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<p>This study examines the construction of media literacy in a special issue on source criticism of the Swedish children's comic <italic>Bamse – Världens Starkaste Björn</italic> [<italic>Bamse – The World's Strongest Bear</italic>]. This is done with the purpose of understanding what values, perspectives, and practices are promoted when media literacy is communicated via children's edutainment media. Using narrative and discourse analysis, we problematise how notions of truth (such as post-truth) guide much of the discourse on digital media in today's post-political society, and how that and individualisation shape notions of media literacy. This is visible in the analysed case in how source criticism is constructed in relation to notions of truth and falsehood, and as moral lessons aimed at the individual media user. We argue that such an individualised, decontextualised, and depoliticised take on media literacy is problematic and an expression of neoliberalism and a middle-class gaze.</p>
</abstract>

This study examines the construction of media literacy in a special issue on source criticism of the Swedish children's comic Bamse – Världens Starkaste Björn [Bamse – The World's Strongest Bear]. This is done with the purpose of understanding what values, perspectives, and practices are promoted when media literacy is communicated via children's edutainment media. Using narrative and discourse analysis, we problematise how notions of truth (such as post-truth) guide much of the discourse on digital media in today's post-political society, and how that and individualisation shape notions of media literacy. This is visible in the analysed case in how source criticism is constructed in relation to notions of truth and falsehood, and as moral lessons aimed at the individual media user. We argue that such an individualised, decontextualised, and depoliticised take on media literacy is problematic and an expression of neoliberalism and a middle-class gaze.

Fostering the truthful individual<break/><italic>Communicating media literacy in the comic Bamse</italic>

School of Humanities, Education and Social sciences

Nordicom Review

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

This study examines the construction of media literacy in a special issue on source criticism of the Swedish children's comic Bamse – Världens Starkaste Björn...

Fostering the truthful individualCommunicating media literacy in the comic Bamse

Published Online: May 03, 2021

Page range: 109 - 123

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/nor-2021-0032

Keywords
Bamse, fake news, media literacy, post-truth, source criticism

© 2021 Ernesto Abalo et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Figure 1

Fostering the truthful individualCommunicating media literacy in the comic Bamse

Published Online: May 03, 2021

Page range: 109 - 123

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/nor-2021-0032

KeywordsBamse, fake news, media literacy, post-truth, source criticism

© 2021 Ernesto Abalo et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Figure 1

Keywords
Bamse, fake news, media literacy, post-truth, source criticism