Mediacy with Carol Arcus & Neil Andersen

Our guest Jesse Hirsh blasts traditional journalism as we try to untangle the issues: Why might the newspaper industry be the biggest culprit of all, and how can we disrupt the system through media literacy?

The people in charge of education talk a lot about children, but not so much with them. Neil and Carol chat with Sophie, an Ontario Secondary school student, to help them understand the role of technology in the social and learning experiences of youth in the time of COVID.

Neil and Carol chat with Ethan and Glenys, experts in learning, parenting, and mental health, in an effort to understand why we’re feeling like hamsters on a wheel. Surprisingly, we discover that 2020 taught us lessons that the “before times” never could.

Neil and Carol ask a thoughtful parent about the struggle to raise future digital citizens. How do we manage the balance between screentime and other experiences such as exploring and appreciating nature?

Neil, Paul, and Carol examine how this ceremony embodied the American metanarrative, and agree to disagree on what makes a perfect musical media experience these days.

Children & Screens?! What’s a parent to do? Wouldn’t it be great to have reliable, informed advice? Listen in as Neil and Carol chat with Sonia Livingstone, world expert on how families negotiate digital environments & how they can make effective choices.

Neil, Carol, and guest Paul Levinson deconstruct the bizarre intersections of social media, popular culture, and politics on Capitol Hill during the week of January 4.

Neil and Carol welcome back Julie Smith to discuss effective privacy strategies for parents and students, acknowledging that true critical media literacy is never negative, but instead develops confidence, enjoyment, and agency.

Neil, Carol, and special guest Julie Nilsson Smith ask, 'How is our privacy at risk?' 'How might WE be part of the problem?' 'What should we know?' And 'what might our media literacy do about it?'

Might Joe Biden be a new character in the JFK/Camelot meta-narrative? Or is the national story Man of la Mancha? Join Paul Levinson, Carol Arcus and Neil Anderson in this episode of Mediacy as they explore the new twists in the American national saga.

In his inimitable droll style, Bill Smart (with Neil and Carol) explores dog films - the good, the ugly, and the excellent - and asks whether a dog feature film can ever reach the heights of film artistry.

Neil and Carol - with the help of Paul Levinson - attempt to understand the Trump/Biden personas and the Pro-Trump rallies of the last week through the lens of McLuhan’s “hot” and “cool” media.

Neil, Carol, and Paul Levinson explore how metanarratives have shaped politics in America, and speculate on whether Joe Biden can stem the Tide of Trumpism.

On this night before the US Election, Neil and Carol welcome Paul Levinson back to dissect the American metanarrative. Will 'Reality TV’ triumph? Or Biden's ‘hero against all odds’?

“Neil and Carol continue their conversation with three smart educators - Diana Maliszewski, Chelsea Attwell, and June Lee - about negotiating virtual and face-to-face learning spaces through media literacy education.”

Diana Maliszewski, Chelsea Attwell, and June Lee chat with Neil and Carol about the stress of the ‘new normal’, and how media literacy might help us cope.

Carol and Neil welcome special guest Laurie Townshend to help understand how different audiences negotiated the debating skills of Black, South Asian female vice-presidential candidate, Kamala Harris.

Carol Arcus and Neil Anderson take a look at the recent US Presidential Debate and, in particular, how the media has handled the event. A look ahead to the Vice-Presidential debates.

Following on the previous episode - Unmasking the Mask - Neil and Carol welcome special guest teacher Irene Faiz from Toronto District School Board to share creative classroom ideas for building media literacy and art skills through masks. She offers wonderful examples of how to mobilize key media concepts through analysis, personal response, and engaging production projects such as mask logos, bi...

Jesse Stommel and Sean Michael Morris are passionate in their work around critical digital pedagogies. Together, they wrote "An Urgency of Teachers: the Work of Critical Digital Pedagogy. Tonight on Mediacy, Jesse and Sean join Carol Arcus and Neil Anderson for a discussion on synchronous and asynchronous learning in our post-COVID learning contexts. Some very powerful messages for anyone tasked w...

Carol Arcus and Neil Andersen are joined by McLuhan scholar (Fordham University), Paul Levinson, to explore the media under our skin. How do video, street painting, dashcams, bodycams, flash grenades narrate our experience?

Carol and Neil are joined by Fordham University media scholar Paul Levinson to discuss how mourners and news are Constructing an Epic, how the George Floyd narrative has evolved into police reform, and how the protests have become international.

Neil Andersen, Carol Arcus and Paul Levinson take a deeper look at interwoven narratives during this powerful time in social and political life. In this epsiode, the team explores memes, iconography, the giddy Bible, taking a knee, the NFL pivot, and more.

In this episode, Paul Levinson, Carol Arcus and Neil Andersen explore ways in which the George Floyd murder protests and the Covid-19 pandemic twist and turn around one another. This conversation will continue in the next episode.