Photovoice is a method for grassroots social action that uses photography to advocate for social change. Photovoice is also an active way to perform a community assessment that depends on community participation. By putting cameras in the hands of community members they are able to show policy makers and other professionals what they think is important in their community and what they think needs to change.
Photovoice has three main goals: (1) to enable people to record and reflect their community’s strengths and concerns; (2) to promote critical dialogue and knowledge about personal and community issues through group discussions focused on the photographs; and (3) to reach policy makers (from PhotoVoice at www.photovoice.com).
January-March 2008: In partnership with Sonia Manhas, Multnomah County Health Department, and Angie Mejia (a Portland State University sociology graduate student who facilitated the process in Spanish), a PSU Senior Capstone team worked to provide technical support for the parents participating in this project from Clarendon/Portsmouth and James John Schools.
One of the challenges faced by photovoice as a method of social change is participant safety. Participants may feel unsafe taking pictures of areas in their community where they want to see change (i.e. gang activity, absentee landlord problems). Participants are trained never to enter a location or put themselves into an unsafe situation. In addition, an ability to take pictures of areas of interest may be compromised as consent is required in photovoice methodology (particularly with regards to taking pictures of individuals).
Nonetheless, the photovoice method provides a way to break down cultural and language barriers as it enables communities to use the power of images to
tell their stories. Each photo in the slideshow is accompanied with a caption written by the community members that provides more
details on why they feel this photo captures what they feel is important.
The additional pages in this website provide a point-and-click map (showing the location of the various photos) and some fun walking maps that can be downloaded.
Photovoice is a method for grassroots social action that uses photography to advocate for social change. Photovoice is also an active way to perform a community assessment that depends on community participation. By putting cameras in the hands of community members they are able to show policy makers and other professionals what they think is important in their community and what they think needs to change.
Photovoice has three main goals: (1) to enable people to record and reflect their community’s strengths and concerns; (2) to promote critical dialogue and knowledge about personal and community issues through group discussions focused on the photographs; and (3) to reach policy makers (from PhotoVoice at www.photovoice.com).
January-March 2008: In partnership with Sonia Manhas, Multnomah County Health Department, and Angie Mejia (a Portland State University sociology graduate student who facilitated the process in Spanish), a PSU Senior Capstone team worked to provide technical support for the parents participating in this project from Clarendon/Portsmouth and James John Schools.
One of the challenges faced by photovoice as a method of social change is participant safety. Participants may feel unsafe taking pictures of areas in their community where they want to see change (i.e. gang activity, absentee landlord problems). Participants are trained never to enter a location or put themselves into an unsafe situation. In addition, an ability to take pictures of areas of interest may be compromised as consent is required in photovoice methodology (particularly with regards to taking pictures of individuals).
Nonetheless, the photovoice method provides a way to break down cultural and language barriers as it enables communities to use the power of images to tell their stories. Each photo in the slideshow is accompanied with a caption written by the community members that provides more details on why they feel this photo captures what they feel is important.
The additional pages in this website provide a point-and-click map (showing the location of the various photos) and some fun walking maps that can be downloaded.
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