This special issue of the Nordic Journal of Digital Literacy focuses on young people’s production of moving image work in Europe. Introduced by Øystein Gilje and Brit Svoen, it situates the edition in the tradition of media literacy research work, especially in the UK, Scandinavia and the US, over the last three decades, and highlights discussions of policy opportunities in Europe, critiques of the notion of digital literacy, and cultural contexts for young people’s film-making. Gilje and Svoen say:

“The essays in this special issue frame engagement in cultures of digital and analogue production over three decades. In this way we provide a time span where cultures of moving images have undergone radical changes in regard to technology. This development has implications well beyond accessibility and the changing practices of production.”

The journal is open access, and can be found here.

Among the essays is one by DARE members Mark Reid and Andrew Burn. This is the first report, effectively, on the EC-commissioned study of Film Literacy in Europe, and provides a summary of key findings from the report which will be published in early 2013. The title and abstract for this article are as follows:

Screening Literacy: Reflecting on Models of Film Education in Europe

This article, building on an extensive summary of the European-scale Experts’ Study on film literacy in Europe 2012, draws attention to two different conceptions of film education: as an (a) entitlement for all, a social good (akin to the entitlement to universal literacy) and as (b) an instrumental means of developing film consumers, or audiences. Based upon a large survey of film education across 32 European countries, the authors give the context of film literacy in Europe three perspectives: (1) The established practice of film educators across all sectors in the member states; (2) the wider arguments about film culture and its importance; and (3) the relation between film literacy and media literacy, especially in the context of the EC’s media literacy initiative. We also reflect at the end on the relation between film education and the affordances, limitations and misconceptions surrounding digital technologies.