Beyond 'fake news': Opportunities and constraints for teaching news literacy

Abstract

Teaching news literacy has, in recent decades, become cross-disciplinary, and as a result, more collaborative. This paper centers the importance of this collaboration by describing a workshop designed and taught by a media studies professor, a media literacy expert, and their subject librarian. In this essay, we discuss the workshop in terms of best practices for teaching about media and information literacy in an era marked by digital news consumption and the proliferation of claims of “fake news.” First, we elaborate on the value of the collaboration between the discipline, the library, and the field, as it allowed us to draw on converging literacies - media and information. Next, we address some of the constraints of the “fake news” narrative when it comes to news literacy efforts. Finally, we share lessons learned from teaching news literacy to account for contemporary news production and consumption.