Preservice Teachers Apply Critical Media Literacy To Trace The Cinematic Migration and Ideological Transformation of The Half-Breed Trope

This study examines whether preservice teachers, trained in critical media literacy and historical thinking, can apply these frameworks to trace the evolution and transformation of the racist “half-breed” trope in The Searchers (1956) and Aquaman (2018), thereby historicizing popular culture films for ideological critique.