Curated Resources > Media, Arts & Culture
Countless ethical challenges are reflected in media, arts, and culture: from biased framing of a news report in journalism or issues of free speech for performing artists to copyright infringement or the perpetuation of negative stereotypes.
These teaching resources look at the ways in which our understanding of mass media and communications, and their influence on culture, have on the ethical frameworks we use to process dilemmas and explore ethical challenges in media, arts, and our society more generally.
Begin by viewing the suggested videos. They introduce concepts such as fair representation, cultural relativism, and appropriation. For a deeper dive, watch the other videos to learn about the behavioral biases, such as conformity bias and ethical fading, at the root of many ethical dilemmas. These biases in particular undermine our ability to see ethical issues in our culture clearly, let alone represent them to others in arts or the media.
To prompt conversation, use the discussion questions which follow each video. Each video has teaching notes for details on the ethics concept, and (often) assignment suggestions.
Read the case studies for real-world examples of ethical challenges in artistic and cultural appropriation, cultural relativism, and journalism ethics. To dig deeper answer the case study discussion questions and sketch the ethical decision-making process outlined in each case. The case studies can start your class discussion on ethics.
To explore the resources further, watch “related” videos and read their corresponding case studies. Many of the ethics concepts covered by Ethics Unwrapped operate in tandem with each other, so the more you watch, the greater your understanding of ethical issues.