Wasko, JanetGuldin, Rachel2022-10-042022-10-042022-10-04https://hdl.handle.net/1794/27554In the wake of the 2016 and 2020 U.S. presidential elections and the COVID-19 pandemic, increasing public attention has been paid to the ability of citizens to use and understand news media, information, and digital technology. Conversations about media literacy—the ability to critically engage with media—are ongoing in the press, schools, and state and federal governments. Most media literacy scholars agree that media literacy is an integral part of an informed and healthy democracy. Yet not all media literacy approaches are the same, and some scholars suggest that mainstream approaches may re-create antidemocratic systems and ideologies. What does it mean when the tools intended to support a healthy democracy reinforce systems of oppression?A case study of the News Literacy Project (NLP), a nonpartisan, nonprofit education organization, was used to explore this question by examining how ideologies of racism and neoliberal capitalism are perpetuated or challenged in the resources and curriculum created and disseminated by NLP, which positions itself as a leader in news literacy education. Within a theoretical framework of critical political economy of communication, curriculum theory, and Critical Race Theory, NLP as an organization and its Checkology® curriculum were analyzed to understand how ideologies of racism and neoliberal capitalism are replicated or rejected in this curriculum. NLP depends on corporate and philanthropic funding from both media and nonmedia industries and uses the standards of the professional news industry to define its approach to news literacy education. The Checkology® 101 curriculum, a default set of news literacy lessons available through an online portal, reflects ideologies of neoliberal capitalism through its atomized and individualistic structure, limited critiques of the news industry’s economic structures, and language centered on individualism and consumerism. The curriculum also reflects ideologies of racism, which appear to be the unintentional result of reliance on liberal ideals such as aspirations for neutrality, universality, objectivity, and unbiased truth, that manifest in stereotyping, decontextualized information, and incomplete storytelling.en-USAll Rights Reserved.critical media literacy educationcritical political economy of communicationCritical Race Theorycurriculum theorynews literacyElectronic Thesis or Dissertation