Digital Literacy is a broad term used to describe three interrelated dimensions of literate practice:
- the operational dimension includes the skills and competences that enable individuals to read and write in diverse digital media (including making meaning with and from diverse modes such as spoken and written language, static and moving images, sounds, screen design etc.);
- the cultural dimension refers to developing a repertoire of digital literacy practices in specific social and cultural contexts (such as constructing and/or maintaining effective social, educational and/or professional relationships online);
- the critical dimension recognises that meaning-making resources are selective and operate as a means of social control (e.g. knowing what Facebook is up to when it reminds you that your profile is not complete). Becoming critically literate with digital media therefore includes not simply participating competently in digital literacy practices but also developing the ability to transform them actively and creatively.
It is transversal to many activities and is ‘a complex and socio-culturally sensitive issue’ (Lemos and Nascimbeni, 2016, p. 1).