This presentation reviews current perspectives on the Media and Information Literacy (MIL) of ageing populations including socio-economic contexts, countering ageism, empowering older people, and the prospects for citywide strategies to support older people’s MIL. The focus of the presentation is on mechanisms to estimate what life is like for older people in a city, including the concept of a lifestyle check, and how that can be applied to Webber & Johnston’s (2019) #AFMIL (Age-Friendly MIL) City model. This model draws on international guidelines and reports including UNESCO (2019).
Ageing remains an international concern (World Health Organization (WHO), 2021; European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, 2022). A common theme is that older people’s access to rights and services have been compromised by the pandemic, requiring renewed action to protect those rights. For example England’s Centre for Ageing Better (2022b) provides evidence that COVID19 has exacerbated longer-term negative trends for older people in employment and housing, with implications for health and social care. In response, the Centre for Ageing Better (2022b) produced a guide for developing local ‘State of Ageing’ reports for use by local authorities, voluntary groups, and community leaders. The guide utilises the WHO’s (2017) eight domains of community life, one of which is Information and Communication, and draws on work in Leeds (Centre for Ageing Better, 2021).
Scotland’s Common Weal has produced an overview of population ageing in the Scottish context (Johnston & Dalzell, 2021) considering factors such as neoliberalism, demographics, ageism, pensions, housing, employment, and health. They propose a lifestyle check, which can be implemented across society to give people greater control of their ageing process. This strategy includes reliance on good MIL. However, for example, in Glasgow’s (2022) Strategic Plan 2022-27 issues relating to population ageing, including MIL opportunities, must be teased out from broader socio-economic policy and value statements. This is a challenge to prioritisation of MIL at city level.
We will draw on the #AFMIL City model, Johnston &Dalzell’s (2021) lifestyle check, the work by the Centre for Ageing Better and the Leeds and Glasgow eqalities outcomes examples to (1) critique indicators of a MIL City (Yanaze & Chibas, 2020) which neglect older people, and (2) propose more positive ways of enabling older people, and city authorities, to audit a city’s response to MIL, and to develop more creative age-friendly media and information literate environments.
References
- Centre for Ageing Better. (2021). The state of ageing in Leeds: What life is like for people aged 50 and over in Leeds. Retrieved 19 January, 2023 from https://ageing-better.org.uk/resources/the-state-of-ageing-in-leeds
- Centre for Ageing Better. (2022a). Guide: Developing a local ‘State of Ageing’ report. London: The Centre for Ageing Better.
- Centre for Ageing Better. (2022b). State of ageing report 2022. London: The Centre for Ageing Better.
- European Union Agency for Fundamental rights. (2022) Social rights and equality in the light of the recovery from the COVID19 pandemic. Retrieved 19 January, 2023 from https://fra. europa.eu/en/publication/2022/fundamental-rights-report-2022
- Glasgow City Council. (2022). Strategic plan 2022 to 2027. Retrieved 19 January, 2023 from https://www.gsastrategicplan.co.uk/
- Johnston, B., & Dalzell, C. (2021). All of our futures: Scotland’s ageing population and what to do about it 2021-2045. Glasgow: Common Weal.
- UNESCO. (2019). Global framework for media and information literacy cities (MIL Cities). Paris: UNESCO.
- Webber, S., & Johnston, B. (2019). The age-friendly media and information literate #AFMIL city: Combining policies and strategies for ageing populations in media and information rich societies. Journal of Information Literacy, 13(2), 276–291.
- World Health Organization. (2021). Global report on ageism. Geneva: WHO.
- World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe. (2017). Age-friendly environments in Europe. Copenhagen: WHO.
- Yanaze, M., & Chibás, F. (2020). From smart cities to MIL cities. Retrieved 19 January, 2023 from https://www.academia.edu/43369259/FROM_SMART_CITIES_TO_MIL_CITIES_Metrics_inspired_by_the_vision_of_UNESCO
Sheila Webber1, Bill Johnston2
1University of Sheffield, UK; 2Formerly University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland, UK
English 
French