection of evidence from news to support
existing beliefs and rejecting information that may counter one’s beliefs further
exacerbates the issue of fake news (Kahne & Bowyer, 2017). The irony is that within the
relatively open media environment of the Internet, media distortions and lies are often
exposed by alternative media and other groups, yet this only adds to the public perception
that we live in a “post-truth” era dominated by fake news.
Mainstream news organizations also suffered a major blow to credibility during the
U.S. presidential election of 2016 when Wikileaks revealed that many reporters from
L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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mainstream news agencies were working with the Clinton campaign to ensure her victory
over Democrat primary opponent Bernie Sanders. News coverage of the contest often
contained only the slightest pretense of neutrality. In one example of slanted coverage, a
review of approximately 200 editorials and op-eds in the Washington Post from January to
June 2016 found 5 negative stories for every positive one on Sanders. By comparison,
stories on Clinton were split about half positive, half negative (see Frank, 2018).
Wikileaks also revealed that the Clinton campaign was working with their allies in
the media to bolster what they perceived as the most vulnerable Republican candidates:
Ben Carson, Ted Cruz, and Donald Trump (Debenedetti, 2016). When Trump won the
Republican nomination for president, the press quickly turned on him and showed blatant
favoritism for Clinton. This may have created a backlash from some voters, though it
certainly provided the rhetorical space for Trump to take an oppositional stance to the
media and label them as fake news, at least in a way that was convincing to his staunchest
supporters, who were already disgruntled with the media coverage of Trump during the
election season. This is not meant to provide a justification for Trump’s attacks on the
media. Rather, it is to assert that understanding our current media environment requires
considering how mainstream media has lost credibility with many citizens for reasons that
must be confronted if media is to serve its ideal role as informer of citizens and watchdog
of the powerful.
Within these media and social contexts, the increased reliance and role of citizens
to encounter and spread news through social media presents new challenges for
democracy and media literacy. Social media companies like Facebook are designed to
induce habit-forming use with notifications and algorithms that offer decontextualized
fragments of information (similar to the telegraph) that make knowing of things more
important than knowing deeply about them (Vaidhyanathan, 2018). Furthermore, Siva
Vaidhyanathan (2018) describes a cryptopticon whereby these companies serveil citizens
through the collection of massive amounts of data which is then sold off, stolen, or used
for marketing purposes to profile individuals in unprecedented ways. Users tend to accept
this invisible surveillance for convenience, efficiency, or security without considering
threats to privacy and democracy. As we have discussed, social media has allowed for
marginalized voices to raise the profile of social issues (e.g., #BlackLivesMatter, #MeToo,
#TimesUp) or even organize activist activities on the ground (e.g., #TahrirNeeds,
@TahrirSupplies). Yet, social media platforms pose significant challenges as our spaces
for news consumption and public discourse are increasingly controlled by private
corporations who desire markets over democracy.
FAILING MEDIA, FALTERING DEMOCRACY, AND MEDIA LITERACY
Public trust in media has declined roughly in step with a distrust of politicians and
a general diminishing faith in public institutions throughout the neoliberal era. However,
these events should also be understood within the context of falling incomes and
decreased future prospects for large portions of the U.S. population. The decline in trust of
media is connected to the broader waning support for public institutions, all of which rests
of the experiences of citizens whose lives have become more difficult over the preceding
period even as media tells them that the economy is doing well and that the nation is
L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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prospering. In distressing times, ideological appeals tend to hold greater sway over the
population, particularly when news coverage does not line up with their lived experiences.
The above challenges to liberal democracy presented by new media dynamics has
resulted in calls for rethinking the role of media literacy (Mason & Metzger, 2012;
Mihailidis, 2018; Stoddard, 2014), educational social media activities (Krutka, 2017), and
civic online reasoning (McGrew, Breakstone, Ortega, Smith, & Wineburg, 2018) in
education. Media literacy can be broadly defined as the “active inquiry and critical
thinking about the messages we receive and create,” (National Association for Media
Literacy Education, 2007) and media literacy efforts have resulted in both successes and
failures (Bulger & Davison, 2018). As we do here, Bulger and Davison argue that
effective media literacy education requires understanding the media environment in
addition to improving cross-disciplinary collaboration; leveraging the current crisis to
consolidate stakeholders; prioritizing approaches and programs with evidence of success;
and develop action-oriented curricula that challenges systemic problems created by media,
including social media; corporations in addition to teaching individuals to interpret media
messages. Additional questions remain. Should fake news become more of a central focus
of media literacy education, or do these challenges suggest that a more fundamental
reframing of media education is necessary that puts media literacy at the forefront of 21st
century education?
If fake news is simply treated as an add-on to an existing media literacy
curriculum, teachers will merely create exercises that will help students determine whether
a particular story can be considered fake or not. While this would be useful, it does not
begin to address the reasons why the phenomenon of fake news has arisen within the
culture in recent years. To examine this, media literacy would need to become a central
part of school curriculum. A deep understanding of the history of media in the United
States would need to be explored by students. The intricacies of private enterprise and
public interests surrounding media would need to become focal questions for student
deliberation. Contemporary media dynamics would also need to be examined and such
inquiries could begin by having students examine their own media use and how it shapes
their worldview. The public and students alike would also need to reflect on their own role
in propagating fake news through their own media-seeking habits and through the ways in
which they share news within their social networks (see Middaugh’s article in this issue).
Some questions for the broader society given the challenges of fake news: Should
social media be more tightly regulated? Should the public demand that journalism once
again operate in the public interest? How can democracy be sustained and renewed in light
of such challenges, and is education even capable of offering an adequate defense for new
media environments? What role does media education play within civics and democratic
education? These questions and more should arguably become part of the exploration that
must be grappled with by both media literacy advocates and their students given the
challenges surrounding fake news.
PREVIEW OF THE SPECIAL ISSUE
While answers to many of these questions will require ongoing inquiry, the authors
of the special issue begin to take up several of these matters in the studies that follow. In
the essay, “Both Facts and Feelings: Emotion and News Literacy,” Susan Currie Sivek
L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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considers the role of emotional manipulation in fake news within the context of social
media. The dynamics of social media, which are organized around retaining the attention
of users, have bolstered the influence of fake news. Sivek offers metacognitive strategies
that could potentially make students more mindful consumers of news and social media.
Ellen Middaugh, in “Civic Media Literacy in a Transmedia World,” provides empirical
evidence focused on the challenges of promoting these kinds of metacognitive thinking
and the role that emotion plays in how young people engage with media as consumers and
circulators. She explores how young people engage with information across media
through the use of an Issue Advocacy Task and pays particular attention to the social and
emotional aspects of these engagements in how students analyze these media and consider
their practices in sharing information within participatory networks.
The concern with newly emerging forms of manipulation also fuels the study
“Fake or Visual Trickery? Understanding the Quantitative Visual Rhetoric in the News,”
by Rohit Mehta and Lynette DeAun Guzman, who examine a particular form of visual
persuasion in news stories they call “quantitative visual rhetoric.” The prevalence of
screen news increases the need for media educators to consider how visual aids are used
by media organizations in conjunction with text to subtly craft message interpretation. The
authors evaluate several key examples and explore their implications for media literacy
education. While students’ understanding of what they engage with on screen is vital,
James Cohen also makes the case for a better understanding of what happens behind the
scenes and behind the screens, namely the impact of algorithms on our media engagement
and ensuing understandings. In “Exploring Echo-Systems,” he makes the case for
developing an understanding of the role of algorithms within media ecosystems as a core
understanding of media literacy for informed citizenship.
Exploring the consequences for practice is a focus of research by James Damico,
Mark Baildon, and Alexandra Panos, whose article titled “Media Literacy and Climate
Change in a Post-Truth Society,” examines pre-service teachers’ interpretations of media
arguments regarding climate change. While virtually all climate scientists acknowledge
the phenomenon and threat of climate change, there is still a debate among the public
about whether climate change is real. This dynamic makes the topic pertinent for
considering within the context of fake news. The study examines how pre-service teachers
make sense of information that either supports or refutes the existence of climate change,
and how media literacy must address both misunderstandings and ingrained ideologies as
part of its broader curriculum.
While it is easy to make calls for more media literacy education, implementation
within current educational contexts is more challenging. Mardi Schmeichel and her
colleagues at the University of Georgia seek to enhance media literacy education for social
studies teacher candidates, but found that teacher candidates struggled with these new
media literacy concepts of which they had little knowledge or experience. Moreover, the
cultures of school proved another barrier as the lack of presence, requirements, or support
deterred teacher candidates from engaging in media literacy work for our democracy. A
different approach is explored in the work of Renee Hobbs, Christian Seyferth-Zapf, and
Silke Grafe titled “Using Virtual Exchange to Advance Media Literacy Competencies
through Analysis of Contemporary Propaganda.” Their case study of practice describes
their collaborative virtual exchange project where teacher education students in Germany
L. Mason, D. Krutka & J. Stoddard | Journal of Media Literacy Education 2018 10(2), 1 - 10
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and media students in the US learned collaboratively about modern propaganda and the
challenges it presents for contemporary media literacy education.
Concerns about media literacy and fake news also expand beyond K-12 education
into adult contexts. In their evaluation study of the Ukrainian public media education
project, Learn to Discern (L2D), Erin Murrock, Joy Amulya, Mehri Druckman, and
Tetiana Liubyva found limited effects on the news literacy skills and beliefs in the adults
who had participated in the project. They found that available news sources and motivated
reasoning seemed to negate some of the news literacy concepts and skills at the heart of
the L2D program. These results present further challenges to media literacy educators as
they consider how to best craft a curriculum that can help students become discerning
consumers and creators of media moving forward.
We hope this special issue inspires educators and scholars alike to take up the
challenges that fake news and the associated media environment present for our
democratic structures and for participation. While these challenges are not entirely new,
they are pressing, complex, and interconnected. We must all consider how media literacy
might help prepare citizens for democratic participation within environments that feature
increasingly complex and subtle forms of manipulation.
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