The 2 nd Media Literacy Days, organized by the Media Literacy Network, were held in the period from 26 October to 2 November 2020. During the MLD 2020, all interested citizens had the opportunity to join in the activities held as part of this year’s programme: workers, debates, webinars and other online events focused on different aspects of media literacy.
The 2 nd Media Literacy Days, organized by the Media Literacy Network, were held in the period from 26 October to 2 November 2020. During the MLD 2020, all interested citizens had the opportunity to join in the activities held as part of this year’s programme: workers, debates, webinars and other online events focused on different aspects of media literacy. Due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, all events under MLD 2020 were organized on-line, following the example of UNESCO’s Global Week on Media and Information Literacy (24-31 October 2020). This was the second time that our country joined in the Global Week on Media and Information Literacy, during which UNESCO sent out a call all to fight disinformation using media literacy as a powerful tool, and take part in the events dedicated to media literacy regardless of their living and working place. That is why the motto of DMP 2020 is “Test Every News With No Excuse”.
The members of the Media Literacy Network (MLN) which participated in the organization of the MLD 2020, addressed several different aspects of media literacy within the framework of their activities. They used video messages to call all interested citizens to join their events. READ MORE
What happened at Media Literacy Days 2020?
The participants in the event titled “Loud and Clear – How to Escape the Conspiracy Theories?,” organized by MOF, spoke about the conspiracy theories present on the Internet during the pandemic. From a deadly virus controlled by the 5G network to chipping and controlling humanity, the conspiracy theories have travelled the world spreading false information that people still believe. You can see the main conclusions of the discussion here:
The Macedonian Institute for Media (MIM) and the Agency for Audio and Audiovisual Media Services (AAAVMS) organized an online roundtable on media literacy and education. On this occasion, Minister of Education and Science Mila Carovska pointed out that a new concept of primary education was being under preparation to include media literacy as of next year, as an approach to learning a number of school subjects.
At the public session of the Appeals Commission of the Council for Media Ethics, the message was highlighted that the public played a very important role in detecting the practice of media reporting, in noticing what meant an unethical and unprofessional reporting, in assisting the self-regulatory body to more easily identify these cases and in promoting the process of professionalization of media’s operations.
The issue of how to recognize the lies about Covid-19 on the Internet was in the spotlight of the second event organized by the Youth Education Forum (MOF). Trust in the experts and in those with experience in this field is crucial. On the other hand, we should also be skeptical and should not believe in everything that “flies” before our eyes on social networks. It is important to compare the news and verify the same using multiple sources.
The event “Gender, Pays and Broadcasting,” organized by the Agency for Audio and Audiovisual Media Services, raised a number of issues related to the gender aspect of media literacy. The discussions were about the extent of representation of women’s knowledge, experience and expertise in the programme contents; if there was a gender gap in the journalists’ salaries; if the implementation of the Law on Equal Opportunities for Women and Men was supervised and to what extent; how much the employers respected journalists’ worker rights, as well as whether investigative journalism payed off. The key points of the discussion can be found here:
As part of the debate titled “Let’s have coffee”, the Institute for Communication Studies (ICS), asked the question: “Do we need a media diet?”. The ICS research had shown that half of the young people aged 15-24 spent 1-3 hours a day on social networks, mostly on Instagram. This topic was discussed with experts in the field of pedagogy and psychology, as well as with high-school and university students. Watch the video and learn more about the possible ways to achieve balance between offline and online reality.
The event titled “Teachers – Key to Raising Awareness about Media Literacy”, organized by the Macedonian Institute for Media (MIM), tackled the impact of social media on young people, the use of new technologies to acquire knowledge and skills, and the future of media literacy in education. The discussion among several professors from different fields and a communicologist underlined the challenges that teachers had in yielding knowledge to students about the media, and offered ways on how to overcome these challenges.
As part of the CriThink project, a webinar was organized on the topic of “Fighting Disinformation under the Conditions of Covid-19 Pandemic“. Presented at the event were some of the conclusions obtained through the research conducted by Eurothink and Metamorphosis, RESIS and AAAVMS, as well as MIM and CIVIL. The discussion raised questions such as whether journalists need to build media literacy capacities, what patterns disinformation have, hate speech and propaganda, the impact of politics on the media sphere and whether there were strategies for verifying the truthfulness of information.