In the current day and age, objective facts have less influence on opinions and decisions than personal emotions and beliefs. Many individuals rely on their social networks to gather information thanks to social media’s ability to share information rapidly and over a much greater geographic range. However, this creates an overall false balance as people tend to seek out information that is compatible with their existing views and values. They deliberately seek out “facts” and data that specifically support their conclusions and classify any information that contradicts their beliefs as “false news.” Navigating Fake News, Alternative Facts, and Misinformation in a Post-Truth World is a collection of innovative research on human and automated methods to deter the spread of misinformation online, such as legal or policy changes, information literacy workshops, and algorithms that can detect fake news dissemination patterns in social media. While highlighting topics including source credibility, share culture, and media literacy, this book is ideally designed for social media managers, technology and software developers, IT specialists, educators, columnists, writers, editors, journalists, broadcasters, newscasters, researchers, policymakers, and students.

Talk of so-called fake news, what it is and what it isn’t, is front and center across the media landscape, with new calls for the public to acquire appropriate research and evaluation skills and become more information savvy. But none of this is new for librarians and information professionals, particularly for those who teach information literacy. Cooke, a Library Journal Mover & Shaker, believes that the current situation represents a golden opportunity for librarians to impart these important skills to patrons, regardless of their age or experience. In this Special Report, she demonstrates how. Readers will learn more about the rise of fake news, particularly those information behaviors that have perpetuated its spread;discover techniques to identify fake news, especially online; andexplore methods to help library patrons of all ages think critically about information, teaching them ways to separate fact from fiction. Information literacy is a key skill for all news consumers, and this Special Report shows how librarians can make a difference by helping patrons identify misinformation.

Did you hear that Pope Francis endorsed Trump? Or that you have to pay to perform “Happy Birthday to You” in public? How about that the Soviet Union once banned microwaves out of fear that they were spreading diseases? These are all totally true things!* Everyone is saying so. There’s a lot of weird news out there today (thanks, Internet!). But given the speed of modern media, often these stories get disseminated faster than they can be fact-checked. As Mark Twain once said, “a lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on.” (Actually, that’s been attributed to about a half-dozen different people in various publications, but still, the point remains.) In Alternative Facts, author Alex Palmer (Weird-o-pedia) collects 200 of the oddest stories he could find, ranging from history to pop culture and science, which have been disseminated over the years, whether true or not. You’ll have to flip to the back of the book to find out which ones were real and which were not; but you couldn’t be fooled that easily, right? [* Actually, just one of those things is really really true; can you guess which one?]

Navigating Post-Truth and Alternative Facts: Religion and Science as Political Theology is an edited volume that explores the critical intersection of “religion-and-science” and our contemporary political and social landscape with a tailored eye towards the epistemological and hermeneutical impact of the “post-truth society.” The rise of the post-truth society has specific importance and inherent risk for nearly all academic disciplines and researchers. When personal beliefs regarding climate change trump scientific consensus, research projects are defunded, results are hidden or undermined, and all of us are at a greater vulnerability to extreme weather patterns. When expertise itself becomes suspect, we become a nation lead by fools. When data is overcome by alternative facts and truth in any form is suspect, where is the space for religious and/or scientific scholarship? The central curiosity of this volume is “what is the role of religion and science scholarship in a post-truth society?” This text explores truth, lies, fear, populism, politics, faith, the environment, post modernity, and our shared public life.

This edited collection brings together international authors to discuss the meaning and purpose of higher education in a “post-truth” world. The editors and authors argue that notions such as “fact” and “evidence” in a post-truth era must be understood not only politically, but also socially and epistemically. The essays philosophically examine the post-truth environment and its impact on education with respect to our most basic ideas of what universities, research and education are or should be. The book brings together authors working in Australia, China, Croatia, Romania, Canada, New Zealand, Portugal, Sweden, UK and USA.

Fake News in Digital Cultures presents a new approach to understanding disinformation and misinformation in contemporary digital communication, arguing that fake news is not an alien phenomenon undertaken by bad actors, but a logical outcome of contemporary digital and popular culture.

"[Censored] should be affixed to the bulletin boards in every newsroom in America. And, perhaps, read aloud to a few publishers and television executives."--RALPH NADER The annual yearbook from Project Censored features the year's most underreported news stories, striving to unmask censorship, self-censorship, and propaganda in corporate-controlled media outlets. Featuring the top 25 most underreported stories, as voted by scholars, journalists, and activists across the country and around the world, as well as chapters exploring timely issues from the previous year with more in-depth analysis.

This encyclopedia examines the phenomenon of deception from a variety of perspectives and in a multitude of contexts. It offers readers an accessibly written and engaging resource that sheds light on when, why, and how we lie. Ironically, it seems to be a universal truth that everyone lies. From innocent "white lies" to elaborate deceptions, humans appear to be hard-wired for dishonesty. But what psychological or evolutionary purpose does lying serve? What motivates us to lie, and what effects do such lies have on those around us and on our own physiology and mental health? What are the differences between types of lies, and how do various forms of dishonesty manifest themselves in such areas as politics, advertising, and social media? And, perhaps most importantly, how can we spot liars in our everyday lives and encourage those around us—and even ourselves—to be more honest? Lies: The Science behind Deception provides a broad and multifaceted introduction to this fascinating topic. More than 175 entries address the many forms of lying, the purpose and development of such behaviors, and their consequences. It also includes practical sidebars that help readers to deal with lying and liars in their own lives.

Since the 2016 presidential election, the term fake news has become part of the national discourse. Although some have appropriated the term for political purposes, actual fake news represents an inherent threat to American democracy given the ease through which it is consumed and shared via social media. This book is one of the first of its kind to address the implications of fake news for the K–12 classroom. It explores what fake news is, why students are susceptible to believing it, and how they can learn to identify it. Leading civic education scholars use a psychoanalytic lens to unpack why fake news is effective and to show educators how they can teach their students to be critical consumers of the political media they encounter. The authors also link these ideas to the broader task of civic education and critical engagement in the democratic process. “Inside this book you will find descriptions of simple lessons practiced by experts that can help make students more critical news consumers.” —From the Foreword by Rebecca Klein, HuffPost “One of the notable strengths of this book is its emphasis on concrete approaches to help students protect themselves and the larger democracy from the insidious influence of fake news.” —Diana Hess, University of Wisconsin–Madison “This book is both an important contribution to social studies education and a timely response to the demands of our current political moment.” —John Rogers, Institute for Democracy, Education, and Access, UCLA

This book examines the history of the legal discourse around political falsehood and its future in the wake of the 2012 US Supreme Court decision in US v. Alvarez through communication law, political philosophy, and communication theory perspectives. As US v. Alvarez confirmed First Amendment protection for lies, Robert N. Spicer addresses how the ramifications of that decision function by looking at statutory and judicial handling of First Amendment protection for political deception. Illustrating how commercial speech is regulated but political speech is not, Spicer evaluates the role of deception in politics and its consequences for democracy in a contemporary political environment where political personalities, partisan media, and dark money donors bend the truth and abuse the virtue of free expression.