During the conference, held in Cairo between 22 and 24 April 2024, a Declaration (in English) shared by all participants on the meaning, role and importance of Media and Information Literacy (MILID) in today’s world was drawn up.

To read the Declaration in Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, click the desired language or download the PDFs at the page’s bottom.

ENGLISH

Empowering Youth through Media and Information Literacy

Information providers, encompassing both traditional and new media, wield significant influence over the cultural identity landscape of any society. While the continuous flow of information, media, and technologies presents opportunities for youth education and sustainable development, it also poses genuine risks, particularly for the more vulnerable younger generation. Through the global pandemic that occurred four years ago brought attention to the dangers of an “infodemic,” the current reality is marked by widespread conflicts in different regions, amplifying the challenges associated with disinformation, hate speech, and harmful content online. Despite concerned efforts by major organizations to combat these issues, empowering youth and arming them with critical media and information literacy remains paramount. Globally addressing this need, though, Media and Information Literacy (MIL) becomes crucial, serving as a tool to safeguard children from the potential effects of excessive media use. MIL not only encourages active engagement with information and media but also cultivates critical thinking skills, digital literacy, and life skills, enabling youth to become informed and responsible global citizens.

Media and Information Literacy as a Safeguard for Youth

When discussing issues regarding democracy and development, we often forget that a media literate citizenry is a precondition. An important prerequisite for the empowerment of citizens is a concerted effort to improve media and information literacy – skills that help to strengthen the critical abilities and communication skills which enable individuals to use the media and communication both as tools and as a way of articulating processes of development and social change, enabling people to influence their own lives by making them more in control of their media use. Media and information literacy is needed for all citizens, but is of decisive importance to the younger generation – in their role as citizens and their expression and personal fulfilment. A fundamental element of the efforts to realize a media and information literate society is media education.

Media Literacy as a Prerequisite for Empowered Citizenship

Media and information literacy has become a global trend and tool for upgrading educational systems in different countries. It has become an important tool to encourage creativity and feelings of loyalty, belonging and citizenship. It has become an important mechanism for the democratic participation of citizens in general and youth in particular. It is a way to bring our young people and children from their bubbles in the virtual world to the real world. Furthermore, media and information literacy help empower young people to be active users of the media and not merely passive receivers. In brief, it helps to create an active audience, which we may call “prosumers”, i.e., producers and consumers of media content simultaneously. Media and information literate citizens can also discern “fake news” and “hate speech”, which have become very common, especially on the new media platforms. Such abilities pave the road to better global understanding and result in having more “global citizens” who realize that they share more in common and interact with people from other races, religions and cultures.

Global Impact of Media and Information Literacy

It is recommended that developments in the educational system take into consideration the integration of MIL into the formal school system. It is another tool to reinvigorate the students’ feeling of belonging to their country, their environment and culture.

Students’ acquisition of MIL competencies facilitates intercultural dialogue and the development of mutual understanding through passing on tradition and cultures in new ways and through more tolerance of the other, fostering intercultural and inter-religious dialogue. Nations never develop without critical and creative minds and qualified teachers who can contribute to building and guiding students’ cognitive abilities by teaching them MIL competencies and skills.

Integrating Media Literacy into Formal Education

MIL has been integrated into educational systems in several countries. In Canada, for instance, there is a formal curriculum for all 6 to 18-year-old students. In Finland, there is a cross-cutting curriculum in many subjects. In the USA and Britain, it is integrated as an activity for students, and the same applies to countries like India, the Philippines and some Asian countries. MIL has demonstrated success as a global tool for upgrading educational systems and empowering students. We live in a world full of violence, complications and challenges, and unfortunately, the media are full of fake news, hate speech and harmful content. The only way to tackle these problems is to have a better understanding of the other, countering the negative stereotypes we have about one another. No doubt that media and information literacy can play an important role in this respect.

Here you can read the Declaration in Spanish, Italian and Portuguese.

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The agreement, entitled “Network of Universities on Media and Information Literacy and Intercultural Dialogue” (UAC-MILID), during the First Forum on “Media and Information Literacy” held in Fez (Morocco) in June 2011, was signed by UNESCO, the United Nations Alliance of Civilisations (UNAOC), the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and six other universities: University of the West Indies (Jamaica); Cairo University (Egypt); University of Sao Paulo (Brazil); Temple University (United States); Beijing University (China); The University of Queensland (Australia) and Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University (Morocco).

Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, supported by Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah University, is responsible for setting the annual calendar of activities, organising a yearly meeting and coordinating a publication including articles on Media and Information Literacy and Intercultural Dialogue.

UNESCO and UNAOC have created the UNESCO-UNAOC  UNITWIN Global Chair on Media and Information Literacy and Intercultural Dialogue (“UNESCO-UNAOC MILID UNITWIN”).

UNESCO-UNAOC MILID UNITWIN specific objectives include:

• Act as a Observatory for critically analyzing: the role of Media and Information Literacy (“MIL”) as a catalyst for civic participation, democracy and development; for the promotion of free, independent and pluralistic media; as well as MIL’s contribution to the prevention and resolution of conflicts and intercultural tensions and polarizations.
• Enhance intercultural and cooperative research on MIL and the exchanges between universities and mass media, encouraging MIL’s initiatives towards respecting human rights and dignity and cultural diversity.
• Develop within the participant universities educational and media production practices that contribute to dissolving prejudice and intercultural barriers and favour global dialogue and cooperation among citizens as well as social and political institutions around the world. In addition to the international dimension, these practices will be reflected at the local level in the 8 cities or neighbourhoods in which the partner universities are located.
• Promote global actions relating to MIL (including adaptation of the UNESCO MIL Curriculum for Teacher Education and other relevant tools, publications, congresses, seminars, teaching resources, and faculty and students’ exchanges) that could contribute towards stimulating dialogue and understanding among people of and within different cultures and societies.
• Create a virtual centre to research on, and study and develop MIL initiatives aimed at the creation of projects and publications linking universities and research centres.
• Promote and support other global media initiatives that could reinforce civic participation through open, free and independent media and information systems that favour intercultural dialogue and cooperation.
• Encourage and support citizen participation as well as educational and cultural institutions whose initiatives promote media and information literacy, cooperation and intercultural dialogue.

UNESCO-UNAOC MILID UNITWIN current universities also include: University of Guadalajara (Mexico); Western University (Ontairo, Canada); University of Gothenburg (Sweden); Punjabi University (Patiala, India); Ahmadu Bello University (Nigeria); University of the South Pacific (Suva, Fiji); Nnamdi Azikiwe University (Nigeria); University of Calabar (Nigeria); University of Jos (Nigeria); Hosei University (Tokyo, Japan); University of South Africa (Pretoria, South Africa); Bergen University College (Norway); Lagos State University (Nigeria); Universidade do Minho (Braga, Portugal); University of Latvia (Riga, Latvia); Sholokhov Moscow State University for Humanities (Russia); Moulay Ismail University (Meknes, Morocco); School of Journalism and Public Relation (Skopje, Macedonia).

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