Literacy, Technology, and Media

Over the years, the notion of literacy has progressively expanded from a narrow definition identifying it with a set of psycholinguistic skills to a wider understanding of its semantic content linking it to the particular sociocultural contexts within which literacy is practiced. In this expanding process media and technology have played a pivotal role. Indeed, literacy is now largely considered as an expressive form no longer and is linked not only to paper but also to the media and digital landscape of the new electronic communication environments, where new practices of meaning‐making are taking shape. The increasingly widespread use of terms like “media literacy” or, more recently, “digital literacy” reflects this evolution and calls for a better understanding of their meaning, particularly focusing on their differences and similarities as well as their potential contaminations.