A Social History of Media, Technology and Schooling

Abstract

AbstractThis article explores the literature in the intersecting fields of media, technology and schooling in the United States across the past two centuries. It organizes the research from a social-historical perspective through a fic-tionalized interview with an archetypal third-generation urban public school teacher. This topography illustrates the problems and possibilities that emerge from the chronic push for technology in schools. Of particular men-tion are the privileging of orality and literacy through the common school reader, the mechanization of school-ing through teaching machines and television, and the transformative yet still untapped potential of computers and the internet.Keywords: Media Education, Media History, Education History, Technology, Media Literacy To more fully understand and appreciate the complexities and challenges of media literacy educa-tion in the digital age, this essay reflects on the his-torical intersection of media, technology, and school-ing in the United States. Although its history is well established as rife with tensions and contradictions,