Content, changers, community and collaboration: expanding digital media literacy initiatives

ABSTRACT

Digital media literacy (DML) is critical for everyone, everywhere, in the modern era to develop, as DML skills help internet users to be not only consumers of online information but also active digital citizens. This study therefore identifies ways of expanding existing DML initiatives in Indonesia, and elements needed to create a framework that will maintain a coherent national DML policy and support grassroots DML initiatives. It analyses interviews and focus group discussions with representative stakeholders such as academics, activists, members of civil society, government officials, professionals, students, and technologists to identify four elements needed for effective DML education in Indonesia: content, changers, community, and collaboration. The findings provide insight into these critical elements and argue that the process of developing young Indonesians’ DML skills will need to involve multiple stakeholders in an extensive collaboration with proactive policymakers. Local and national changers and various communities will need to collaborate to push forward policy on the national curriculum, making it clear that they and institutions are essential to expanding DML initiatives into a sustainable national program.

KEYWORDS:

• Digital media
• digital media literacy
• digital media literacy initiatives
• framework
• Indonesia
• young people

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the editorial team and reviewers from Journal of Media Practice and Education for their useful feedback and comments for improving this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Fiona Suwana

Dr. Fiona Suwana is a researcher at the University of South Australia and a research associate at Flinders University. She has become a course designer and co-course leader for a short-term program of “Democratic Resilience - Digital and Media Literacy” and “Democratic Resilience: Youth participation in Indonesia's Democracy” at DFAT Australia Awards Indonesia and Queensland University of Technology (QUT). She graduated with a Doctor of Philosophy of Digital Media at Digital Media Research Centre, QUT - Australia. She also received a M.Sc in Communication Science from the University of Indonesia, and B.A (Honours) of Communication Studies (Mass Communication) from the London School of Public Relations, Jakarta. Her research focuses on digital media, digital activism, digital media literacy, data activism, social media, political movement, democracy, and young people. Her work has been published in Information, Communication and Society, Social and Behavioral Sciences, Kasetsart Journal of Social Science and Research Report (a commissioned independent study into digital news in Australia for Facebook and accompanied their submission to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Digital Platforms Inquiry), The Conversation, The Jakarta Post, and several book chapters including in Palgrave.