Critical Media Research Articles

Design of the INARA (Inclusive and Gender Responsive Historia) Application: Accentuating Inclusive and Gender-Responsive History Learning

This article aims to elaborate on the initial development of the historical learning application design, INARA (Inclusive and Gender Responsive Historia). The authors gathered data from literature reviews, including journal articles and online media, which were analyzed using a SWOT approach. The study's results showcase examples of inclusive and gender-responsive features in this application, such as games, quizzes, QR codes, and comics focusing on female heroes in Indonesia. The application is also designed with specific features to support differently-abled students in learning history. It is hoped that INARA can become a creative, engaging, and critical medium for history learning at school levels. Its innovative design and inclusive features make a valuable contribution to the scholarly discourse in education. This article is expected to enrich the understanding of utilizing technology to support inclusive and gender-responsive history learning. As part of further development efforts, INARA is anticipated to become a progressive educational solution supporting various learning needs.
 Keywords: history, application, learning, inclusive, gender responsive

Differentiation of Polish and Ukrainian consumers' attitudes to Russian brands and international brands remaining on the Russian market

PurposeThe purpose of this paper was identification and empirical assessment of the differentiation of consumers' attitudes in Ukraine and Poland to Russian brands and other brands offered on the Russian market after Russia’s aggression against Ukraine on February 24, 2022.Design/methodology/approachThe main research methods include a systematic literature review and the authors' own surveys conducted in November 2022. The research sample comprised 950 consumers – 67% of them were Poles, 30% – Ukrainians and 3% from other countries.FindingsA respondents' country (Poland and Ukraine) does not impact attitudes to brands offered on the Russian market after Russia's invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Moreover, it does not affect and differentiate emotional engagement in the conflict and assistance to war victims. Cluster analysis resulted in identifying two groups on the basis of consumers' declared emotional reactions to the war. The first group was smaller (N = 353, 37.2%), referred to as “indifferent consumers”, and was characterized by a greater inclination to purchase brands offered in Russia. The other cluster, referred to as “sensitive consumers” (N = 597, 62.8%), comprises those engaged in offering assistance to war victims, showing strong emotions in connection with the aggression and military activities and characterized by a clearly negative attitude to Russian and other offered brands and an inclination to boycott these brands.Research limitations/implicationsA short time horizon, the study confined to two countries, difficulties in reaching Ukrainian respondents due to power failures in Ukraine in the period of conducting the survey (November 2022), a non-representative research sample – overrepresentation of people aged 18–25 years.Practical implicationsThe research study contributes to the knowledge about consumer brand attitudes and preferences under unique social, economic and market conditions. These conditions were created by Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, as well as the international and global character of the war in Ukraine. The significant implications of the study refer to brand communication policies and companies' CSR-related declarations. A number of consumers' errors were recorded, resulting from wrong brand retrieval, which were rectified at a later stage as a result of international restrictions imposed on Russia, harsh media criticism and social international embargoes imposed on brands offered in Russia. The marketing communication of contemporary global brands should give consideration to the informative function of CSR activities, and the communication process should be continuous. Critical attitudes and an inclination to boycott brands point to the possible consequences faced by inconsistent and ethically doubtful brand policies. This implication is clearly confirmed by the results of the study.Social implicationsThe authors also wish to highlight the implications for practice and society. As mentioned earlier, Polish consumers involved in providing aid to victims of the war also expressed their opposition to the war by boycotting Russian products and international brands remaining in Russia. Popularization of the research results obtained by the authors can be a form of sensitizing the public to the need for long-term relief, awakening global awareness of the essence and importance of sanctions imposed on Russia, as well as the possibility of expressing opposition through individual purchasing decisions and boycotting brands still present in Russia.Originality/valueThe study allowed for identifying consumers' differentiated brand attitudes in two countries: a country inflicted by war (Ukraine) and a front-line country, strongly supporting Ukraine (Poland). The research contributes to consumer behavior theories and studies of consumer attitudes and preferences from the perspective of international corporations' CSR activities under the unique conditions of war. Also, it contributes to the knowledge of the mechanism of forming attitudes to Russian and international brands offered in Russia among CEE consumers.

The Importance of Critical Social Media Literacy in the Digital Era: Benefits for Social Support and Flourishing

We examined the association between critical social media literacy (critical consumption and prosumption) and several indicators of flourishing mental health (i.e., resilience, coping ability, life satisfaction) as well as mental health issues (i.e., depressive symptoms, anxiety, loneliness), with a focus on the mediating role of social support. Using data from 338 emerging adults ( Mage = 23.28, SD = 2.38), we conducted a path analysis to examine the relationship between critical social media literacy, social support, flourishing, and mental health outcomes. Our results showed that greater critical social media literacy was associated with greater social support, which in turn was associated with greater levels of flourishing outcomes and lower levels of mental health issues. These findings suggest that critical social media literacy may serve as a key tool in developing effective social support systems and promoting a flourishing lifestyle among emerging adults. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Ambivalence of informality: Covid-19 and unmasked precarity in Nollywood

This article explores the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on the Nigerian film industry (Nollywood) and the local responses of filmmakers to the precariousness engendered by the pandemic. This research adopts the critical media industry studies framework and relies on interviews with 30 Nollywood filmmakers who provided insights on the impact of the pandemic on labour in Nollywood. Theorizing the Covid-19 dynamics as reflective of the ambivalence of informality, this article submits that although informality was central to Nollywood's industrial structure and sustainability, the pandemic triggered unprecedented tensions associated with those informal practices and highlighted existing precarity which had been largely masked by constant availability of jobs. Accordingly, a significant legacy of the pandemic for the industry is the unprecedented gravitation of industry players towards more formalized industrial structures and practices.

Fashion Activism of Extinction Rebellion and Fashion Act Now

This article examines the fashion activism of Extinction Rebellion (XR) through a comparative analysis of literature, media, and interviews with activists. We argue that their decentralized organizational structure allows the individual local chapters and action groups to function and organize independently, quickly, and more efficiently than many other current and past organizations, in part thanks to social media connectivity, trans-national communication channels, multi-generational involvement of activists and researchers, and the nonhierarchical structure of the action groups. This is significant because despite the criticism they have received from sociologists, media critics, and other analysts, currently they are one of the most effective organizations in terms of raising awareness and provoking public debate about the climate emergency and how it relates to fashion.

VEVERICA PLAŠLJIVICA MELANI VOT – INTERAKCIJA VERBALNOG I VIZUELNOG

The paper deals with the picture book Scaredy Squirrel illustrated and written by the Canadian author Melanie Watt. First, it is about the contemporary production of picture books about feelings, and then it is considered what is the place of the picture book Scaredy Squirrel among them. The picture book is analyzed as dual, visual, and verbal piece of art whose meaning emerges from the dialogue between image and text. The role of paratext, metatextual playing and the fragmentation of the narrative dominated by linguistic and pictorial enumerations and interruptions of linear storytelling with non-literary genres (tables, plans, lists) are pointed out. The emphasis is on interactivity and communicativeness and addressing a dual readership, children and adults. Children are encouraged in an unobtrusive, playful, and humorous way, while the understanding of adults is also offered with meanings related to criticism and parody of modern media and the society of fear.

Digital Pleasure and Danger

This roundtable discussion features two leading scholars of critical race and digital media, Drs. Brooklyne Gipson and Kishonna Gray. The impacts of pleasure and danger on social network sites and digital media certainly predate these technologies yet are heightened in unique ways by their affordances. Both Gipson and Gray discuss how they center Black feminism, queerness, and intersectionality in their approaches to digital media studies and the conundrum of harm, pleasure, and nuance online. They discuss themes such as storytelling, methods, and play to push the boundaries of the binary and chart a path forward that is neither afraid of nor essentialist about the role of technology in our lives.

Values of humanitarian security concerning institutional and public support

The study of humanitarian security’s value orientations is based on the results of a content analysis of the content of national documents and current publications of Ukrainian and European researchers. It was determined that the values of humanitari-an security are correlated with the general humanistic values of strategic develop-ment – intellectual freedom, justice, tolerance, people-centeredness. In the condi-tions of war, one of the key values is "security" (informational, national, personal). From the point of view of national security, the importance of the Strategy’s imple-mentation for Popularization of the Ukrainian Language until 2030 "A Strong Lan-guage – a Successful State" and the Strategy for the Development of Reading for the period until 2032 "Reading as a Life Strategy" was noted. The formation, devel-opment and ability to practically apply critical thinking and media literacy were noted as influential factors for ensuring the humanitarian security of the individual as a result of the civic education development. Special attention is paid to the spectrum of existential problems of humanitarian security, which the author highlights in the context of the study "Psychological well-being in Europe after the outbreak of war in Ukraine", carried out by a research group from many European universities. The re-sults of this study were published in the journal Nature Communications in early 2024.

Effects of motivation to use social networking sites on students’ media literacy and critical thinking

Participation in social networking sites offers many potential benefits for university students. Online interaction on these sites provides various opportunities for them to learn and improve self-control, tolerate and respect the viewpoints of others, express emotions in healthy and orderly ways, and think and make decisions critically. These sites also provide them with a virtual space to execute time, form close connections with friends without being spatially restricted and provide space for young people’s self-development. However, the number of studies examining university students’ social networking sites, media literacy, and critical thinking is very limited in the literature. Therefore, this research examined the effects of motivation to use social networking sites on students’ media literacy and critical thinking. The research also examined the relationships between students’ motivation for using social networks, media literacy, and critical thinking. The data were collected using three data collection instruments. The participants were 211 university students enrolled at two universities in Bangkok, Thailand. The results showed significant positive correlations between motivation to use social networking sites, and critical thinking, that university students with better performance in information and learning show better performance in critical thinking and reflection skills. The results also showed remarkable positive correlations between motivation for using social networking sites and media literacy, indicating that university students with better performance in information and learning show better performance in multimedia messages and multimedia organization and analysis. In addition, the results also revealed positive correlations between critical thinking and media literacy. The implications are made based on the results obtained from this research.

Analysis of the Alignment of K to 12 Most Essential Learning Competencies, Instruction, and Assessment Tools in Statistics and Probability

Curriculum alignment is vital in realizing educational goals. However, predicaments in the teaching and learning process challenge the alignment. Hence, this paper aims to determine students' academic performances in the years 2022-2023 and 2023-2024, analyze the alignment of the curriculum, instruction, and assessment in Statistics and Probability, and propose recommendations to ensure the alignment of curriculum, instruction, and assessment. A document analysis of the teaching and learning tools was conducted to gain in-depth results. Descriptive statistics, such as frequency, percent, mean, and standard deviation, were employed to describe further the results. Results showed that the students’ average academic performance in Statistics and Probability for 2022-2023 was 86.80 and 87.46 for 2023-2024, both indicating a very satisfactory level. The teacher’s instructions in the six (6) contents of Statistics and Probability were aligned with the curriculum or the K to 12 Most Essential Learning Competencies. Assessment tools were aligned with the teacher’s instructions or strategies. The 21st-century skills commonly integrated among learners were critical thinking, information, media, and technology. As the teacher’s instructions indicated, students gained an average mastery level (57%). The most common cognitive domain used in the students’ assessments was remembering. Findings revealed that the teacher attained good proof of transfer, lesson outlines, and assessments or graded activities aligning curriculum, instruction, and assessment. The teacher obtained an excellent level of objectives. Overall, the teacher aligned the curriculum, instruction, and assessment well. Based on the document analysis, the alignment of teaching and learning resources to the curriculum was evident. This study proposed the following recommendations - implement assessment of standards-based curriculum, effective pedagogy, and achievable assessments, provide teacher support, strengthen evaluation of teaching and assessment, and contextualize assessments catering to the 21st-century skills of the learners.

The limits of sportswashing. How the 2022 FIFA World Cup affected attitudes about Qatar.

Non-democratic regimes have increasingly been hosting major sports events to boost their visibility and image abroad, which sparked debates about the potential for "sportswashing". Using the case of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar we examine how the framing of the tournament influenced opinions about Qatar abroad. Our pre-registered survey experiment with more than 14,000 respondents in eight European countries conducted before the tournament shows that framing it in light of human rights issues in Qatar leads to more negative attitudes towards the host of the World Cup. In contrast, frames emphasizing Qatar's organizational capacity improve respondents' attitudes. The heterogeneity of effects across countries highlights the relevance of the national information environment for the effects of major sports events on public opinion. These findings suggest that critical media coverage could potentially mitigate sportswashing efforts while uncritical coverage can increase the legitimacy of autocracies.

Postawy studentów wobec zjawiska infodemii w perspektywie doskonalenia edukacji medialnej w kształceniu akademickim

The article presents the results of a study that aimed to analyse students’ attitudes towards infodemic caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The author adopted the interpretation of infodemic as a process of spreading an excess of untrue information, which complicates the evaluation and selection of reliable content. The research problem was the question of students’ attitudes towards false information related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The research sample consisted of 37 students of pedagogy. The research was conducted in a qualitative research paradigm. The results indicated that the surveyed students had a positive and stable organisation of their own knowledge, beliefs, feelings, and such forms of behaviour and expressive reactions as are necessary when confronted with infodemic. The respondents declared that they search for content in various sources and make a critical comparison and identification of false content. Despite this, they do not have a sufficiently in-depth knowledge of how to debunk false information. They feel the need for a great deal of cognitive effort to verify content. Therefore, the author makes recommendations for the formation of critical media literacy – as a way of building social resilience to disinformation and other disorders of the information age.

The commercialization of thumbnail update in the Ajwa TV Indonesia Muslim broadcasting on Youtube Canal

Religion is an ideology, not a good or service, but rather an attraction used to draw in the audience. Ajwa TV Indonesia is an illustration of the critical media political economy theory of how religious content has become commodified because of the transformation of religion's initial use value as a way of life and a source of belief into an exchange value. One of the media's mediators for boosting viewership is YouTube update thumbnails. The research included qualitative descriptive techniques. The practice of commodification of religious content emerged as a response to these negative effects and as a rule for Indonesian Muslims' daily life. Additionally, YouTube plays a significant role in enhancing the performance and visibility of devoted Ajwa TV viewers. The purpose of a thumbnail update is to make information about shows on Ajwa TV more widely known by releasing and sharing it. A device's thumbnails serve many functions, one of which is to display a preview of a digital image. A device's thumbnails serve many functions, one of which is to display a preview of a digital image. Ajwa TV Indonesia is anticipated to continue producing current programming including music, lifestyle, news, and Islamic studies to expand the discussion.

Transformation or Indoctrination through Critical Pedagogy: Strategic Planning, Digital Literacy, and Technology Infusion in K-12

The impact of critical theory on students has sparked false accusations, leading to book banning and restrictive policies in the classroom. While some argue that teachers are being radicalized, scholars advocate for integrating critical pedagogy in teacher education to address the influences of media messages on students’ thinking. Critical literacy involves recognizing and challenging societal power structures in media. To support diverse student perspectives, educators must understand social and cultural forces. Digital literacy is crucial for critically evaluating digital content and ensures safety and privacy. The graduate programs emphasize the application of critical pedagogy for infusing technology in schooling to prepare culturally diverse students. The importance of critical media education is emphasized by the essential task of fostering intelligent, critical thinkers among students as they interact with media.

Innovation of Media Business Models in the Digital Economy Era

This research delves into the evolution of media business models in the digital economy period, with a specific emphasis on examining the key aspects of technology-centered and customer-focused. The research defined how essential components like value proposition, customer segments, and revenue streams are uniquely implemented in the media sector's business model. It has considered real contributions in big data, artificial intelligence, and blockchain that augment efficiency with respect to content creation, user experience, and equality with concern to revenue sharing in the media industry. The current piece of research at the same time emphasizes analyzing users' behavior and gauging users' involvement to enhance their level of engagement and satisfaction ratio. After this, it plunges deep into two details of new critical media platforms in TikTok and Facebook, describing successful business models detailing user growth trends, sources of revenue for firms, user distribution, and other dataset details. The findings recommend how, in this era, where the digital economy is growing tremendously, media companies should keep working persistently to innovate business models through an amalgamation of technology-driven with customer-oriented methods to make it sterling in such a stiff market. This study offers theoretical backing and practical guidance for the development of new media business models, with significant practical implications.

Critical Media Literacy: Balancing Skepticism and Trust Toward Epistemic Authorities

Critical Media Literacy: Balancing Skepticism and Trust Toward Epistemic Authorities

The risks of symbiotic relationship between terrorism and the media in media coverage of russia’s military aggression against Ukraine

Introduction. The symbiotic relationship between terrorism and the media may have destructive media effects on society in peacetime, but under wartime conditions, these effects may intensify, pose new threats, and weaken the state’s position in fighting against the enemy. Relevance of the study. Identifying and analyzing these risks is a critical and relevant topic and scientific task during Russia's military aggression against Ukraine, which has significantly scaled after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Therefore, the purpose of the article is to analyze the risks of the symbiotic relationship between terrorism and the media in the coverage of Russia's aggression by Ukrainian journalists. Methodology. The negative consequences of the symbiotic relationship between terrorism and the media are identified through the analysis of scientific and media criticism articles. The risks of such ties during Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine were determined by induction, reasoning by analogy, ascent from the abstract to the concrete, synthesis, and generalization. Results. The disproportionate to the overall war threat, overly dramatic and sensitive, sensationalized, detailed coverage of Russia’s terrorist practices in the Ukrainian media can lead to destructive media influence desired by the enemy: spreading fear, panic and paralyzing pessimism among Ukrainians, which turn them into a dysfunctional, disorganized society incapable of mobilizing resources under existential threats; such a society usually makes more significant emotional, irrational political pressure on the authorities making concede to terrorists; polarization of public opinion and internal political destabilization; Ukrainians who are latent supporters of Russia may perceive massive terrorist attacks as a manifestation of Russian tremendous military capability and a call to action (risks of collaboration and sabotage); distraction of public attention from other problems, such as losses on the battlefield; obtaining information from the media about the psychological state of society, countermeasures of the security forces (OSINT intelligence), etc. Conclusions. When covering Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, Ukrainian journalists need to weaken the symbiotic relationship between terrorism and the media. They should develop a media frame for covering the Russian Federation’s terror that provides objective and comprehensive information for citizens and does not cause long-term destructive media effects on Ukrainian society, as well as indirect assistance to the enemy. Ukrainian media professionals can use the article’s results and journalistic examples to formulate or improve their editorial policy on media coverage of Russia’s terror in Ukraine.

The Voice of a Stranger: Rumor, Radio, and the Aurality of Difference in Interwar Japan

Abstract: In the late 1930s, a unique strain of media criticism developed in Japan surrounding radio broadcasting, sound, and the limits of public speech. Galvanized by a ban on "groundless rumors" which stifled independent expression in favor of state broadcasting, many intellectuals heralded rumor as a voice of the people—a mode of aural transmission that presented a more vernacular alternative to the foreign intrusions of broadcast sound. In order to better apprehend this critique, however, this article situates it within a darker history of rumor and aurality that traces back to the violent aftermath of the Great Kanto Earthquake, revealing unspoken anxieties over ethnic and racial difference at the heart of Japan's interwar media discourse.

Analysis of the value of news and cultural communication using multimodal learning

Abstract News serves as a critical medium for mass communication, characterized by its distinct purpose, comprehensiveness, and authenticity. It is essential to explore the developmental trends within the news sector from the perspective of communicative value and to provide appropriate guidance. This study employs multimodal learning techniques to develop a new content detection model that leverages multimodal fusion for effective content identification. Building on this framework, a sentiment analysis model utilizing multimodal data is constructed to assess the emotional impact of news communication. Additionally, the cognitive mediation model is used to establish an analysis model for determining the value of news communication. Empirical analyses indicate that the multimodal news content detection model presented in this study achieves high-performance metrics, with each index exceeding 0.9. Similarly, the sentiment direction model demonstrates robust accuracy, precision, recall, and F1 values, all-surpassing 0.83. The models exhibit Pearson correlation coefficients (Corr) of 0.758 and 0.785 and mean absolute errors (MAE) of 0.624 and 0.948, respectively, outperforming comparable models. Further analysis into the value of news and cultural communication reveals significant impacts of sound attention (0.328), sound-associated thinking (0.210), and image attention (0.284) on communicative value. Conversely, leisure Internet time shows a negative correlation with knowledge acquisition (-0.090). The findings underscore a positive correlation between the value of news and cultural communication and sound content, thereby affirming that the methodologies employed in this study provide a viable approach to analyzing the communicative value of news. This study not only advances the theoretical understanding of news communication but also enhances practical approaches to media analysis.

대학생의 비판적 미디어 리터러시 역량과 디지털 뉴스 이용의 관계

This study aims to examine the media literacy and digital media practices of university students who are digital natives and Generation Z. This study diagnosed critical media literacy among university students, investigate their daily digital news use, and analyzed the relationship between critical media literacy levels and digital news use.
 The analysis on the data of university students’ critical media literacy and digital news use showed that their media literacy levels are quite high, but their media practices are not. They perceived the credibility of social media as a source of information to be moderate and believed it to be trustworthy in attractiveness rather than qualifications or expertise. Nonetheless, they reported that social media is the primary source of news in their daily lives.
 The main implication of this study is that the goals of media literacy education for university students should include the ability to transfer their media literacy skills into everyday media practices. This research may contribute to increase of the interest of researchers in the area of university media literacy education.