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CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AND THE DIGITAL CLASSROOM: AWAKENING ACTIVISM THROUGH INSTRUCTION ON SOCIAL MEDIA WRITING

Perkins, Melissa F
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1491576984030128

Abstract Details

2017, Master of Arts, University of Akron, English-Composition.
Students entering our freshman composition classrooms use digital writing every day, whether on social media, blogging, or various other digital areas. Students also have fast access to news, media, and other information. These two interactions, writing and reading, in today’s digital realm are often drenched in social propaganda and debates. In Ira Shor’s sub-section titled “Academic Problem-Posing: Media Studies and a Critical Literature Class” within his work Empowering Education, he writes that students “are starved for meaningful contexts, for intellectual and emotional pleasure in the life of the mind, and for holistic learning that feeds their understanding. Schooling teaches many students that education is a pointless ritual wrapped in meaningless words” (83). Shor’s words still ring true today, especially in classrooms where student’s 21st century interactions with technology are disused for traditional composition classrooms with lectures and no digital components from the social media world in which they actively participate. When students are unable to address propaganda and digital identities in the classroom when they see it their everyday lives, how do they learn to critically analyze these messages? With Critical pedagogy’s teachings and digital culture commodities, teachers can help prepare students for decoding and deconstructing digital propaganda with the hopes of fostering participation and push-back through social media. By using critical pedagogy’s core teachings and digital instruction, teachers can create a classroom where students can recognize and debunk propaganda used in online media while also introducing them to the ways that digital mediums can aid in resistance. Helping students to decode online media while understanding its power can foster student’s critical thinking in a digital world. The primary goal of this thesis is to research and discover the importance of rhetoric and propaganda in writing on social media and how the dissection of this writing genre implores our students to develop into more active online citizens.
William Thelin (Advisor)
Amanda Booher (Other)
Joseph Ceccio (Other)
87 p.
Composition
social media activism; social media; pedagogy; digital writing; critical pedagogy

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Perkins, M. F. (2017). CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AND THE DIGITAL CLASSROOM: AWAKENING ACTIVISM THROUGH INSTRUCTION ON SOCIAL MEDIA WRITING [Master's thesis, University of Akron]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1491576984030128

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Perkins, Melissa. CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AND THE DIGITAL CLASSROOM: AWAKENING ACTIVISM THROUGH INSTRUCTION ON SOCIAL MEDIA WRITING . 2017. University of Akron, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1491576984030128.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Perkins, Melissa. "CRITICAL PEDAGOGY AND THE DIGITAL CLASSROOM: AWAKENING ACTIVISM THROUGH INSTRUCTION ON SOCIAL MEDIA WRITING ." Master's thesis, University of Akron, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1491576984030128

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

akron1491576984030128
454
© 2017, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by University of Akron and OhioLINK.