Yet We Live, Strive, and Succeed: Using Photovoice to Understand Community Members’ Experiences of Justice, Safety, Hope, and Racial Equity

Abstract

Residents' experiences provide rich insight into the factors that drive widening social and health disparities, and those experiences are not homogeneous. Only through attending to people's lived experiences will society begin to see these as issues of the entire community, and only by engaging residents in the process of community change can the kinds of change that are needed ever be achieved. Photovoice is a participatory qualitative research method that gives voice to participants' experiences and perspectives while simultaneously facilitating critical consciousness-raising for social action and social change. This study employed a Photovoice process to explore experiences and perspectives of residents and people working in organizations that serve West Louisville, and to facilitate dialogue and action leading to social change. Forty-three individuals across eight groups completed the Photovoice project, representing youth, older adults, LGBTQ people, faith leaders, educators, activists, and two groups of Black men. Analysis of photos and group dialogue within and across the eight groups identified several common themes that pointed at the historical and present structural racism in the community, the city's lack of concern for the Black community, the importance of Black history, and the need for collective community action. The public Photovoice exhibit helped inform the subsequent agenda for the city's Center for Health Equity.

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

“…Researchers report different ways in which the taking of photographs by participants is facilitated. In some cases, participants use their own phones (Irby et al, 2018); while in others, they are provided with a digital camera (Finholt et al, 2010;Gravina et al, 2020;Musoke et al, 2016); a disposable camera (Mayfield-Johnson et al, 2014;McKernan et al, 2019); or given the option to use any of the three (Wendel et al, 2019). The researchers will typically direct participants about the number of photos they should take (Cooper et al, 2017;Musoke et al, 2016), and in all but the most "low-participation studies" (Catalani & Minkler, 2010), participants will also be involved in the selection of the photos to be used for further discussion and analysis (Musoke et al, 2016).…”

“…As much as the ultimate goal of a photovoice study may be conceived as seeking to promote social change at the community or policy level (Sanon et al, 2014; Wendel et al, 2019), most such research actually only succeeds in creating change at the level of the individual (Sanon et al, 2014). This change can manifest in the form of enhanced awareness (Sanon et al, 2014); increased knowledge of a subject (Mayfield-Johnson et al, 2014); partnership development; and an increased sense of agency (Cooper et al, 2017; Irby et al, 2018; Musoke et al, 2016); inspiring critical thinking and broadening perspectives (O’Donovan et al, 2020); and reducing participants’ sense of their own helplessness (Carlson et al, 2006).…”

What about Using Photovoice for Health and Safety?

“…Further process steps for Action, Societal change and Evaluation [11] are included in the process design after dissemination of the findings. Here it is all about social problems, e.g., in a neighbourhood, cultural-or ethnic community, and taking action for improvements with and to the benefit of the entire community [17,34,39,40,63,75,92,110,111,126,[176][177][178][179][180][181][182][183][184][185][186][187][188]. Safety improvement relies on each of the workers embracing safe conduct instructions and reporting unsafe situations and near misses.…”

Photovoice as a Multilevel Tool for Gender and Sexual Identity Exploration

“…Focusing on the mezzo level, many studies portrayed how participating in a PV project encouraged participants to reflect on how their individual identities corresponded to the values and social norms within the larger community. Many studies portrayed how engaging with PV method encouraged the participants to examine communal aspects of sexuality (Allen, 2015; Boonzaier & Mhkize, 2018; Capous-Desyllas & Johnson-Rhoades, 2018; Fenge & Jones, 2012; Mamary et al, 2007; Payne et al, 2016; Wendel et al, 2019). Specifically, the PV participants explored the social, cultural, communal, and familial influences associated with their HIV risk and their general sexual health (Mamary et al, 2007).…”

“…Specifically, the PV participants explored the social, cultural, communal, and familial influences associated with their HIV risk and their general sexual health (Mamary et al, 2007). In other studies, the participants gained opportunities to advocate for safe physical spaces for LGBTQ youth (Wendel et al, 2019) and public affirmation of sexual and gender identities (Capous-Desyllas & Johnson-Rhoades, 2018). Another project showed how adolescents perceived and experienced sexuality within a school setting.…”