What the Fact?
Finding the Truth in All the Noise
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
From acclaimed writer, journalist, and physician Dr. Seema Yasmin comes a “savvy, accessible, and critical” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) book about the importance of media literacy, fact-based reporting, and the ability to discern truth from lies.
What is a fact? What are reliable sources? What is news? What is fake news? How can anyone make sense of it anymore? Well, we have to. As conspiracy theories and online hoaxes increasingly become a part of our national discourse and “truth” itself is being questioned, it has never been more vital to build the discernment necessary to tell fact from fiction, and media literacy has never been more important.
In this accessible guide, Dr. Seema Yasmin, an award-winning journalist, scientist, medical professional, and professor, traces the spread of misinformation and disinformation through our fast-moving media landscape and teaches young readers the skills that will help them identify and counter poorly-sourced clickbait and misleading headlines.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Journalist Yasmin (If God Is a Virus, for adults) effectively explores contemporary media literacy's barriers and how to overcome them in this eye-opening work told via contagion and vaccine metaphor. "Information spreads from one person to another, just like a virus," the author writes in an introductory essay. What follows is a "navigation guide for the treacherous terrains of Bias, the craggy mountains of Groupthink, and the slippery ravines of Disinformation," containing allegorical boosters needed to prevent disinformation infection. A chapter titled "Bias, Beliefs, and Why We Fall for BS" explains how brains process media and why they cling to biases; another, "News, Noise, and Nonsense," uses Iraq War coverage to demonstrate how purportedly unbiased news outlets can influence a person's perception of events depending on where—and when—information is dispensed. Insightful sidebars detailing how ideas are spread, along with photos and social media screenshots illustrating the dangers of groupthink, accompany approachable prose. In a time when "social media holds the power to radicalize people" or even cause death, as in the case of widespread misinformative Covid remedies, Yasmin encourages readers to "BS-proof our brain" in this conversation-starting handbook. Ages 12–up.
