IDENTITY AND MEDIA: AN ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECT OF STEREOTYPES ON CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS FROM AN EDUCATIONAL PERSPECTIVE
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.56219/lneaimaginaria.v1i23.4976Keywords:
Media literacy, youth identity, digital stereotypes, critical creation, digital citizenshipAbstract
This article examines how stereotypes disseminated by digital media influence the identity construction of Latin American children and adolescents and proposes a comprehensive pedagogical response to mitigate these effects. It begins with an epistemological theoretical framework that articulates social learning, cultivation theory, cultural studies, and intersectionality, emphasizing that media messages operate simultaneously as models of behavior and devices of symbolic power.
The arguments section contrasts the strengths and weaknesses of the corpus: interdisciplinary integration and regional updating are strong points, while the absence of rural longitudinal studies and the indirect measurement of identity limit generalization. Comparisons with international research show convergences in the effectiveness of critical creation and divergences related to the digital divide and school infrastructure.
Based on these findings, the pedagogical proposal expands the 3C model (Know Question Create) to five phases—Contextualize, Know, Question, Create, Connect—developed over a semester. It includes a 120-hour teaching diploma, multimedia production labs, and two cross-cutting themes: body literacy (video dance and digital parkour) and responsible consumption (carbon footprint and circular economy). A governance architecture is developed that allocates a fixed percentage of the municipal ICT budget to creative equipment and requires schools to report participation and diversity indicators.
The conclusions reinforce that critical media literacy is essential for digital citizenship and that the combination of analysis, creation, and community participation can erode internalized stereotypes. The article closes with an ethical call to democratize algorithmic culture, open licenses and repositories, and ensure that young people—regardless of their context—can narrate themselves with dignity, autonomy, and hope.
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