Media Literacy through Popular Music, AI, and Youth Cultures: A Review of We Want More: Music / Sociology!
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: The international conference We Want More: Music / Sociology!, organised by Rotterdam Popular Music Studies at Erasmus University Rotterdam on 8–10 April 2026, brought these questions into a rich interdisciplinary setting. Its programme included a Young Scholars Workshop, an opening event titled The Future Sound of Rotterdam, AI robots on stage, panels on nightlife and social justice, and sessions on audiences, platformization, inequalities, labour, education, memory, activism, and music ecosystems. Although the conference was not organised explicitly around media literacy, its themes closely intersect with current debates on digital culture and critical media engagement. As Buchan, Bhawra, and Katapally (2024) note, digital literacy has become a crucial competence for young people as digital platforms increasingly shape communication, socialization, entertainment, and education (p. 3). Popular music is central to this platformed environment, especially for young people whose cultural identities, tastes, and forms of belonging are often mediated through digital music cultures. This review reads the conference as a space where music sociology, AI, youth cultures, and media literacy can be brought into dialogue. The review follows the three-day structure of the conference and focuses on its broader conceptual contributions. It first considers the opening day through AI, speculative imagination, and nightlife as public culture. It then examines the second day through audiences, ecosystems, inequalities, and platformized music cultures. The third day is discussed through gatekeepers, nightlife, AI, and the politics of musical visibility. The final section brings these themes together to argue that popular music provides a valuable lens for rethinking media literacy in a platformed and increasingly automated cultural world.
Author: Serbes, Hüseyin
Language: English
Topic: Music History and Culture
Subfield: Music
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7166315866