Credibility
How do we assess the quality of information we encounter online? What accountability/responsibility should we have over the integrity of the social justice content we decide to circulate? And, how prepared should we be to defend the claims we make to support our arguments around political issues? According to a recent survey conducted by the MacArthur Foundation’s Youth and Participatory Politics Network, 85 percent of high school aged youth want more help in learning to discern the credibility of the information they encounter online. For us, this issue is most powerfully raised by our case study of Invisible Children’s Kony 2012 campaign, but it is also one which almost every public awareness effort confronts sooner or later.
Real World Example:
John Green’s “Crash Course” history lessons are comprehensive, holistic lessons on particular historical subjects created through effective and playful uses of media. John relies on a series of visual strategies from the typical historical paintings/photos but also use modern animations and graphs to supplement his verbal lessons. Additionally there are often playful uses of cinematic tricks and game show elements, such as the “Mystery Document”, in which John is playfully electrocuted if he doesn’t properly guess the author of said document. John’s language, speed of speech, and quick jumps across subjects all work to create a linguistic strategy that appeal to logic and give a sense of credibility to his historical lessons.
Conversation Starter Questions:
Looking to Start Your Own Conversation?
If the HitRecord Credibility video and information contained here inspired you to action, you may want reach to the original call for submissions that inspired this video to be made in the first place. While the deadline for submissions has expired, you are always free to create your own responses to it!
