Rapid Photovoice as a Close-Up, Emancipatory Methodology in Student Experience Research: The Case of the Student Movement Violence and Wellbeing Study

Abstract

In this paper, we critically reflect on our conceptualization and operationalization of “rapid photovoice” as a close-up, emancipatory, action research methodology which has multiple, intersecting social-justice goals; and consider the methodology’s potential for helping to achieve such goals. We first consider photovoice in relation to its typical use in public health research, as well as in prior research into student experiences of higher education. We then consider our pragmatic redesign of the methodology as rapid photovoice (RPV), which we conceptualized in response to the goals, parameters, and constraints inherent in our project, which studied student movement violence and wellbeing. In the third part of the article, we describe and discuss our operationalization of RPV in this study on four university campuses in South Africa. In the fourth section, we reflect on some of the ethical considerations arising from the topic and the methodology. In the final section of the article, we critically assess the interim outcomes of our use of RPV in terms of (1) psychologically empowering students to reflect on traumatic experiences in a safe space and enhancing their self-awareness of wellbeing, wellbeing resources and coping strategies; (2) the politically emancipatory potential of photovoice to represent student experiences authentically and with immediacy to higher education policy role-players, and (3) its ability to co-create artifacts of collective memory that provide authentic empirical material for making trustworthy knowledge claims.

Photovoice: An active learning tool with community nursing students

“…In the same vein, Luescher et al. (2021) proposed a photovoice activity in which undergraduate health and social science students reflected on issues of violence and well‐being issues, and Woods‐Jaeger et al. (2020), with health equity issues.…”

“…This is in line with the findings of Christensen´s et al (2020) and Wass et al (2019), who explore the opinion of social science students after an educational photovoice activity, as well as Andina's research (2020), who assessed the perceptions of nursing students after a photovoice activity.Students explained that photovoice helped them to develop critical reflection on social and health inequities, to become aware of reality and to appreciate how privileged they were during the pandemic. In the same vein,Luescher et al (2021) proposed a photovoice activity in which undergraduate health and social science students reflected on issues of violence and well-being issues, and Woods-Jaeger et al…”

Perspectives of youth in Ireland on school-based mental health and suicide prevention: the MYSTORY study

“…Despite the unavoidable impact of power in our research, we believe that our rigorous methodology ensures that power biases were kept to a minimum. Similar to previous studies, our study design was constrained within parameters governed by (lack of) funding ( Pincock and Jones, 2020 ; Luescher et al , 2021 ), resulting in aspects of MYSTORY which could not pragmatically involve young people.…”

The dance of the positives and negatives of life: Student wellbeing in the context of #FeesMustFall-related violence

“…This is because participants deliberate on and relay their community's concerns to expose for instance social problems and push for transformation (Sutton-Brown 2020). We adapted this methodology to work with student participants on their campus sites over the course of several days in a way that we describe elsewhere in detail as "rapid photovoice" (Luescher et al 2021).…”

“…Using RPV still enabled us to critically examine students' experiences in relation to power as well as their interests, while it also fostered trust in the course of the research (see Luescher et al 2021). Moreover, the three-day intensive series of workshops were preceded and followed by continuous engagement with the student participants especially in order to build a good rapport ahead of the workshops and to collectively present the students' concerns and advocating together for change afterwards.…”