The Challenges of Defining 'News Literacy'

Abstract

This research brief is a contribution by the Youth and Media Team at the Berkman Center to the first "Why News Matters" grantees workshop sponsored by the McCormick Foundation and organized by the Educational Development Center, Inc., which took place on March 8 and March 11, 2013, in Chicago. Informed by our own research and practice, with a focus on 'news literacy', the brief seeks to stimulate a discussion among the grantees about different approaches to defining, framing, and understanding core concepts such as 'news' and 'news literacy', and to provide a frame of reference for a debate about the question of 'why news matters'.