Advertising: It’s everywhere. No, it’s not your imagination. The amount of advertising and marketing we are exposed to daily has exploded: on average, we see more than four thousand ads each day.[1] At the gas pumps, in the movie theatre, in a washroom stall, on stickers on fruit, during sporting events and plastered all over social media—advertising is pretty much impossible to avoid.
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.
They have ads of how you should dress and what you should look like and this and that, and then they say, 'but respect people for what they choose to be like.' Okay, so which do we do first?"
Kelsey, 16, quoted in Girl Talk
Many curricular expectations in Saskatchewan Practical and Applied Arts courses relate to media and digital literacy. The following excerpt from Practical and Applied Arts Handbook (2006) details how media and digital literacy have been integrated into the curriculum:
MediaSmarts is governed by an elected, volunteer Board of Directors.
Media components are found in all three goals of the Saskatchewan Arts Education curriculum: Creative/Productive, Critical/Responsive strand and Cultural/Historical.
In the Saskatchewan elementary English Language Arts curriculum, media-related objectives are provided under foundational outcomes of Comprehend and Respond, Compose and Create, and Assess and Reflect.
Photo credits: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador