Marketing Violence to Young People
No one knows better than communications industries that children and youth represent a huge market, due to both their own spending power and their influence on family spending decisions.
No one knows better than communications industries that children and youth represent a huge market, due to both their own spending power and their influence on family spending decisions.
As concerned adults, we also need to recognize when our anxieties about media violence are used to sell us on blanket censorship, ideology, and a variety of products.
In this lesson, students explore the gratuitous use of violence in sports.
In this lesson, students become aware of the types and amounts of violence in children's programming, and how media violence influences young viewers.
This lesson helps children become aware of the types of violence that appear in the media, the frequency with which these acts occur, and how they respond to these acts. It begins with a guided discussion about the different types of violence and then, how violence is portrayed in the media. Using worksheets, students then survey the shows they enjoy for acts of violence and then, as a class, compile and discuss their findings.
The video game sector is the fastest growing entertainment industry and second only to music in profitability. Global sales of video game software hit almost $17 billion U.S. in 2011. [1]
Level: Grade K to 3
About the Author: Matthew Johnson, Director of Education, MediaSmarts
Duration: 10-15 minutes per activity
This lesson is part of USE, UNDERSTAND & ENGAGE: A Digital Media Literacy Framework for Canadian Schools.
To introduce students to the organizations of the Canadian broadcasting industry, and to the codes, guidelines and issues relating to violence, ethics, representation, advertising and the accuracy of news in television and radio programming.