Professor Michael Dezuanni is a digital media and learning researcher with national standing in the field of media literacy education and as a scholar of children’s participation on digital platforms. As Chief Investigator in the Connected and Educated Child programs, Michael’s work focuses on the commercialisation of childhood, personal relationships in online environments and media literacy. He hopes that his work will lead to new understandings about digital childhoods and generate evidence that will positively inform conversations, policy and practice on children’s formal and informal learnings with digital media.

Michael brings to the Centre experience as Chief Investigator on five ARC Linkage projects that focussed on digital literacy and learning at school, the use of digital games in the classroom, digital inclusion in regional and rural Australia, the use of screen content in formal and informal learning, and digital inclusion in low-income families. He is currently a Program Leader for Digital Inclusion and Participation at QUT’s Digital Media Research Centre. In 2020, Michael published a book with MIT Press on how YouTube’s popular Let’s Play videos created by Minecraft players offer opportunities for learning.

Earliest digital memory
Whiling away hours playing Space Invaders at the local corner store, the only place a kid could play arcade games in rural 1970s Australia.