Chapter 9: Learning About Social Justice Through Social Media: A Review of the Literature

The influence of social media on the knowledge, attitudes, and identities of young people is a growing field. Existing evidence on how social media is used in PK–12 education, teacher education, and undergraduate classroom spaces cuts across traditional academic fields and can therefore be difficult to locate and organize. Given that young people spend a great deal of their lives online, understanding how conceptualizations of social justice, equity, and oppression are circulating in digital spaces is important for equity-oriented educators. This chapter reports on a systematic review of the literature that sits at the intersection of social justice learning and development and social media engagement. Patterns from the literature demonstrate that this scholarship is occurring across academic fields and in both formal and informal educational settings. Thematic analysis reveals both affordances and tensions of using social media to explore social justice concepts.