Racially and Culturally Diverse Media - Barriers and Challenges
Although the benefits of diverse media are considerable, the creation process can be riddled with challenges.
Indigenous expression in the arts and media
In the 19th century, Métis leader Louis Riel reportedly predicted: “My people will sleep for one hundred years. When they awaken, it will be the artists who give them back their spirit.” Most Indigenous groups in Canada have relied on the oral tradition to convey an idea, message or value.
2SLGBTQ+ Representation in Other Media
2SLGBTQ+ people have been involved in producing their own media for as long as alternative media has existed, but with the advent of the electronic age and cheaper and more accessible electronic devices for production, there has been an explosion of 2SLGBTQ+-produced media of all kinds. The following section explores the ways that 2SLGBTQ+ people have sought to claim space for themselves within media and culture.
Wacky Media Songs: Media Representation
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.
Overview
The importance of media education
Media education can help young people put current images and messages about Indigenous people into perspective by helping them understand how the media work, why stereotyping exists, how decisions are made and why “it matters who makes it.” Media education is not about learning the right answers; it’s about consuming media images with an active, critical mind and asking the right questions.
2SLGBTQ+ Representation in the Media
No longer relegated to the realms of innuendo and secrecy, today we see a wide range of gender identities and sexual orientations represented on television and in mainstream film alongside cisgender people. 2SLGBTQ+ (two-spirit, lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, trans, queer and gender and sexually diverse communities) people see their reflections on screen in a wide variety of roles. And yet, there remain many challenges.
The development of Indigenous media in Canada
Indigenous media has a long history in Canada. While the earliest newspapers aimed at Indigenous readers were published by settlers, there have been Indigenous-run papers since Ojibwa chief, doctor and publisher Peter Edmund Jones, also called Kahkewaquonaby, launched The Indian in Hagersville, Ontario, in 1885. This tradition has continued with papers such as Wawatay News, based in northern Ontario and Edmonton’s Windspeaker.[1]
Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Canadian Broadcasting Policy
Canada’s Broadcasting Act, last amended in 1991, outlines industry guidelines for portrayal of diversity.
Representation of Diversity in Media – Overview
What we see – and don’t see – in media affects how we view reality. Media works can be imagined either as mirrors that reflect an audience’s own experience, windows that give them access to experiences they otherwise wouldn’t have known, or in some cases both.
Diversity and Media Ownership
In this lesson students are introduced to the media literacy key concepts that “media are created to re-present reality” and “media are influenced by commercial considerations.”