Critical literacy is a way of reading and viewing media that encourages critical thinking and finding underlying meanings. It can be applied to literature, film, television, and comics. Students are encouraged to question and analyze works to construct new ideas and meanings. Critical literacy arose from the work of educators like Pablo Freire and can be used in various ways, including feminist criticism.
Critical literacy refers to a type of literacy, or viewing and reading different types of media, in which a person is encouraged to think critically and to look for new or underlying meanings in a work. This type of literacy is often encouraged and used in a school setting where students are asked to read a particular work of literature and then critically analyze the work to look for themes or meanings that may not be immediately apparent from a cursory reading. Critical literacy can also be applied to other media than literature or poetry, including film, television, and comic books.
The use of critical literacy arose in large part from the work of some educators, such as Pablo Freire, and from various developments in literacy. This approach to literacy can be used in many different ways, and various types of critical thinking have developed out of the general concept of critical literacy. Feminist criticism, for example, is a method by which a work can be read or viewed to look for underlying meanings that may be misogynistic or even pro-feminist in nature. There are also a number of other critical movements, often based on different cultural or social statuses within a particular segment of the population.
Students engaged in using critical literacy are encouraged to read the materials with a questioning mind. This means that students should read a work of literature and try to determine how the writer may have used different literary devices or other methods to express more than the work’s surface level seems to say. Such critical literacy allows students to better understand what a writer might have been trying to express and to construct new or original ideas and meanings from a work.
Critical literacy can also be applied beyond the confines of literature and poetry. Films can often be viewed from a critical point of view, and the images and audio used in films can help create greater meaning than what could happen directly on the screen. Television can also be viewed in a similar way, with a critical view that allows the audience to see symbolism or deeper meaning in the context of the work presented on screen. Some readers have even applied critical literacy to comics, usually finding ways writers have used superheroes or other comic book themes to tell stories about human nature or the modern world.
Protect your devices with Threat Protection by NordVPN
