Part 1 - Reflective Blog
The issue with tackling such a question as a historian is the almost privileged perspective of well hopefully being aware of what critical thinking and what historically sound sources are, but thinking on the average persons ability to see past misinformation is hard to gauge. In an ideal situation I would be thinking of the new generation of kids entering middle school now who are still learning and absorbing information through their parents and school, with a strong push from teachers and hopefully family members to emphasize the importance of questioning sources of information that is seen online.
With the challenges of algorithms, emotionally targeted sources, and influencers or celebrities who can post whatever they want coming off as a trusted source of information is the major challenge, like these health and fitness influencers that appear on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok promoting some product they are paid to propagate to vulnerable and hopeful people. I believe the challenge is just in being able to have trusted sources especially when it pertains to history, because the President Of the United States himself rewrites history as he sees fit, so how do we challenge misinformation coming from the government.
I would use YouTube videos such as those from WIRED on YouTube that get academic professionals in certain fields, or actual university professors to answer questions in the video, like a historian answering historical questions on fascism, with their citations in the video description. Unfortunately, I am negative on the media literacy aspect in society currently, as even those who are educated and one would expect to be intellectually sound in sussing out misinformation, still fall victim to it.
Part 2 - Digital History Review
The video I chose is the “History Professor Answers Dictator Questions | Tech Support | WIRED” where professor and authoritarianism scholar Ruth Ben-Ghiat answers questions relating to the subject. What I find incredibly strong about this form of media is the aspect of the professional/expert answering questions from regular people who submitted even the most basic questions as “what is a dictator?” with the expert in a very earnest manner answering these questions in a very digestible and entertaining manner. They do not speak down to the audience and truly attempt to give a nuanced and well obviously historically grounded answers, focusing on as the title suggests on dictators, fascists, and how, why, when, situations arise where these bad actors come to power.
Professor Ruth uses historical images in their responses which helps drastically in maximizing the benefits of the format of YouTube videos, like the use of historical political cartoons of Hitler and Stalin when answering what Tyrants have in common. Also I like how since she is supposed to actually be answering questions given on these numerous different media platforms such as, Reddit, Quora, Twitter, and more, they provide the written response which is far more brief than the long and detailed explanation she gives when answering the question, allowing for a more digestible and quick summary of historical information if needed.
I would say this is a very strong format as it comes off as very personal in the manner in which these experts in the videos answer the questions from numerous platforms, in a very digestible, academically grounded and bi-partisan manner, also since the source is very credible, but of course they themselves would urge you to check the information if you had doubts. I would say a weakness of this format is if you do not want to listen to a professional speak about one specific topic or well time period it can be not engaging, but that can be argued about most things. I would say that from my own experience I listen to these videos almost as if a podcast, the fact that it is in video format with the occasional images is not pertinent in the way which I connect and am focused on the video and what it wants to present.
I would say this is still my favourite form of historical videos because I trust the sources and I enjoy the how the range of questions they answer range from very rudimentary and beginner to very complex and more nuanced in nature, such as how dictators continue in power amid mass unpopularity. There could of course be misinformation and potential bias, but that is up to the viewer to judge, and if so I would expect the audience to call it out in the comment section, that might sound a bit hopeful in nature but I find that the a good percentage of the people who watch these videos are somewhat intellectually inclined. This is due to the other videos on economics, science, politics, and other topics that most people would have to go out of their way to search for.