If the state of Canada's democracy doesn't already reduce you to tears, it will once you get your hands on Mark Bourrie's latest book, Kill the Messengers: Stephen Harper's Assault on Your Right to Know. This book would be worth the time under any circumstances; in an election year, it's absolutely essential reading.

In Media Ecosystem, Antonio Lopez examines how participatory media can draw an end to the 'world system' of the Industrial-Scientific Revolution and supplant it with a much needed Sustainability Revolution.

Media Ecosystem is an Evolver Editions 'Manifesto Series' and it reads as such, tackling head-on the colonial capitalist neoliberal worldview and system that is destroying our world. I read it as something of a change from his previous Mediacology book where he expressed the opinion that "critical pessimists" hinder the development of good working media literacy.

This weekend rabble.ca and other independent media in Vancouver will gather to celebrate Media Democracy Day. At the event, citizens, artists, activists, scholars, policy-makers, journalists, and community leaders will participate in a dialogue about the state of Canadian media.

At Media Democracy Day, author and film scholar, Dr. Peter Steven, will be featured on a plenary with rabble.ca founder, Judy Rebick and communication scholar, Dr. Sut Jhally.

Feeling Canadian, by academic and filmmaker Marusya Bociurkiw, explores the impact of television and corporate culture on Canadian identity.

Bociurkiw's book is not organized as a linear argument aimed at proving a thesis, however. Instead, she examines specific "traumatic points" in televised Canadian history. The cultural artifacts and traumatic points studied include the television shows A People's History of Canada and Loving Spoonfuls, the Molson Canadian television commercial "The Rant" featuring Joe Canadian and Pierre Trudeau's funeral. She studies these shows in order to determine how much the elusive Canadian identity is simply a product of commercial culture.