The purpose of this study is to understand why and how media education became
legitimate in the Ontario educational system in the 1980s. The theoretical focus is on how a
new social movement (the new social movement in Ontario) led to the legitimation of a new
social curriculum (the media education program).
This study on media education in Ontario is contextualized in the epochal shift to the
information society. Adopting the approach of historical sociology, it documents the
influence of those social forces which gave rise to media education and investigates how key
individuals brought media education into schools.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the societal shift brought with it rapid development in media
technologies and induced new social tensions. This study finds that the conceptualization of
the mass media as "invisible curriculum," the ideology of techno-cultural nationalism and the
moral controversy over media sex and violence directed public attention to the importance of
media literacy. The media literacy movement in Ontario subsequently placed media
education in the formal school curriculum. Legitimating media education can be regarded as
a social and educational response to the technological changes in the information age. This
study also indicates that less powerful groups in the community and the educational field
were able to put a body of low-status knowledge into the formal school curriculum.
In order to analyze the process from social movement to subject formation, a
theoretical framework is put forward identifying strong justification, effective lobbying,
proper positioning and unofficial support for curriculum-building as the four key elements for
legitimating a new social curriculum. Instead of justifying media education in terms of
utilitarian and academic values, the advocates emphasized the pragmatic solution provided by
the new curriculum to social problems. The manipulation of public support by creating a
"climate of opinion" was vital to the success of lobbying. "Subject inhabitancy" was an
effective way to find a curricular niche for a new social curriculum. Finally, the advocates'
support for the curriculum development and implementation played an important role in
strengthening the government's confidence in mandating a new program.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:BVAU.2429/6726 |
| Date | 11 1900 |
| Creators | Lee, Alice Yuet Lin |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Relation | UBC Retrospective Theses Digitization Project [http://www.library.ubc.ca/archives/retro_theses/] |
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