Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education 3031257448, 9783031257445

Table of contents :
Contents
List of Figures
Chapter 1: Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education
References
Chapter 2: “Reimagining Education” in the Current Neoliberal Era: Creative Visual Methods for Social Change
Disturbing Neoliberal Governmentality: Beyond “Urban Schools” as “Data Plantations”
Inquiry Paradigms: from Positivism to Constructivism to a “Visual Turn” Within Critical, Participatory, Cooperative Research Paradigms
Positivism/Post-positivism
Interpretative/Constructivist
Beyond Words: A “Visual Turn” Within Critical Theory and Participatory/Cooperative Paradigms
“Other” Ways of Seeing Education: Beyond Words-Driven Qualitative Research
References
Chapter 3: Entanglement: Theory, Visual Methodology, and Intersectionality
Entanglement of Theory and Visual Methodology
Intersectionality: Storytelling and Counter-Visualities
References
Chapter 4: Photo-Elicitation to Amplify and Elevate the Voices of Research Participants
A Brief History
From Classic Photo-Elicitation to “Reflexive Photography” and “Auto-Driven Photo-Elicitation”
Photo-Elicitation: Grounding the Voices of Participants from Minoritized Groups in Their Own Cultural Knowledge and Contexts
Photo-Elicitation to Create “Visual Encounters” in Education: “Can the Subaltern Speak?”
References
Chapter 5: Participatory Visual Research for Community Empowerment and Social Change: Photovoice, Visual Diary, Photojournalism, and Fotonovela
Empowerment, Ownership, and Imagination for Social Change
Photo Diary, Video Diary, Photojournalism, Photovoice, and Fotonovela
Participatory Visual Methods for Humanizing Research
References
Chapter 6: Visual Ethnography of Decolonization from “Salvage Ethnography” to the “Ethnographic Turn”
Toward More Embodied and Multisensory Visual Ethnography for Cultural Transformation
“Collaborative Seeing” with Hard-to-Reach Communities
Cultural Probes to Decolonize Context and Culture
References
Chapter 7: Drawing as a Research Tool of Child Empowerment
The New Paradigm of Childhood
From Adult-Centric Methodologies to Child-Centered Methodologies: Drawing
Cautions and Limitations
References
Chapter 8: Dismantling “Remain in Mexico” at the Crossroads: Intersectionality, Counter-Story, and Un Nuevo Mundo Art Exhibition
But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish): Intersectionality Lens
A Counter-Story of Migration: Un Nuevo Mundo
References
Chapter 9: Visual Research Ethics: Dilemmas, Judgment, and Ethics of Care
Visual Ethics: Key Principles and Guidelines
Key Issues in Visual Ethics
A Situated Approach to Visual Research Ethics
References
Chapter 10: Conclusion
Index

Citation preview

Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education Laura Azzarito

Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education “Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education by Laura Azzarito is a tour de force, a wonderful collection that advances social justice through visual, participatory, non-procedural and decolonial methods conducted with ‘at risk’ participants towards education for social change! A go to text for all working in education!”

—Maggie O’Neill, Professor of Sociology & Criminology at University College Cork, UK “Laura Azzarito has opened up a new space in the research literature. There are many books about visual research methods, and a growing collection of diverse studies that involve the use of visual media, but this book steps beyond methods and techniques to place the visual as central to social action.”

—Rob Walker, Emeritus Professor, University of East Anglia, UK

Laura Azzarito

Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education

Laura Azzarito Columbia University New York, NY, USA

ISBN 978-3-031-25744-5    ISBN 978-3-031-25745-2 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG, part of Springer Nature 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: © coldsun777 This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

To my daughter, Vivien Rose Azzarito-Thompson With love, Tua mamma

Contents

1 Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education  1 2 “Reimagining  Education” in the Current Neoliberal Era: Creative Visual Methods for Social Change 19 3 Entanglement:  Theory, Visual Methodology, and Intersectionality 39 4 Photo-Elicitation  to Amplify and Elevate the Voices of Research Participants 55 5 Participatory  Visual Research for Community Empowerment and Social Change: Photovoice, Visual Diary, Photojournalism, and Fotonovela 75 6 Visual  Ethnography of Decolonization from “Salvage Ethnography” to the “Ethnographic Turn” 97 7 Drawing as a Research Tool of Child Empowerment119 8 Dismantling  “Remain in Mexico” at the Crossroads: Intersectionality, Counter-­Story, and Un Nuevo Mundo Art Exhibition135 9 Visual  Research Ethics: Dilemmas, Judgment, and Ethics of Care153

vii

viii 

Contents

10 Conclusion167 Index173

List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Fig. 1.2 Fig. 1.3 Fig. 1.4 Fig. 1.5 Fig. 2.1 Fig. 2.2 Fig. 3.1 Fig. 3.2 Fig. 3.3 Fig. 3.4 Fig. 3.5 Fig. 6.1 Fig. 6.2 Fig. 7.1 Fig. 7.2 Fig. 8.1 Fig. 8.2

PROTEST, June 2020. Printed with permission from Tricia Ward 2 PROTEST, June 2020. Printed with permission from Tricia Ward 3 BLACK LIVES MATTER, NYC, 2021. Author’s photo 4 BLACK LIVES MATTER, NYC, 2021. Author’s photo 5 WALKING IN NEIGHBORHOOD, 2021. Author’s photo 6 CREATIVITY, 2021. Visit to the Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC: Jennifer Packer, “The eye is not satisfied with seeing.” Author’s photo 22 INQUIRY AIMS: From Positivist to Constructivism to a “Visual Turn” within Critical Theory, Participatory, Cooperative Research Paradigms32 ENTANGLEMENT, 2021, Visit to the Botanic Garden, Bronx, NYC: Yayoi Kusama, “Cosmic Nature.” Author’s photo 42 ENTANGLEMENT, 2022. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew43 COUNTER-VISUALITIES, 2021. Frederick Douglass, Murals, New Bedford, MA. Author’s photos 44 COUNTER-VISUALITIES, 2021. Frederick Douglass, Murals, New Bedford, MA. Author’s photos 45 COUNTER-VISUALITIES, 2021. Frederick Douglass, Murals, New Bedford, MA. Author’s photos 46 BEING THERE, 2016. Frogner Park in Oslo, Gustav Vigeland’s sculptures. (Source: Author’s photo) 104 BEING THERE, 2016. Frogner Park in Oslo, Gustav Vigeland’s sculptures. (Source: Author’s photo) 105 CLIMATE (IN)JUSTICE. My daughter’s vision of climate injustice. (Source: Author’s photo) 125 CLIMATE (IN)JUSTICE. My daughter’s vision of climate justice. (Source: Author’s photo) 126 PORTHOLES. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew 136 BUT YOU DON’T LOOK MEXICAN (LATINA & JEWISH), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew 140

ix

x 

List of Figures

Fig. 8.3

A NEW WORLD/UN NUEVO MUNDO, 2022. Gorse Mill Exhibition poster. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew Fig. 8.4 (a, b, c) PORTHOLES (close-up), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew Fig. 8.5 BOLSITAS de INMIGRACION (IMMIGRATION BAGS), 2022. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew Fig. 8.6 (a) TALIT con MOLE (closed), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew. (b) TALIT con MOLE (open), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew Fig. 8.7 EL BABERITO de BOBE (Bobe’s Apron), 2022. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew Fig. 9.1 A DELICATE BALANCE, 2021. Author’s birthplace, Canelli, Italy. Author’s photo Fig. 9.2 A DELICATE BALANCE, 2021. Author’s photo Fig. 10.1 Social justice and education, 2021. (Source: Author’s photo) Fig. 10.2 Social change, 2021. (Source: Author’s photo) Fig. 10.3 Social change, 2021. (Source: Author’s photo)

143 145 146 146 147 163 164 168 170 171

CHAPTER 1

Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education

Recent images of protests worldwide have captured the ongoing struggle for social justice in the US and in other countries around the world. In the US, the #BlackLivesMatter movement has been at the forefront as many marginalized voices have raised serious concerns about racism, violence, LGTBQIA+ human rights, and inequalities. Since 2013, #BlackLivesMatter has created a visible and needed socio-educational and political space for asserting a social justice agenda. Parallel to #BlackLivesMatter, the recent COVID-19 pandemic and its devastating consequences and disproportionate effects on people from historically oppressed groups have exacerbated social inequalities, further underscoring the urgent need to embrace and sustain a social justice agenda. In the past few years, the “Remain in Mexico” policy has also intensified the anti-­immigrant rhetoric, increasing discrimination, racism, violence, and fears of asylum seekers and refugees. Around the world, vulnerable and disadvantaged communities are disproportionally impacted by climate injustice but climate (in)justice remains an underdeveloped research topic. Decolonizing education, at-risk communities, and schools is an urgent enterprise. In light of these recent events and to advance diversity, inclusion, and equity in an increasingly homogenized neoliberal world, research and research methods also need to be decolonized. Today’s current climate calls for researchers, artists, educators, activists, and graduate students in the social sciences across disciplines, to explore, embrace, and conceptualize innovative research methods for social justice and social change in education. Against neoliberal narratives that work to depoliticize a social justice agenda, current research in social science calls for decolonizing and humanizing research methods to valorize, recognize, re-center, and represent voicelessness. Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education is inspired by images of protests, social justice movements, and human rights activists crying out about the need for equality, representation, recognition of difference, and

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_1

1

2 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 1.1  PROTEST, June 2020. Printed with permission from Tricia Ward

reimagining of “communities of risk” for social change (Figs. 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, and 1.5). When research is conducted with, for, and about marginalized identities and oppressed, minoritized, and underrepresented groups, the incorporation of images in research processes can decolonize research and research methods and thus mobilize social justice–oriented research for reimagining a more equitable, inclusive, and peaceful world. Against today’s neoliberal imperatives and the effects of “shrinking the world” that only benefit the new global economies, current academic trends in the social sciences foreground socio-cultural research models of difference, equity, and social justice. As Fraser (2010) noted, “adopting the one-size-fits-­ all research approach framed by the current neoliberal global times, forecloses the possibility that different issues of social justice require different frames or scales of justice” (p. 64). In this vein, social science committed to social change calls for interdisciplinary research projects using a wide range of research methods that are decolonizing and humanizing and thus can value, legitimate, and represent people from marginalized groups in meaningful, creative, and contextualized ways. In the past two decades, the emergence of social justice research has provided an alternative paradigmatic position to dominant post-­ positivist research paradigms and, in particular, has worked to counteract the production of Western forms of knowledge for “money-making activities” (Sikes, 2006, p. 350). The current pervasive commercial discourse driven by

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

3

Fig. 1.2  PROTEST, June 2020. Printed with permission from Tricia Ward

today’s neoliberal imperatives implicitly sustains homogenization, the Othering process, and, dangerously, the invisibility and intactness of Whiteness (KoroLjungberg & Mazzei, 2012). As MacLure (2003, p. 3) pointed out, “Othering” is a “pervasive concern in contemporary research.” Against neoliberal models of research that perpetuate “Othering,” binaries, decontextualized research, and (over)simplified knowledge claims, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education celebrates a “visual turn,” moving toward a “more visually literate (social) science” (Pauwels, 2000), underlying the potential of visual research to re-center, value, and incorporate subjugated knowledge for social change (Aydarova, 2019; Cridland-Hughes et al., 2019; Walls & Holquist, 2019). To shed light on the “Othering” process and subjugation of marginalized, LGTBQIA+, Black, Indigenous or First Nation People, American Indian, Maori, Hawaiians, and Latinx people, the advancement of social justice scholarship for all people aims to acknowledge, reveal, and represent different worldviews, multiple subject positions, the material impact on inequalities, and alternative realities and experiences from the dominant, normative White ones.

4 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 1.3  BLACK LIVES MATTER, NYC, 2021. Author’s photo

When the visual is merged into the social justice paradigm, visual research for social justice has the potential to make room for underrepresented groups of people; to legitimate and empower marginalized identities that have traditionally been alienated and invisible in Western epistemologies; to foster an interdisciplinary understanding of social issues for appreciating more diverse meanings, cultural practices, and ways of expressing knowledge; and to enable marginalized voices to represent meaningful counter-narratives or counter-­ stories for social change (Luttrell, 2016, 2019; Mitchell, 2015; Mitchell et al., 2017; Mitchell & De Lange, 2011; Trafi-Prats, 2009). To interrogate, analyze, and theorize about social justice, incorporating images throughout the research process as primary sources of data might offer powerful tools for revealing inequalities, looking at social problems through different lenses, producing alternative worldviews, and envisioning new ways of seeing the world in more democratic ways. Images can be powerful tools for social justice (Rose, 2016). Images are polysemic: they have agency, “the ability to produce multiple meaning” (Schwartz, 1989, p. 119). Images can provide powerful representations of structural inequalities. Images can represent powerful counter-narratives in persuasive ways as a means of social change (Azzarito, 2016, 2019). Images can transcend academic boundaries, reaching out to the public by sharing research findings with real people in their own communities through participatory dissemination (Azzarito & Kirk, 2013; Yang, 2015).

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

5

Fig. 1.4  BLACK LIVES MATTER, NYC, 2021. Author’s photo

This book also draws attention to how visual methods advance emancipatory research projects and interdisciplinary knowledge-building in the social sciences, reorienting the social justice agenda toward visual-centric investigations of structural racism, the master narrative of Whiteness, and dominant discourses of normativity informed by the intersectionality of gender/sex, social class, (dis)ability, religion, and race. This book thus aims to provide a range of qualitative visual research tools to invoke different stories, voices, embodiments, and experiences of social inequalities with the pedagogical intent to counter-narrate Western forms of knowledge, values, and cultures. As those images of protests and struggles reveal (Figs. 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, and 1.5), there

6 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 1.5  WALKING IN NEIGHBORHOOD, 2021. Author’s photo

is a need for innovative, decolonizing, and humanizing research methods that can make visible invisible frames of Whiteness; assumptions of gender/sex, race, social class, religion, and (dis)ability and the intersectionality of these social categories; and homogeneous (mis)representations of normative social models, problematizing issues of representation, structural racism, dominant canons, and fixed and categorical ways of seeing the social world. Institutionalized systems of oppression at both micro and macro levels have real and serious material effects on the daily lives of people from historically marginalized and oppressed groups (Delgrado, 2000; Solorzano & Yosso, 2002; Yosso, 2005). Race, racism, gender/sex, (dis)abilities, religion, and social class, and the visual structure that supports each social category; and the fluidity and contradictory intersectionality of those social categories call for decolonizing research methods that can interrogate, reveal, and make visible their historical and cultural constructions (Stanczak, 2007; Swartz, 2002). This book advocates for the employment of visual research methods with a commitment to social justice in education to critically examine the intersectionality of gender/sex, race, social class, and (dis)ability, highlighting complex interlocking systems of oppression and privilege while re-centering and representing voicelessness. In the past two decades, visual research methods have proliferated across disciplines in the social sciences, creating a critical space for fostering interdisciplinary conversations about social justice (Pink, 2013; Rose, 2016). Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education aims to offer a wide range of visual research methodologies for graduate students, researchers, artists, educators, and activists to move beyond a simplistic, dominant, and/or singular way of

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

7

knowing (Rose, 2016). Moreover, working toward interdisciplinary visual research projects for social change by problematizing “simplistic and mechanist approaches that rely on authority and normativity” (Koro-Ljungberg & Mazzei, 2012, p.  728) can allow researchers to move toward “unlearning oppression” (Mutua & Swadener, 2004, p.  6; Soto & Swadener, 2005). Embracing decolonizing research (Sikes, 2006) opens up possibilities for attempting to capture the complexity of ways of seeing the social world (Berger, 1972) with more democratizing ambitions. With this in mind, the book builds upon and expands current key visual method texts (Banks, 2007; Luttrell, 2019; Mitchell et al., 2017; Pink, 2013; Prosser, 2006; Rose, 2016; Thompson, 2008), providing a vital resource for education researchers, activist/researchers, artists, and graduate students committed to a social justice agenda with interdisciplinary perspectives. According to Rose (2016), moving beyond simplistic, normative, and singular ways of knowing, visual research methods informed by critical theoretical models of visual analysis reject disciplinary barriers and hierarchies, calling for new interdisciplinary strategies of interpretation. In line with Rose (2016), critical visual analysis and theorizing reject disciplinary boundaries and hierarchies and call for new interdisciplinary strategies of interpretation (Pink, 2013), welcoming the framing of multiple realities and social models of difference that might capture the complexity of ways of seeing the social world for social change. By supporting mutualistic and interdisciplinary knowledge-building, the book hopes to move beyond the academic wall to reach out to the public space, engaging policymakers, practitioners, and journalists and considering community sites of dissemination for social change (Finley, 2008). Acknowledging visual methods as methodologies always in process (Pink, 2013) or “methodologies as always becoming” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1994, p. 5), the book is pedagogical as well. Just like traditional researchers driven by number of words, visual researchers and students need methodological options, choices, and approaches to consider to make appropriate decisions about how to best address their research problems with carefully designed research plans. Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education can also help graduate students and researchers who are often at loss when trying to understand how to conceptualize, use, and analyze visual images incorporated throughout the research process as primary sources of data and are seeking to understand how to make sound methodological decisions. The book offers visual approaches for qualitative researchers, activists, artists, educators, and graduate students that can help them consider methodological choices and make decisions that best fit their research interests. Providing a wide range of options for conducting visual inquiries thoughtfully, the text serves as a pedagogical guide to qualitative researchers and graduate students in identifying the most appropriate visual research method(s) to address their research questions. From visual ethnography of decolonization, to photo-elicitation, drawing, visual storytelling, photo documentary, critical arts-based inquiry, and Participatory Action Research (PAR), including fotonovelas, photo diaries, photojournalism, and

8 

L. AZZARITO

photovoice—they can guide visual researchers in making informed, sound, and thoughtful decisions about the most appropriate visual approach to use. These types of research methodologies reflect the wide range of approaches to visual research that are most currently and frequently used across disciplines in the social sciences. Learning about various visual research methods with an explicit emphasis on social justice can further assist researchers and graduate students in conceptualizing, identifying, and conducting the entire process of visual research, from building up a review of literature, to conceptualizing a problem, to writing up the research questions, to planning the methodological procedures, to collecting visual data, to conducting the data analysis and theoretical interpretations, and to reporting the results for social change. Sound methodological steps are crucial in research design and need to be carefully, reflectively, and rigorously planned and explained. A sound visual research design is at the heart of a thoughtful and rigorous study that can contribute to a social justice– oriented social science committed to decolonized forms of research that value and validate human rights, equality, and equity. A summary of each chapter is included below. Each chapter will include two to four author-produced photos to creatively capture and represent its pedagogical aims. Drawing from a critical theory paradigm, social justice–oriented visual research aims to explore and represent the voices, experiences, and practices of individuals from underserved and marginalized groups (Aydarova, 2019). This is especially important in today’s globalized neoliberal world, as ongoing omission, exclusion, and/or misrepresentation of the “Other” and neoliberal ways of seeing and understanding the world maintain the epistemological production and reproduction of normative forms of Western knowledge. Chapter 1 considers the relationships among neoliberalism, social justice paradigms, and visual research methods in education for social change. Like other visual researchers’ positions (Banks, 2007; Finley, 2008; Gauntlett & Holzwarth, 2006; Luttrell, 2016; Pink, 2013; Prosser, 2006), the chapter rejects the notion of using the visual in research as a simple account or record of “reality”; rather, the chapter makes a case for the integration of visual texts as the primary source of data in visual research and, thus, for the use of visual data as a medium through which new knowledge for social change is generated. This first chapter draws from a social justice research paradigm to advocate for visual research and research methods to critically examine, reveal, and destabilize the relationships among globalization, schooling, Whiteness, and the “Other.” When the visual researcher seeks to understand the human experience from a social justice paradigm ontologically, epistemologically, and methodologically, the inquiry is informed by multiple realities, multiple layers, and critical theories. From a social justice paradigm, Western “normative” ways of seeing the world are not “natural” but socially constructed, embedded in Whiteness, and visually mediated, maintained, and normalized by the colonial gaze and its representation of “Otherness.” The chapter concludes by advocating for the centrality of visual research that employs decolonized methodologies from a social justice–oriented research paradigm to de-center Western epistemologies,

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

9

to democratize and humanize social science research, and thus to advance knowledge production from the perspective of minoritized, marginalized, and underrepresented individuals and groups—non-Western epistemologies or “Other” ways of seeing and understanding the social world. Building upon the first chapter, Chapter 2 advances the notion of “entanglement of theory and methodology” (Pink, 2013, p. 4) as key to the task of decolonizing research in education and further, discusses the usefulness of incorporating the intersectionality framework into visual research to produce counter-visualities for social change in education. Research paradigms, theories, research questions, and research methods cannot be separated, as they intertwine in their ontological, epistemological, and methodological assumptions. Visual methods are always grounded in theory, and importantly, theories underpinning visual methods frame the ways in which images are collected, used, and interpreted throughout the research process to generate new knowledge. However, considering the notion of the “appropriateness” of visual methods to address particular research aims as embedded in specific research contexts is crucial (Banks, 2007; Delgado, 2015; Pink, 2013; Prosser, 2006; Rose, 2016). While links between social justice theories and research methods are often overlooked, Chapter 2 makes a case for the importance of those theoretical and methodological alignments, explaining the need for theoretically sophisticated visual research projects for social justice. In particular, this chapter employs the intersectionality (Crenshaw, 1991) as a crucial component of CRT to suggest that this framework can be useful when visual researchers are committed to moving beyond a monovocal study and investing in counter-­ storytelling for social change (Solorzano & Yosso, 2002). Integrating “storytelling” into visual research with and for Indigenous research projects, including American Indian communities in the US, Hawaiians, Indigenous peoples of Canada, and the Maori of New Zealand (Durie, 1999; Smith, 1999; May, 1999; McCarty, 2000; McGregor, 2018; Mutua & Swadener, 2004; Wilson, 1999), has the potential to create decolonizing approaches, producing powerful counter-visualities (Mirzoeff, 2001). To enable individuals from marginalized groups to “speak up” about relevant research topics, Chapter 3 maintains that the researcher’s use of photo-­ elicitation in the interview process can offer useful methodological tools to amplify individuals’ voices from marginalized and minoritized groups, affording an enabling space for exploring the complex ways in which research participants construct, make sense of, and represent inequalities they experience in their daily lives. Photo-elicitation is a widely used visual method across disciplines in the social sciences (Rose, 2016). Photo-elicitation is employed in the research interview and includes a number of photos assembled by the researcher and/or created by the research participants to stimulate the interview conversation. Harper (2002) defines photo-elicitation as the incorporation of photographs into the interview process to trigger the dialogue between the participant and researcher. Chapter 3 hopes to accomplish three aims. Drawing from relevant visual studies (Blinn & Harris, 1991; Clark-Ibanez, 2004, 2007; Croghan

10 

L. AZZARITO

et al., 2008; Katzew & Azzarito, 2013; Keller et al., 2008; Mannay, 2010), the chapter first suggests that photo-elicitation recalls the intimate dimension of the self in relation to society, shedding light on hidden aspects of identities. Photo-elicitation offers a visual vehicle of representation of research participants’ memories, struggles, thoughts, and feelings that are often either hidden and/or unconscious. Further, the chapter discusses the potential of photo-­ elicitation to create a “visual plan” (Clark-Ibanez, 2007) through which research participants’ agency is mobilized, and thus, research participants’ “voices” are enabled and elevated in personal and meaningful ways that words or oral-driven data cannot provide (Rose, 2016). Complicating the notion of voice as “authoritative,” “critical,” and therapeutic” (Young, 2015), drawing from postcolonialism, the chapter further engages with the question “can the subaltern speak?” (Spivak, 2006, p. 62). This last section theorizes that photo-­ elicitation interviews not only mobilize the agency of the “subaltern” but might also create a visual infrastructure from which the voice of the subaltern can be restored and legitimated (Azzarito, 2016; Restler & Luttrell, 2018). While Spivak (1993) recognizes that the subaltern’s voice is never separate from but always dependent on the dominant mainstream culture, the use of photo-elicitation might shed light on and disturb the subjectification process that often prevents the “subaltern” from seeing her/his subjectification to the oppressor as a racialized, gendered, disabled, classed identity. While conventional research methods under the guise of “objectivity” and “neutrality” continues to silence and distort epistemologies of minoritized groups, Chapter 4 discusses how participatory visual methodologies (PVMs), in line with the aims of participatory action research (PAR), address issues of social justice, focusing on the experiences, voices, and actions of marginalized groups not from a deficit position but as a source of strength (Mitchell, 2015; Mitchell & De Lange, 2011). Inspired by Paulo Freire’s groundbreaking philosophy of education, PAR is a qualitative approach used by activists and researchers in action research projects with the specific intent of empowering participants to address social inequalities (Rose, 2016). Shifting from words-­ driven PAR to more visual-centric approaches to action research, participatory visual research (PVR) uses photos, documentaries, films, and other visual texts as primary sources of data to invoke and represent stories, experiences, and ideas for social change from the perspectives of research participants with the specific aim of contributing to community and policy change (Finney & Rishbeth, 2006; McIntyre, 2003; Packard, 2008; Wenger, 1999). PVR shifts the ownership of the research process over to the research participants, destabilizes the hierarchical relationship between the researcher and participants, and positions both participants and the researcher as visual co-researchers. Listening to community members is a key factor in the successful establishment of a community agenda and programs for social change. Moving away from deficit paradigms, PVMs embrace an asset-focused approach as an engaging research practice for building a strong, trusting, positive relationship with co-­ researchers, sharing efforts to address localized manifestations of injustices, and

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

11

strengthening the social conditions of community members’ lives. PVMs can foster successful, supportive, and positive relationships among co-researchers, creating a space for visual co-researchers to make decisions with regard to the aims of the visual inquiry, the methodological steps, and their representation (Young, 2015, p. 311). In the process of self-generating images for inquiry, learning, and empowerment, members of a community positioned as co-­ researchers take a collaborative approach to research, investigate problems, and identify solutions. This is also true for innovative research methods (i.e., social media in visual research), as they can potentially create virtual platforms for investigations of online cultures, social engagement, and social inequalities (Literat, 2013, 2014; 2020; Liou & Literat, 2020). Chapter 4 first emphasizes that the transformative aspect of PVMs often results in the co-researchers changing and making public unjust power relations embedded in specific social situations to enhance social change (Mitchell, 2015). The chapter then provides an overview of different methodological approaches to PVMs, from photovoice to photo diary to photojournalism, to fotonovela, suggesting they are useful when participants as co-researchers investigate hidden social relations and issues troubling them in their communities (Azzarito & Lee, in press; Aldridge, 2007; Baker & Wang, 2006; Barrett, 2004, 2008; Becker, 1967; Burke, 2005; De Lange et al., 2016; Hubbard, 1991; Wang, 1999; Wang & Pies, 2004). While research participants in photovoice, fotonovela, and photodiary studies decide what story to tell, the last section of the chapter discusses how the aims and methodological procedures among the three PVM approaches differ. Nevertheless, they all have the potential to transform research participants and the social conditions in which they live. The book goes on to draw attention to how photography in ethnography is no longer used as an anthropological means of capturing “social reality” to portray cultures “different” from Western Eurocentric culture but rather employed as a methodological tool to integrate the visual into the ethnographical argument to challenge the normal/Other binary, to center and highlight research participants’ narratives and experiences, and to generate theories for social change. Chapter 5 considers visual ethnography of decolonization as a useful methodology to interrogate the “visualist bias” constructed around the culture of Western science, works against colonial essentialization, and problematizes the “authority of the anthropological voice” (Harper, 2003, p. 243). This chapter aims to explore possibilities for imaginative, critical, and meaningful use of visual ethnography for decolonizing goals. To accomplish these aims, first, Chapter 5 situates visual ethnography in the historical context of European civilization, capturing the shift from “savage ethnography” to the postmodern “ethnographic turn.” Second, the chapter suggests that to fully explore the microsociology of daily life, visual ethnography of decolonization demands that researchers extend the use of the visual as a primary source of data to other sensory forms of data, embracing multisensory and embodied methodologies for social change. The third section contends that to generate anticolonial work in the current neoliberal landscape of education, researchers’ use of visual

12 

L. AZZARITO

ethnography of decolonization needs to commit to “collaborative seeing” (Restler & Luttrell, 2018) and incorporate images in combination with other sensory modes as a crucial source of data to explore the sociocultural, political, and economic dimensions of hard-to-reach communities for social change. The conclusion of the chapter draws attention to how visual ethnography of decolonization integrates the visual as “cultural probes” (Goopy & Kassan, 2021, p.  7) into the ethnographical argument to challenge the Western normal/ Other binary with subversive imagination (Becker, 2013), placing “Otherness” in relation to culture at the heart of the research design to reimaging Otherness from a “different” frame. Adopting a sociocultural perspective, Chapter 6 first positions children’s identities as socially constructed and thus the expression and performance of their identities as a crucial source of knowledge production that can generate critical insights into their own social worlds. While glimpses into children’s viewpoints are not always possible with more traditional research methods (e.g., surveys, questionnaires, interviews), drawing allows entry into children’s worlds. By positioning children as “artists” of their own lives, drawing as a visual methodology can provide a means for self-reflection, self-expression, and communication in meaningful and contextualized ways. Chapter 6 suggests that drawing as a visual methodology is particularly useful for researching the perspectives, embodiments, and experiences of children (Leitch, 2008; Literat, 2013; Thompson, 2008). In line with the “new childhood studies” that have emerged over the past 30 years in the social sciences (James & Prout, 1990), Chapter 6 advocates for visual research with children positioned as “active agents” to challenge the traditional view of children as “passive recipients,” “immature,” and not to be taken seriously. Moreover, constructing children as having “less voice” is problematic because this assumption denies children’s agency (Pink, 2003). Shifting away from the view of children as “passive agents,” the chapter draws from the new social studies of the childhood paradigm to view children as having their own agendas, capable of providing valuable and thoughtful insights, and able to provide “expert testimony” about their experiences, lifestyles, and daily practices (Prosser & Burke, 2008; Thompson, 2008; Veale, 2005). To honor children’s views and to mobilize their agency, understanding children as “competent” beings whose views, actions, and choices are valuable is crucial. Doing so also enables children to become “artists” in their expressions of “hidden” identities and/or social inequalities. When we start positioning children as active agents in creating, expressing, and performing visual arts, visual research scholars can then begin to open up possibilities for social change. The chapter concludes by suggesting that while drawing is a particularly apt approach in research with children, education researchers need to take cautions and limitations into consideration when they implement drawing in a research setting. Embracing the powerful, inspiring, and transformative capacity of arts, Chapter 7 argues that critical arts-based exhibitions offer vital community sites for restoring and amplifying the voices of minoritized groups, activating a

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

13

transformative space for their stories to come alive, while generating counter-­ histories and counter-stories for the reimagining of education. Chapter 7 aims to demonstrate how arts-based exhibitions organized in collaboration and conjunction with research participants have the potential to generate socio-­ educational and critical sites of learning for the public in general, as well as policymakers (Delgrado, 2011; Finley, 2008); and create “sites of spectacle and display, environment that can be rich and surprising” (Hooper-Greenhill, 2007, p.  4), inviting visitors to interact with and interpret visual displays to construct knowledge and build new understandings for social justice and social change. To counter-narrate today’s majoritarian anti-immigrant narrative, Chapter 7 turns to Adriana Katzew’s artwork as a means of demonstrating the potential of critical arts-based inquiry enacted in an urban community for the recovery of subjugated knowledge. To this end, the chapter first, considers Adriana’s critical artwork But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) to attend to, explore, and stage the multiple, hidden, and vulnerable aspects of her own identity from an intersectionality framework and, second, offers a glimpse into Adriana’s Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition as a way of exemplifying the powerful and transformative capacity of arts-based exhibitions as critical sites of public pedagogy for social justice. Thinking about the wide range and complexity of visual methodologies for social justice in education, the book then suggests that visual researchers need to consider visual research ethically. To this end, Chapter 8 emphasizes that visual research ethics is a rapidly changing field of study and needs to be considered dynamic, contextual (Becker, 1998), and at times contested (Wiles et al., 2011). In particular, for social justice researchers, visual ethics calls for an ethics of care (Clark, 2012; Clark et al., 2010; Mauthner et al., 2002; Prosser & Wiles, 2010), careful judgment, prudence, and reflexivity (Rose, 2016) throughout the entire research process. Chapter 8 first provides an overview of principles, practices, dilemmas, and ethics of care that inform visual research ethics. While laying out key principles or guidelines for visual ethics (ESRC, 2015; Papademas & IVSA, 2009), the chapter also considers some challenges for ethical practices associated with visual research, in particular around issues of informed consent, anonymity, confidentiality, and sites for dissemination of findings. The chapter goes on to consider ongoing central debates on whether— in contrast to ethical practices and regulations used for number- and/or words-­ centric research—visual research ethics should be regarded as a specialist area within visual methodologies, especially when working with people from marginalized, hidden, and vulnerable populations (Wiles et al., 2011). Many visual scholars concur that while visual ethics guidelines offer valuable principles, visual ethics within visual methodologies present unique challenges, and thus, ethical responsibility should be situated within the specific research context, the visual researcher’s moral framework (Banks, 2001; Becker, 1998; Clark et al., 2010; Dingwall, 2008; Pauwels, 2008; Prosser, 2000, 2006), and the community rights and benefits for research participants (Mitchell & de Lange, 2011). The last section of the chapter underscores that while ethics guidelines

14 

L. AZZARITO

and frameworks offer valuable principles, a situated approach to visual research ethics might help researchers consider the unique challenges of visual research with thoughtfulness, ethics of care, integrity (Banks, 2001; Becker, 1998; Clark et  al., 2010; Dingwall, 2008; Pouwels, 2008; Prosser, 2000, 2006), careful judgment, prudence, and reflexivity (Rose, 2016). The book concludes by encouraging visual researchers, activists, artists, educators, and graduate students to avoid “easy thinking” about visual methodologies and to think about visual methods not in fixed or rigid ways but with flexibility, creativity, collaborative attitudes, and visual ethics of care. It argues for the usefulness of visual research methods for advancing a social justice agenda in education and for developing new knowledge from the viewpoint of individuals from historically oppressed groups through interdisciplinary scholarly engagement. Carefully considering and weighing alternatives, options, and possibilities allow a rigorous, thoughtful, yet creative visual research design to be the heart of robust scholarship for social change and essential to interdisciplinary knowledge-building efforts for reimagining more social justice–oriented school communities and societies.

References Aldridge, J. (2007). Picture this: The use of participatory photographic research methods with people with learning disabilities. Disability & Society, 22(1), 1–17. Aydarova, E. (2019). Flipping the paradigm: Studying up and research for social justice. In K. K. Stunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for Social Justice & Equity in education (pp. 151–162). Palgrave Macmillan. Azzarito, L., & Kirk, D. (2013). Pedagogies, physical culture, and visual methods. Routledge. Azzarito, L. (2016). “Permission to speak”: A postcolonial view of racialized bodies and PE in the current context of globalization. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 87, 141–150. Azzarito, L. (2019). Social justice in globalized fitness and health: Bodies out of sight. Routledge. Baker, T., & Wang, C. (2006). Photovoice: Use of a participatory action research method to explore the chronic pain experience of adults. Qualitative Health Research, 16, 1405–1413. Banks, M. (2007). Visual methods in social research. Sage Publications. Barrett, D. (2004). Photo-documenting the needle exchange: Methods and ethics. Visual Studies, 19(2), 145–149. Becker, H. (1998). Forward: Images, ethics and organizations. In L. Gross, J. Kats, & J.  Ruby (Eds.), The moral rights of subjects in photographs, films, and television (pp. xi–xvii). Oxford University Press. Berger, J. (1972). Ways of seeing. Penguin. Blinn, L., & Harris, A. W. (1991). Combining native instant photography and photo-­ elicitation. Visual Anthropology, 4, 175–192. Burke, C. (2005). “Play in focus.” Children’s visual voice in participative research. In P. Thompson (Ed.), Doing visual research with children and young people (pp. 1–19). Routledge.

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

15

Clark, A. (2012). Visual ethics in a contemporary landscape. In S. Pink (Ed.), Advances in visual methodology (pp. 17–35). Sage. Clark, A., Prosser, J., & Wiles, R. (2010). Ethics issues in image-based research. Arts & Health, 2(1), 81–93. Clark-Ibanez, M. (2004). Framing the social world with photo-elicitation interviews. American Behavioral Scientist, 47(12), 1507–1527. Clark-Ibanez, M. (2007). Inner-city children in sharp focus: Sociology of childhood and photo-elicitation interviews. In G. C. Stanczak (Ed.), Visual research methods: Image, society, and representation (pp. 167–196). Sage. Crenshaw, K. W. (1991). Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. Stanford Law Review, 43(6), 1241–1299. Cridland-Hughes, S., Brittain, M., & Che, S. M. (2019). Using photovoice to resist colonial research paradigms. In K. K. Stunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for Social Justice & Equity in education (pp. 151–162). Palgrave Macmillan. Croghan, R., Griffin, C., Hunter, J., & Phoenix, A. (2008). Young people’s construction of the self: Notes on the use and analysis of the photo-elicitation methods. Journal of Social Research Methods, 11, 365–356. De Lange, N., Nguyen, X. T., & Nghiem, T. T. (2016). Creating dialogue on inclusion in Vietnam: Girls with disabilities exhibiting their work. Girlhood Studies, 9(1), 104–117. Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1994). What is philosophy? Columbia University Press. Delgrado, R. (2000). Storytelling for oppositionists and others: A plea for narrative. In R. Delgrado & J. Stefancic (Eds.), Critical race theory: The cutting edge (2nd ed.). Temple University Press. Delgrado, R. (2011). Rodrigo’s reconsideration: Intersectionality and the future of critical race theory. Iowa Law Review, 96, 1247–1288. Dingwall, R. (2008). The ethical case against ethical regulation in humanities and social science research. 21st Century Society: Journal of the Academy of Social Sciences, 3(1), 1–12. Economic and Social Research Council. (2015). ESRC Framework for Research Ethics. Swindon: Economic and Social Research Council. Retrieved August 26, 2020, from https://www.esrc.ac.uk/_images/framework-­for-­research-­ethics_tcm8-­33470.pdf. Finley, S. (2008). Arts-based inquiry: Performing revolutionary pedagogy. In J.  G. Knowles & A.  L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the arts in qualitative research (pp. 407–420). Sage Publications. Finney, N., & Rishbeth, C. (2006). Engaging with marginalized groups in public open space research: The potential collaboration and combined methods. Planning Theory & Practice, 7(1), 27–46. Fraser, N. (2010). Scales of justice. Reimagining political space in a globalized world. Columbia University Press. Gauntlett, D., & Holzwarth, P. (2006). Creative visual methods for exploring identities. Visual Studies, 21(1), 82–91. Harper, D. (2002). Talking about pictures: A case for photo-elicitation. Visual Studies, 17, 13–26. Harper, D. (2003). Framing photographic ethnography: A case study. Ethnography, 4, 241–266. Hubbard, J. (1991). Shooting back: A photographic view of life by homeless children. Chronicle Books.

16 

L. AZZARITO

James, A., & Prout, A. (1990). Constructing and deconstructing childhood: Contemporary issues in the sociology of childhood. Falmer Books. Katzew, A., & Azzarito, L. (2013). From media images to body narratives: Photo elicitation as a method for triggering young people’s ‘body talk’. In L.  Azzarito & D.  Kirk (Eds.), Pedagogies, physical culture, and visual methods (pp.  62–75). Routledge. Keller, C., Fleury, J., Perez, A., Ainsworth, B., & Vaughan, L. (2008). Using visual methods to uncover context. Qualitative Health Research, 18, 428–436. Koro-Ljungberg, M., & Mazzei, L. A. (2012). Problematizing methodological simplicity in qualitative research: Editor’s introduction. Qualitative Inquiry, 18(9), 728–731. Leitch, R. (2008). Creatively researching children’s narratives through images and drawings. In P. Thomson (Ed.), Doing visual research with children and young people (pp. 37–58). Routledge. Luttrell, W. (2016). Children framing childhoods and looking back. In J.  Moss & B.  Pini (Eds.), Visual research methods in educational research (pp.  172–188). Palgrave Macmillan. Luttrell, W. (2019). Children framing childhoods. Working-class kids’ visions of care. Bristol University Press. MacLure, M. (2003). Discourse in educational and social research. Open University Press. Mannay, D. (2010). Making the familiar strange: Can visual research methods render the familiar setting more perceptible? Qualitative Research, 10, 91–111. Mauthner, M., Birch, M., Jessop, J., & Miller, T. (2002). Ethics in qualitative research. Sage Publications. McIntyre, A. (2003). Through eyes of women: Photovoice and participatory research as tools for reimagining place. Gender, Place and Culture, 10(1), 47–66. Mitchell, C. (2015). Looking at showing: On the politics and pedagogy of exhibiting in community-based research and work with policy makers. Educational Research for Social Change, 4(2), 48–60. Mitchell, C., & De Lange, N. (2011). Community-based participatory video and social action in rural South Africa. In E. Margolis & L. Pauwels (Eds.), The Sage handbook of visual research methods (pp. 171–185). Sage Publications. Mitchell, C., De Lange, N., & Moletsane, R. (2017). Participatory visual methodologies. Social change, community and policy. Sage. Mutua, K., & Swadener, B.  B. (Eds.). (2004). Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts: Critical personal narrative. University Press, New York. Packard, J. (2008). ‘I’m gonna show you what it’s really like out there’: The power and limitation of participatory visual methods. Visual Studies, 23(1), 63–77. Papademas, D., & International Visual Sociology Association (IVSA). (2009). IVSA – Code of research ethics and guidelines. Visual Studies, 24, 250–257. Pauwels, L. (2000). Taking the visual turn in research and scholarly communication: Key issues in developing a more visually literate (social) science. Visual Sociology, 15, 7–14. Pauwels, L. (2008). Taking and using: Ethical issues of photographs for research purposes. Visual Communication Quarterly, 15(4), 1–16. Pink, S. (2003). Interdisciplinary agendas in visual research: Re-situating visual anthropology. Visual Studies, 18(2), 179–192. Pink, S. (2013). Dong visual ethnography. Sage. Prosser, J. (2000). The moral maze of image ethics. In H. Simons & R. Usher (Eds.), Situated ethics in education research (pp. 116–132). Routledge.

1  VISUAL METHODS FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE IN EDUCATION 

17

Prosser, J. (2006). Image-based research: A sourcebook for qualitative researchers. RoutledgeFalmer. Prosser, J., & Burke, C. (2008). Image-based educational research: Childlike perspectives. In J.  G. Knowles & A.  L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the arts in qualitative research (pp. 681–694). Sage Publications. Restler, V., & Luttrell, W. (2018). Gaze interrupted: Speaking back to stigma with visual research. In P. Alldred, F. Cullen, K. Edwards, & D. Fusco (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of youth work practice (pp. 454–469). Sage. Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies. An introduction to researching with visual methods. Sage publications. Solorzano, D. G., & Yosso, T. J. (2002). Critical race methodology: Counter-storytelling as an analytical framework for education research. Qualitative Inquiry, 8(1), 23–44. Soto, L. D., & Swadener, B. B. (Eds.). (2005). Power and voice in research with children. Peter Lang. Spivak, G. C. (1993). Outside in the teaching machine. Routledge. Spivak, G. C. (2006). Conversations with gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Seagull Books. Stanczak, G. C. (Ed.). (2007). Visual research methods: Image, society, and representation. Sage. Thompson, P. (2008). Doing visual research with children and young people. Routledge. Trafi-Prats, L. (2009). Destination Raval Sud: A visual ethnography on pedagogy, aesthetics, and the spatial experience of growing up urban. Studies in Art Education, 51(1), 6–20. Veale, A. (2005). Creative methodologies in participatory research with children. In S.  Green & D.  Hogan (Eds.), Researching Children’s experience: Approaches and methods (pp. 253–272). Sage. Walls, J., & Holquist, S. E. (2019). Through their eyes, in their worlds: Using photo-­ elicitation to amplify student voice in policy and school improvement research. In K. K. Stunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for Social Justice & Equity in education (pp. 151–162). Palgrave Macmillan. Wang, C. C., & Pies, C. A. (2004). Family, maternal, and child health through photovoice. Maternal and Child Health Journal, 8(2), 95–102. Wang, C.  W. (1999). Photovoice: A participatory action research strategy applied to women’s health. Journal of Women’s Health, 8(2), 185–192. Wiles, R., Clark, A., & Prosser, J. (2011). Visual research ethics at the crossroad. In E.  Margolis & L.  Pauwels (Eds.), The Sage handbook of visual research methods (pp. 685–706). Sage Publications. Yang, K.-H. (2015). Voice, authenticity and ethical challenges: The participatory dissemination of youth-generated visual data over social media. Visual Studies, 30(3), 309–318. Yosso, T. J. (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. Race, Ethnicity & Education, 8(1), 69–91.

CHAPTER 2

“Reimagining Education” in the Current Neoliberal Era: Creative Visual Methods for Social Change

Today’s world is becoming increasingly homogenized by neoliberal global trends. The current commercial discourse driven by neoliberal globalization legitimates research methods that are “marketable,” implicitly providing a fertile neoliberal academic context for researchers to become “victims of global simplification and purification efforts” (Koro-Ljungberg, 2012, p.  810). However, globalization is a “seen” phenomenon (Monea et  al., 2020). The ubiquity of images in people’s daily lives calls for an alternative kind of data that captures the ways people connect, communicate, and express themselves in the current globalized era. Unless informed by critical eyes that highlight the “normativities” often attached to research methods driven by neoliberalism, the framing of a research problem and the carrying out of research often result in the production of knowledge that is monocultural and reproduces the status quo. Neoliberalism has a huge impact on ways of seeing the social world, maintaining Whiteness as dominant, invisible, and normative while preserving “difference” in deficit terms. From this position, social issues at the intersection of gender/sex, social class, race, and (dis)ability continue to be overlooked and hidden by Whiteness. To counter the ongoing omission, exclusion, and/or misrepresentation of the “Other” in monocultural forms and neoliberal ways of seeing and understanding the world, there is a need to research with, about, and for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) individuals; LGTBQIA+ individuals; Latinx individuals; First Nations People; and individuals from other historically marginalized groups to bring to light alternative epistemologies. Since ways of seeing an image are often determined by what we know (Berger, 1977), images can present valuable data to shed light on the experiences of individuals from marginalized identities and to amplify and represent silenced and marginalized voices, revealing complexities, nuances, and multiplicities of knowing. The visual refers to representations such as photos, videos, drawings, collages, and media texts (Buckingham, 2009) and plays a crucial © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_2

19

20 

L. AZZARITO

role in creating, redefining, and representing culture as constantly changing but also situated in and constructed upon a specific historical contingency. Images can enable participants to think about and create representations of their own experiences in meaningful, thoughtful, and culturally relevant ways. As creative methods, visual approaches enable participants to think about themselves, their words, and their lives (Gauntlett & Holzwarth, 2006). Visual researchers employ creative visual methods as methodological approaches to gain access to particular aspects of people’s lives that might be more difficult to explore and represent with language-based methods. As an enabling methodology, a visual approach can also set up a research context for participants “to ‘re-frame’ scenarios [that] may have the potential to build children’s capacities to choose, disrupt the norm, and enact their own voice. Encouraging students’ sense of agency relates to engaging their imagination” (Powell & Serriere, 2013, p.  19). Framed within a social justice research agenda, creative visual research methods can trouble homogenization driven by neoliberal globalization, move beyond normative forms of knowledge, and thus bring to light how the “Other” students are positioned, constructed, and represented in society. As Weber (2008) noted, “images provoke action for social justice” (p. 46). The visual has the power to simultaneously promote, subvert, and confront neoliberal ideologies that implicitly serve a neocolonial aim in education. Through the lens of a social-justice-oriented research agenda, creative visual inquiries that challenge Western normative ways of seeing the world of education explore and represent the voices, experiences, and practices of individuals from underserved and marginalized groups (Aydarova, 2019). Against corporate pedagogies that leave very little educational room for many students from historically marginalized communities, this chapter critically considers the relationships among neoliberalism, social justice paradigms, and creative visual methods in education. In line with many other visual researchers’ positions (Banks, 2007; Finley, 2008; Gauntlett & Holzwarth, 2006; Luttrell, 2019; Pink, 2013), the chapter rejects the notion of using visual texts in research as a simple account or record of “reality” but rather makes a case for the integration of visual texts as the primary source of data in the research process, working as a medium through which new knowledge in education for social change is generated. In particular, first, the chapter advocates for a strategy of alliance between creative visual methods and social-justice-oriented research, investing in producing counter-visualities, participatory visual research, visual ethnographies of decolonization, multimodal texts, critical arts-based inquiries to resist the current marketization of education, and a single model of educational research. This alliance can enable scholars, students, activists, artists, and educators to critically examine, reveal, and disturb the relationships among globalization, Whiteness, and the “Other,” opening up opportunities to de-center Western epistemologies in education. Second, in response to the postmodern shift toward the globalization of visual culture and to expand on conventional research paradigms, the chapter advocates for a paradigmatic shift toward a “visual turn” within critical theory and participatory/cooperative research in

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

21

education. Infused with a critical theoretical perspective, this visual turn can then offer a broad frame for visual scientists invested in creative inquiries committed to decolonizing epistemologies: ways of seeing, knowing, and understanding the world of education from the views and experiences of individuals from historically oppressed groups. Finally, the chapter concludes by advocating for the centrality of creative visual methods that employ social-justice-­ oriented approaches to democratizing and humanizing educational research and thus to advancing knowledge production from the perspective of minoritized, marginalized, and underrepresented individuals and groups—“Other” ways of seeing and understanding.

Disturbing Neoliberal Governmentality: Beyond “Urban Schools” as “Data Plantations” Today, advancing a social justice research agenda calls for exploring, tackling, and revealing social issues hidden by the current neoliberal governance of race, (dis)ability, social class, gender/sex, and other social categories and attempting to de-center Western epistemologies and to expose silenced voices, marginalized identities, and underrepresented experiences of individuals from historically oppressed groups. Using the rhetoric of “academic underachievement” and the need to tackle the “academic gap” accompanied by the “health gap,” market-driven education implicitly reinforces deficit views of the culture of ethnic minoritized students, especially in urban schools (Azzarito, 2019). As Giroux (2005) stressed, today’s “terror of neoliberalism” in education, driven by the corporate world, increasingly positions schools as “malls or jails”: disheartening spaces where teachers are more and more “forced to get revenue for their schools by adopting market values” (p.  2). Moreover, Giroux (2005) warned: …neoliberalism has been hard on young people. The incarceration rates have soared for black and brown youth, who have become the target population in America’s ongoing and intensified war on crime. By almost all measures ranging from health care to job opportunities to getting a decent education, youth of color fare considerably worse than white youth. (p. 7)

Against corporate pedagogies that leave very little educational room for many students from historically marginalized communities, there is an urgent need for innovating research inquiries to re-center, nurture, create, and stage ideals of social justice, social change, caring, empathy, hope, and dreams. The current neoliberal educational landscape calls for innovative methodologies framed by a novel research paradigm that can insert cultural resistance into the public sphere to foster and repaint today’s education with creativity (Fig. 2.1), principles of social justice, civic engagement, cultural representation, diversity, and artistic expression. When methodologies welcome creativity, visual research has the potential to humanize, validate, honor, and express the richness and

22 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 2.1  CREATIVITY, 2021. Visit to the Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC: Jennifer Packer, “The eye is not satisfied with seeing.” Author’s photo

plurality of cultural diversity and humanity, legitimating students’ diverse cultural backgrounds, upbringings, and languages. In today’s increasingly diverse schools, re-positioning children and young people as “public citizens” in schools (Azzarito, 2019) can also create emancipatory and empowering means to move understandings, knowledges, and curricula beyond English as the dominant words-driven academic practice and as a “killer language” (Mutua & Swadener, 2004, p. 14). Embracing students’ multiple stories, voices, expressions, and counter-visualities beyond “English-centric text-based communication” (Monea et  al., 2021, p.  2) is vital to the reimagining of schools as empowering and equitable learning spaces built on a “strength-based approach” (Perso, 2012, p. 18). New modes of communication and dissemination as well as new research questions around interpretations, expressions, and counter-visualities are central to resisting Whiteness, deficit notions about students, English as the dominant language, low expectations of urban students, essentialism, and the story of Black educational inferiority in education and health (Azzarito, 2019; Douglass Horsford & Grosland, 2013). While methodological simplification can only generate the oversimplification of knowledge production

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

23

(Koro-Ljungberg, 2012, p.  808), a paradigmatic shift toward social-justice-­ oriented visual research welcomes “methodological complexity” as well as greater creativity, malleability, innovation, exploration, and fluidity with the research design. These methodological attributes of research are vital to unlocking rigid methodological techniques that aim to maintain a single model of research methods as dominant (Louth & Potter, 2017), opening up opportunities to think critically and creatively about how to counter Western epistemologies. Images intimately form the social fabric of today’s world. Images have power. The polysemic nature of images can therefore disturb the current globalized trend toward homogenization supported by “methodological reductionism in neo-liberal policy discourse” (Lather, 2006, p.  784). The ambiguity of an image invites researchers to embrace the creative use of visual methods, carefully weighing options, possibilities, and alternatives to generate sound and thoughtful designs that can complicate the neoliberal emphasis on scientific reductionism, uninformed scholarship, and the decontextualization of research and thus advance a social justice orientation in educational research. To resist neoliberal trends that privilege control and simplify research with ordered, mechanical, and sterile research approaches and promote a single model of education framed by effectiveness, accountability, and standardization, the crafting of visual methods blended in a social justice agenda can address questions raised by complex and contextualized social problems. A strategy of alliance between a social justice orientation and creative visual methods engenders a productive space for educational researchers to question and resist today’s globalized homogenization, including its emphasis on expansion and reproduction of neoliberal subjectivities (Brock & Carrigan, 2017). Moving away from using images as “appendages” to words-driven data in conventional qualitative research designs (Prosser, 1996), the incorporation of images in the research process as primary sources of data can draw attention to “neoliberal subjectivities” that have become the “global norm” in the context of the hegemonic logic of neoliberalism. Against discursive structures of neoliberal governmentality that function to depoliticize social issues in education through homogenized and normative storytelling for Western audiences, creative visual research for social change hopes to create alternative epistemologies that counter the neocolonial enterprise of neoliberalism in education. To destabilize neoliberal imperatives taken on by consumer-citizens and “marketable” research practices that solely serve economic ends, the incorporation of visual methods in education can generate credible, valid, situated data that sustains empirical representations for social change. Promoting alternative ways in schooling demands that visual researchers imagine innovating methodologies invested in social-justice-oriented research to produce anti-discriminatory research projects that can respond to this moment of neoliberal globalized governmentality to tell a “different story”: anti-racist, anti-ableist, queer, and postfeminist epistemologies through the eyes of the oppressed or colonized (Tuhiwai Smith, 1999). Creative visual inquiries for social justice embrace the process of decolonizing education and

24 

L. AZZARITO

its neoliberal research agenda, revealing neocolonial influences on current beliefs and research practices to counter the dehumanizing effects of neoliberal-­ driven “marketable” research models. In this vein, a paradigmatic shift toward visual inquiries for social-justice-oriented research opens up possibilities for using naturalistic and creative inquiries that bring to light, capture, and represent the often-hidden complexity of real-world social inequalities institutionalized in urban school contexts. While epistemological and methodological simplification does not allow for the complexity of the social world and its hidden inequalities in education to emerge, the incorporation of images throughout the research process can offer insights and different ways of seeing urban schooling, shedding light on hidden phenomena that other research methods relying on words or numbers-driven data cannot provide. The implementation of creative visual methods problematizes and contests “urban schools serving as data plantations that serve the researcher and exploit those urban communities and schools, without sustained relationship being built or reciprocal possibilities explored” (Mutua & Swadener, 2004, p. 6). At the same time, visual research can open up new possibilities for researchers, activists, students, artists, and educators to reimagine education for the public good. In the current neoliberal era, reimaging education calls for creative, alternative, and situated methodological approaches that use images as primary sources of data to convey documentations, tell stories, and offer counter-­ visualities for social justice and change (Monea et  al., 2021). This methodological shift toward visual research can also enable scholars, activists, doctoral students, and educators to enter, shed light on, and disrupt school contexts that are increasingly used as “research settings” for capitalist expansion and neocolonial enterprise, re-positioning school communities from a perspective of “cultural deficit” to a “strength-based approach” (Perso, 2012, p.  18). Drawing from the viewpoints and imaginings of lived experiences, cultural representations, identity performances, and artistic expressions of teachers, students, families, and community members from historically marginalized groups can fully acknowledge, re-center, and re-present people’s humanities, subjectivities, and identities in affirmative ways. Beyond modes of expression rooted in Whiteness and dominated by English-centric text-based communication, as Campano et al. (2015) maintained, “minoritized identities and communities provide unique and invaluable epistemic vantage points from which to understand our shared world, including how it (re)produces inequality” (p. 99). While images have been historically used as technologies of domination and colonization through Eurocentric lenses, playing a significant role in the regime of representation of the “Other,” a thoughtful, creative, and strategic use of images can also subvert, resist, and counter. This potential subversive capacity of images can trouble the neoliberal homogeneous landscape of education with a “different” picture: new epistemologies informed by “Other” ways of seeing and understanding the social world of education. When the researcher views the nature of reality as historically rooted in the imperial legacies of Western knowledge (Tuhiwai Smith, 1999), visual research plays a crucial role in the

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

25

reimagining of education and thus in the reconstruction of school curricula from the worldviews of women, BIPOC individuals, LGTBQIA+ individuals, First Nations People, and individuals from other historically marginalized groups.

Inquiry Paradigms: from Positivism to Constructivism to a “Visual Turn” Within Critical, Participatory, Cooperative Research Paradigms “Images convey” in powerful ways (Stanczak, 2007, p. 1). In an increasingly globalized era where our human experience is more visual and visualized than ever before and in response to the growing new visual technologies that permeate our daily lives, the establishment of a “visual competence” (Muller, 2008) research paradigm appears to be paramount in education. Expanding on traditional ordered qualitative narratives that follow a linear, rigid progression adopted by “orthodox qualitative researchers” (Prosser, 1996), visual research has the potential to de-center Western epistemologies and to generate an interesting, creative, and interdisciplinary scholarship for social justice and change in education. However, as Prosser (1996) maintained, “if image-based research is to attain its full potential it must go beyond being an adjunct of a larger language based ‘script’” (p. 29). When thinking about creative visual methods, however, like any other kind of research method, it is important for the inquirer to become aware of and critically examine and reflect on her/his positionality within the wide range of conventional and emerging research paradigms. Research methods—whether quantitative, qualitative, combined, or image-­ based—are always contingent on the ontological and epistemological position of the researcher. Whether researchers are aware of their own positionality within the range of research paradigms, their philosophical orientations are deeply grounded in human experiences, attitudes, and beliefs. The researcher’s beliefs, attitudes, or worldviews inform their philosophical assumptions underpinning the research topic, feeding into how the researcher conceptualizes a problem and decides to address it. Research paradigms, theories, questions, and methods cannot be separated, as they intertwine in their ontological, epistemological, and methodological assumptions. To formulate new ways of seeing, visual scientists must also examine the relationships among research paradigms, ontology, epistemology, and methods to understand how images are used throughout the research process (Pink, 2013). When a visual researcher seeks to understand the human experience from a social justice paradigm ontologically, epistemologically, and methodologically, such inquiry is informed by multiple realities, layers, and interpretations. Philosophical assumptions inform, implicitly or explicitly, consciously or unconsciously, the inquirer’s research interest, research questions, and methodological procedures. Thus, a paradigmatic frame guides the inquiry process in terms of choice of problem, theory, research context, images used

26 

L. AZZARITO

for data collection, data analysis, interpretation, and dissemination of findings. A research paradigm refers to a set of philosophical beliefs that represent the researcher’s worldview and guide the researcher ontologically, epistemologically, and methodologically. In other words, a research paradigm broadly defines the philosophical assumptions underpinning the nature of the world the researcher holds as well as the researcher’s place in it. In this vein, from a social justice perspective, Chan et al. (2019) describe a research paradigm as “the researchers’ personal philosophy and value; fit between research purpose and design; and connection across the entire process of study” (p. 60). Notably, the “basic beliefs” or values of the researcher shape the “inquirer posture” (Guba & Lincoln, 2003), impacting the inquiry process in terms of choice of paradigm to guide the research process. Shifting away from words-centric paradigms, image-based epistemological arguments are generated by the interplay of the participants’ and the researcher’s subjectivities that are bounded socially, culturally, and educationally throughout the research process. Since the 1980s, paradigm inquiry has grown tremendously, dismantling the supremacy of post-positivism with the establishment and the legitimacy of the constructivist/interpretative paradigm and, later, with the emergence of new postmodern and critical theory paradigms. In particular, the emergence of postmodern paradigms has called into question the hegemony or supremacy of one or a few paradigms that dominated the academic community in the social sciences until the 1980s, creating an intellectual space for the blurring of genres and borrowing or bricolage of different philosophical viewpoints (Guba & Lincoln, 2003). While the significant contention among paradigmatic hegemony, supremacy, and hierarchy that resulted in the “paradigm wars” characterized this academic landscape in the late 1980s (Gage, 1989), more recently, the “postmodern turn” has created an intellectual space for dialogue, commonalities, and possible confluences among research paradigms, welcoming interdisciplinary dialogues and engendering multiple viewpoints and perspectives. This recent postmodern shift has thus contributed to the collapse of categories that traditionally characterized positivism/post-positivism in opposition to constructivist/interpretative paradigms, opening up possibilities for new paradigm inquiries to emerge. For example, in the past decade, the establishment of critical theory and participatory/cooperative research paradigms has played a central role in validating and recognizing the active construction of “multiple realities” embedded in the traditional constructivist/interpretative paradigm as well as the role of human consciousness in the co-construction of knowledge, contested meanings, and the fluidity of identities for social change. As Guba and Lincoln (2003) elucidated: …in the postmodern moment, and in the wake of poststructuralism, the assumption that there is no single “truth”—that all truths are but partial truths; that the slippage between signifier and signified in linguistic and textual terms creates re-­ presentations that are only and always shadows of the actual people, events, and places; that identities are fluid rather than fixed—leads us ineluctably toward the

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

27

insight that there will be no single “conventional” paradigm to which all social scientists might ascribe in some common terms and with mutual understanding. Rather, we stand at the threshold of a history marked by multivocality, contested meanings, paradigmatic controversies, and new textual forms. (p. 212)

Nevertheless, the breakdown of rigid paradigmatic walls on the matter of legitimacy has allowed researchers in the social sciences to move beyond the stagnation of academic monovocality, expanding and building upon conventional paradigms with new research paradigms. Particularly in response to the “postmodern globalization of the visual as everyday life” (Mirzoeff, 2003, p. 3), new methodological approaches and practices have provided the basis for new paradigm inquiries to emerge. As early as the beginning of the 1990s, Prosser (1996) advocated for a “visual turn” in words-dominated qualitative research. Entering the complicated ongoing conversation about conventional and new research paradigms, in the eyes of postmodernity, visual-centric dialogues where interweaving viewpoints, voices, imaginaries, and perspectives are legitimated can be useful, rich, and theoretically heuristic and transcend academic boundaries. For the embrace of new textual forms in today’s postmodern era (Guba & Lincoln, 2003), the wealth of visual experience produced by today’s postmodern globalized culture has created both the opportunity and need for understanding the role of the visual in people’s daily lives (Mirzoeff, 2003). This postmodern shift beyond univocal research thus opens up, recognizes, and gives legitimacy to non-linguistic or non-numeric ways of knowing (Muller, 2008; Pauwels, 2000). As the need to collect and study the visual as primary sources of data in the social sciences becomes necessary in today’s globalized society (Muller, 2008), the significance of non-verbal, non-written, and non-­ numeric knowing becomes increasingly central across academic disciplines. This shift toward visual-centric ways of knowing can advance new epistemologies. Through postmodern lenses, visual inquiries call for reflective and critical engagement with social issues, interdisciplinary practices, and theory-work that can inspire social justice scholars’ imaginings and future research for social change (Pink, 2013). However, as Blumenfeld-Jones (2016) noted, different ways of understanding the world can be known only if such a way of knowing can be cultivated. Beyond the logo-centric Western culture that has traditionally privileged language (spoken and/or written) in the dominant form of research methods in social science, today’s ever-growing technologies demand the establishment of a new visual research paradigm. More and more, today’s postmodern globalized culture calls for a shift toward a “visual turn” in the ongoing paradigmatic dialogue is necessary. It is also evident that in the current postmodern era, for many researchers in education, arts-based research, sociology, psychology, health, and so on, words-­ driven data is neither relevant to their inquiry processes nor at the heart of their ways of knowing. For visual researchers, the incorporation of visual texts represents the primary source of data and understanding of the social world.

28 

L. AZZARITO

However, embracing and using images as primary textual forms in and for the inquiry process advance the need to establish “visual competence” (Muller, 2008; Pauwels, 2000). In this vein, Muller (2008) defined “visual competence” as “a new research paradigm for basic research on the production, distribution, perception, interpretation and reception of visuals, aimed at understanding visual communication processes in different social, cultural and political contexts” (p.  103). Expanding on the conventional main research paradigms (i.e., positivism/post-positivism and constructivist/interpretative), the current oculocentric Western society calls for a shift toward a “visual turn” to provide a frame for using, collecting, and interpreting the visual. This shift toward the visual can also counter current neoliberal imperatives shaping education in frightening ways. Importantly, to counter neoliberal homogenized storytelling for Western audiences (Campano et  al., 2015), moving beyond “words” as the dominant form of communication acknowledges the “visual turn” as a necessary means to shed light on the “visualist bias in the culture of Western science” (Pels, 1997). This visual turn, indeed, problematizes how images and their colonial interpretations have historically played a role in the construction of the “Other” in Western societies. Moving beyond words-­ driven epistemologies, from a social justice paradigm, Western “normative” ways of seeing the world are not “natural” or “real” but socially constructed, embedded in Eurocentric ideals, and visually mediated, maintained, and normalized by the colonial gaze and its modern enterprise to represent “Otherness.” However, exploring visual aspects of culture, identities, and social change demands a serious engagement with reflexivity throughout the research process. As Stanczak (2007) maintained, “incorporating images into these assumptions strengthens, amends, challenges, advances, and if nothing else, makes us think about our epistemological bases” (p. 9). Reflecting upon the epistemological position and its alignment with the research paradigm, theory, questions, and methods allows the inquirer to generate a clear picture of the process. While often overlooked within post-positivist research paradigms, enhancing reflexivity is critical in visual approaches dedicated to social justice-oriented inquiries. Reflexivity demands the inquirer become aware of and deal with her/ his personal history, beliefs, and upbringing. As a basic belief system, a research paradigm guides the researcher and thus determines how she/he situates her/ himself within research paradigms. This positionality, then, informs the researcher’s way of looking at a particular problem, her/his decision of what data is gathered, and how she/he goes about collecting and analyzing data. Understanding and recognizing the wide range of philosophical views informing the inquirer’s positionality can be helpful to visual inquirers for a number of reasons. First, becoming aware of the wide range of research paradigms helps visual researchers learn about the philosophical assumptions and orientations that exist in and inform the current educational research community. Second, by engaging with, reflecting upon, and addressing ontological and epistemological questions, the visual inquirer develops reflexivity, becoming conscious of her/his positionality within the wide range of research

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

29

paradigms, from conventional to new. Third, developing critical awareness around philosophical assumptions underpinning research facilitates the visual researcher’s bridge-making with other philosophical standpoints, orienting her or him toward interdisciplinary knowledge-building for social justice in education. Notably, the researcher’s positionality within the range of primary research paradigms is based on how the inquirer addresses three fundamental questions: ontological, epistemological, and methodological. The following section addresses these three key questions, first distinguishing among three main research paradigms—positivist/post-positivist, interpretative/constructivist, and the “visual turn”—and then elucidating underlying differences in their ontological, epistemological, and methodological orientations.

Positivism/Post-positivism The ontological question: What is the nature of reality? What can be known about reality? How do things really work? If the researcher views the nature of reality as a reflection of the “real word,” then what can be known is about “how things really are.” When a reality is assumed to be “out there,” to be captured with objectivity, detachment, and neutrality, the ontological posture is realism or positivism. From this ontological position, the researcher views knowledge-building as value-free. This means that the production of knowledge is not affected by the researcher’s values and beliefs. The realistic or positivist philosophical view assumes that the “real world” or “phenomenon” exists “out there,” independent from human life, interventions, perceptions, context, and cultures. The epistemological question: What is the nature of the relationship between the knower and what can be known? The ontological posture intrinsically links to the epistemological question. The ontological position informs the epistemological posture, calling for an objective or subjective relationship between the researcher and what can be known. If a researcher assumes that a “real word” exists “out there” and aims to investigate “how things really work” using quantitative research interventions, then she or he assumes an “objective detachment,” or value-free posture. To investigate “how things really are,” the researcher engages with the epistemological question by adopting an objective posture. In other words, the researcher sees the existence of a phenomenon “out there” to study with an “objective reality” or “objective empiricism.” Framed by a positivist/post-positivist research paradigm, when the epistemological posture is objective, the inquirer assumes that she/he can study the phenomenon without influencing it or being influenced by it. Permeated by objective empiricism, in the highly controlled research setting, the researcher aims to prevent the possible impact of values, attitudes, and contexts on the research outcome. The methodological question: How the researcher addresses this question is, in turn, informed by how the researcher answers the ontological and epistemological questions. If the researcher assumes that there is a “real reality” or a

30 

L. AZZARITO

“real phenomenon” “out there” to be captured with objectivity, the appropriate research methods are quantitative. Interpretative/Constructivist The ontological question: Different from a positivist stand, a constructivist paradigm is recognized as a naturalistic paradigm of inquiry, which, in turn, positions knowledge-building not as value-free but rather as affected by the researcher’s values and beliefs. In a logocentric world, the nature of reality is assumed to be co-constructed and conveyed through words and language as a fundamental expression of reality. The nature of reality is co-constructed as the result of the researcher’s dialogical exploration, connection, and interactions with the participants’ worldviews in a naturalistic research setting. Because the human experience is subjective, the naturalist inquirer views reality as co-­ constructed by the researcher and participants and the social dynamic interactions that take place in the research setting over the course of the naturalistic inquiry. The epistemological question: The premise of the objective epistemological relationship held in a positivist paradigm cannot be maintained in a constructivist, naturalistic paradigm of research. Making an epistemological break from the historically dominant positivist paradigm, researchers working in the constructivist paradigm use naturalistic inquiries to explore and understand the human experience and the complexity of the social world. Moving away from an objective posture, the constructivist research paradigm epistemologically fractures the control, neutrality, and detachment the positivist paradigm insists upon. What can be known is assumed to be intimately linked to the values of the researcher in a constructivist paradigm. In this view, the researcher recognizes the nature of the “real world” as socially constructed. In this naturalistic paradigm, the epistemological relationship between the inquirer and what can be known is subjective, which in turn fosters an interactive, intertwined, and interconnected relationship between the researcher and the phenomenon. Findings emerging from naturalistic inquiry are viewed as socially constructed, subjective, and contextualized in a historical contingency. The methodological question: If the inquirer assumes that “reality” is not “out there” to be captured objectively but rather co-constructed subjectively in a logocentric world and that the dominant forms of data and communication are written or spoken language, traditional words-driven qualitative research methods are appropriate. Beyond Words: A “Visual Turn” Within Critical Theory and Participatory/Cooperative Paradigms The ontological question: When the nature of reality is assumed to be co-­ constructed and conveyed through the power of images, a “visual turn” recognizes the nature of reality as dependent on human perception of, response to,

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

31

and interpretations of visual imageries. Insights emerging from image-based inquiries aim to reveal the worldviews of underserved and marginalized groups for social justice, with the specific intent of critiquing, deconstructing, and transforming oppressive socio-educational, political, economic, and cultural forces. Ontologically, visual researchers occupy a social-justice-oriented or decolonizing stance to shed light on subjugated knowledge, assuming that reality was constructed upon a set of colonial research ideas, practices, and privileges set up by Western imperial and colonization. This ontological posture also assumes that academic disciplines, universities, and schools have historically been colonized through Western eyes and the modern world, misrepresenting the nature of reality of the “Other” or colonized. Image-based research rooted in a social-justice-oriented and decolonized ontological stance calls for “counter-stories” to re-tell the “nature of reality” from the eyes of the “Other.” The nature of reality is not objective or simply constructed but re-­ framed from the worldview of women, BIPOC individuals, LGTBQ individuals, First Nations People, and individuals from other historically marginalized groups. The epistemological question: Moving away from the “world-as-a-text” nature of reality, the “visual turn” positions images as vehicles for eliciting, probing, and staging human constructions, representations, and subjectivities. Images invite the researcher to problematize what we know about the social world and how we know it. In particular, the ontological assumption is that visual imageries produced by imperial have historically framed the “Other’s” experience (Tuhiwai Smith, 1999) informs this epistemological stance. Adopting a subjective, critical, decolonized epistemological posture toward what can be known, the visual inquirer problematizes the Western binary construction of Other/normative and thus “sees” the existence of a phenomenon from the viewpoints of individuals from marginalized groups. The methodological question: Epistemological assumptions, in turn, inform the types of research methods researchers choose. When reality is co-­ constructed subjectively through the power of images, shifting away from a words-driven reality, the integration of visual texts as the primary source of data generates new knowledge is generated. Methodologically, using the visual in research as a simple account or record of “reality” is rejected, and the polysemic nature of images is legitimated. From this paradigmatic inquiry, to fracture the rigidity and normativity often attached to quantitative or conventional qualitative research methods (Prosser, 1996), visual methods are conceptualized as a visual methodology, embracing flexibility, reflexivity, and fluidity (Pink, 2013). Recognizing differences, possible commonalties, and confluences with respect to the ontological, epistemological, and methodological questions, Table 1 aims to illustrate the position of each main paradigm inquiry (Fig. 2.2). While no unified body of literature is representative of a visual-driven research paradigm, various features are common within different theoretical positions invested in the “transformative” potential of visual research (Romm,

32 

L. AZZARITO

POSITIVISM/POST-POSITIVISM

Inquiry Aims

While with the rise of positivist social science around the 1950s positivism only legitimated notions of “empirical objectivism,” “context stripping,” “generalization,” and “neutrality” in the production of knowledge as “absolute truth,” more recently, post-positivism has recognized that the “real world” can be captured, but only imperfectly. Knowledge is produced with imperfect “absolute truth” by verifying hypotheses and accepting knowledge as “facts” or “laws.”

INTERPRETATIVE/CONSTRUCTIVIST

Different from post-positivism, constructivism views knowledge as socially situated and thus as intimately impacted by culture, context, and human interaction. Knowledge is not viewed as “absolute truth” to be generalized but as “multiple knowledges” situated upon specific historical contingencies. Language—spoken and /or written— remains the dominant form of data as a means of communication in socioeducational research. Drawing from the notion of multiple realities coconstructed in a specific context, the production of multiple knowledges recognizes, accepts, and validates multiple views, voices, and interpretations of a specific phenomenon. As a result of complex social processes, multiple knowledges are shaped by context, social interactions, culture, and socio-educational, economic, and political factors.

A “VISUAL TURN” FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE

As a result of the rapid changes in global technologies and communication systems, there is a growing interest in using visual texts and visual data to understand the world. While Western culture has historically privileged words in ways of knowing, today’s global communication structures are rapidly shifting toward a visual-centric way of knowing. With new technologies (e.g., televison, mobile phones, social media, media, computers) ubiquitous in the postmodern globalized era, visual texts are the primary way of connecting, interacting, and communicating ways of a “visual turn” in generating ways of knowing. Grounded in social justice research paradigms, the “visual turn” legitimates knowledge as socially constructed but recognizes, re-centers, and validates the worldviews of individuals from traditionally marginalized or underserved groups.

Fig. 2.2  INQUIRY AIMS: From Positivist to Constructivism to a “Visual Turn” within Critical Theory, Participatory, Cooperative Research Paradigms

2015). In particular, the emphasis on the “visual turn” within critical theory and participatory/cooperative research paradigms creates a new space for framing and guiding the visual researcher’s inquiry process. Given the wide range of conventional and novel paradigms, however, it is important to underline that a research paradigm does not define what “good research” is but simply offers a set of philosophical standpoints that represent the researcher’s worldview and her/his place in the word. Notably, “good research” is not a question of research paradigms but depends on systematic, thorough, and thoughtful ways of collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data to address specific research questions. Good research depends on the researcher’s ability to create and implement a sound, thoughtful, and appropriate research design. In visual research, like in any other type of research method, the quality of research relies on the researcher’s ability to develop a thoughtful image-based research design, carefully considering approaches to understanding and exploring complicated aspects of the social world with creativity, reflectivity, and malleability. Thus, in addressing specific research questions, the quality of visual research depends on the researcher’s ability to develop research design creatively and thoughtfully, including collecting, analyzing, interpreting, and representing images as data throughout the research process (Prosser, 1996). However, to address particular research aims, it is crucial to draw attention to the notion of the “appropriateness” of visual methods. In particular, in line with prominent visual scholars’ positions (Banks, 2007; Pink, 2013; Prosser,

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

33

1996; Rose, 2016), the “appropriateness” of visual research methods is conceptualized into three broad categories: (a) “researcher-found visual data” (e.g., media texts, murals, graffiti), (b) “researcher-created visual data” (e.g., photos, videos), and (c) “research-participant-generated visual data” (e.g., drawings, photos, videos) (Delgado, 2015, p.  6). However, as Pink (2013) noted, these three broad categories need to be understood as flexible and malleable, with the potential to be built upon with creativity.

“Other” Ways of Seeing Education: Beyond Words-­Driven Qualitative Research In the current globalized society, the visual is essential to understanding human experience. Through visually represented forms of visual culture, meanings are constantly created, contested, and represented. As Mirzoeff (2003) maintained, “human experience is now more visual and visualized than ever before from satellite picture to medical images of the interior human body” (p. 1). While in making sense of the Western social world built upon logocentrism, qualitative research has historically privileged the spoken word as the highest form of intellectual practice (Prosser, 1996) and positioned images as “second-­ rate illustrations” of reality or ideas (Mirzoeff, 2003), today’s image-driven society calls for a shift toward visually driven texts as primary sources of data. In the Western oculocentric world, the nature of reality cannot only be defined in words, and culture cannot be simply defined in linguistic terms. The “world as a picture” has replaced the “world as a text,” marking a “visual turn” in the social sciences (Mirzoeff, 2003, p. 5). Acknowledging that the use of images is not limited to a specific research paradigm (Pauwels, 2000), however, reimagining education calls for creating and implementing arts-based inquiries and many other forms of creative visual methods, nurturing cultural and artistic encounters for social change (Azzarito & Kirk, 2013; Campano et al., 2015; Romm, 2015). Moving beyond normative Eurocentric forms of knowledge, the shift toward a “visual turn” in education, then, looks at knowledge as historically and socially produced by a Western visuality. Innovating methodologies for social justice in education calls for alternative imaginings and sensitivities, using decolonizing approaches (Sikes, 2015) to create social models of “difference” in affirmative ways, with multiple realities and alternative world views. To advance a social justice agenda in education, creative visual methods can serve as a decolonizing means of privileging, picturing, and representing “the vantage points of the colonized” (Tuhiwai Smith, 1999, p.  1); of blurring and undermining Western binaries; and of forwarding interpretative practices and epistemologies in the eyes of the colonized or the “Other’s” own research agenda in education with imagination (Fig. 2.1). Creative visual methods for social justice in education open up possibilities for innovative naturalistic inquiries and “real-world” research settings where “minoritized identities and

34 

L. AZZARITO

communities provide unique and invaluable epistemic vantage points from which to understand our shared world, including how it (re)produces inequality” (Campano et al., 2015, p. 99). Working to advance and create more diverse and humanizing research means exploring, crafting, and representing the world through the eyes of women, BIPOC individuals, LGTBQIA+ individuals, First Nations People, and individuals from other historically marginalized groups. This effort also calls for a commitment to generating creative and critical lines of inquiry to offer a space for resistance to the current neoliberal corporatization of education and thus to counter global injustice. Building upon constructivism and moving beyond words as the dominant basis for communication and qualitative methods (Banks, 2007; Finley, 2008; Gauntlett & Holzwarth, 2006; Luttrell, 2016; Prosser, 2006), importantly, the “visual turn” acknowledges the “visualist bias in the culture of Western science” (Pels, 1997), problematizing how images and their colonial interpretations have historically played a role in the construction of the “Other” in Western societies. In response to imperial and its colonial research, researchers’ use of creative visual methods for social justice in education are committed to tackling and confronting ignorance as well as racism, sexism, classism, ableism, and xenophobia, and the intersectionality of those social categories. This paradigmatic shift toward image-based research can offer a frame to guide, mobilize, and recognize the significance of the visual for de-centering cultural imageries rooted in historically constructed Western epistemologies. Embracing and representing multiple viewpoints can work to democratize and humanize educational research to counter the colonial dialectic of Western neoliberal governmentality. Images can be powerful in mobilizing decolonized research in education to advance ways of knowing from the worldview and perspective of minoritized, marginalized, and underrepresented individuals and groups. Creative visual methods for social justice in education, on the one hand, engage and invite the process of decolonization by problematizing imperial, colonialism, and postcolonialism. On the other hand, visual inquiries welcome and center “Other” ways of seeing the world creatively, implementing “Other” epistemologies and critical interpretative practices to counter neoliberal narratives. Giving more attention to creative visual research projects in education— including those produced by Blacks, Latinx, LGBTQIA+ individuals, American Indian communities in the US, Hawaiians, Indigenous peoples of Canada, and the Maori of New Zealand—highlights the potential of visual research methods as “decolonizing approaches” to producing powerful counter-visualities (Mutua & Swadener, 2004; Tuhiwai Smith, 1999). In a postmodern era where corporate institutional models have prevailed, a possible humanizing change has to come from our imagination for social justice (Mirzoeff, 2011). The ongoing social inequalities in education and health exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic call for creative methodologies to reimagine the world of education not as it is but as “how it should and could be” (Monea et al., 2021, p. 2). At a time when public education is driven by the neoliberal enterprise toward standardization, regulation, and

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

35

accountability to close the “achievement gap” parallel to the “health gap,” creative visual methods have the potential to challenge and trouble corporate pedagogies maintained by the dominant neoliberal research agenda of schooling. The visual, incorporated in the research process critically and reflectively, has the potential to shed light on subjugated knowledge and hidden social inequalities, destabilizing neoliberal power relations that are more and more institutionalized in schools. Images can open up possibilities for action and social change. Images have power. Images offer an alternative “language” of critique, questioning, and representation, opening up possibilities for human empowerment. Images can allow students, teachers, activists, artists, and educators to step into their historical and cultural contexts; present alternative, meaningful self-portraits; and reveal their own words, ideas, and agendas that often lie hidden from view creatively. Images can picture and, simultaneously, disturb neoliberal normativity and its Whiteness. As the growing interest in visual texts within the field of education challenges the conventional words-driven landscapes of schooling (Kontovourki & Siegel, 2021), reimagining the microcosms of schools can be interesting, creative, and generative for young people, educators, scholars, and activists, producing co-construction of multiple meanings, provoking new meanings, and potentially impacting and changing subjectivities. Moving “beyond words,” many visual scholars have suggested that the incorporation of creative visual methods into educational research with, about, and for marginalized groups and communities might be a powerful medium to help the researcher as well as the participants to “see,” understand, and express their own reality. Inspired by Maxine Greene’s (1995) educational philosophy, visual scholars’ effort to reimagine education in today’s neoliberal era claims the “right to look” (Mirzoeff, 2011, p. 3) with creativity for social change. Creative visual methods can provoke a new way of thinking away from the Western canon, opening up possibilities for transforming social inequalities and mainstream understandings of the world.

References Aydarova, E. (2019). Flipping the paradigm: Studying up and research for social justice. In K. K. Stunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research Methods for Social Justice & Equity in Education (pp. 151–162). Palgrave Macmillan. Azzarito, L., & Kirk, D. (2013). Pedagogies, physical culture, and visual methods. Routledge. Azzarito, L. (2019). Social justice in globalized fitness and health: Bodies out of sight. Routledge. Banks, M. (2007). Visual Methods in social research. Sage Publications. Berger, J. (1977). Ways of seeing. Penguin. Blumenfeld-Jones, D. S. (2016). The artistic process and arts-based research: A phenomenological account of practice. Qualitative Inquiry, 22(5), 322–333.

36 

L. AZZARITO

Brock, T., & Carrigan, M. (2017). Subjects or subjected? The puzzle of identity in neoliberal times. In J. Louth & M. Potter (Eds.), Edges of identity: The production of neoliberal subjectivities (pp. 134–160). University of Chester Press. Campano, G., Jacobs, K. B., & Ngo, L. (2015). A critical resource orientation to literacy assessment through a stance of solidarity. In J.  Brass & A.  Webb (Eds.), Reclaiming English Language Arts methods courses: Critical issues and challenges for teacher educators in top down times (pp. 97–108). Routledge. Chan, C. D., Steen, S., Howard, L. C., & Ali, A. I. (2019). Disentangling the complexities of queer theory and intersectionality theory: Research paradigms and insight for social justice. In K. K. Stunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research Methods for Social Justice & Equity in Education (pp. 59–70). Palgrave Macmillan. Douglass Horsford, S. D., & Grosland, T. J. (2013). Badges of inferiority. The racialization of achievement in U.S. education. In M. Lynn & A. D. Dixon (Eds.), Handbook of critical race theory in education (pp. 153–166). Routledge. Finley, S. (2008). Arts-based inquiry: Performing revolutionary pedagogy. In J. G. Knowles & A. L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the Arts in Qualitative Research (pp. 407–420). Sage Publications. Gage, N. (1989). The paradigm wars and their aftermath: A “historical” sketch of research on teaching since 1989. Educational Researcher, 18, 4–10. Gauntlett, D., & Holzwarth, P. (2006). Creative visual methods for exploring identities. Visual Studies, 21(1), 82–91. Giroux, H.  A. (2005). The terror of neoliberalism: Rethinking the significance of cultural politics. College Literature, 32(1), 1–19. Greene, M. (1995). Releasing the Imagination: Essays on Education, the Arts, and Social Change. Jossey-Bass Publishers. Guba, E. G., & Lincoln, Y. S. (2003). Competing Paradigms in Qualitative Research. In N.  K. Denzin & Y.  S. Lincoln (Eds.), The Landscape of Qualitative Research (pp. 195–220). Sage. Kontovourki, S., & Siegel, M. (2021). “B Is for Bunny”: Contested sign-making and the possibilities for performing school literacy differently. Reading Research Quarterly, 1, 1–19. Koro-Ljungberg, M. (2012). Researchers of the world, create! Qualitative Inquiry, 18(9), 808–818. Lather, P. (2006). Foucauldian scientific: Rethinking the nexus of qualitative research and educational policy analysis. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 19(6), 783–791. Louth, J., & Potter, M. (2017). Edges of identity: The production of neoliberal subjectivities. University of Chester Press. Luttrell, W. (2019). Children framing childhoods. Working-class kids’ visions of care. Bristol University Press. Mirzoeff, N. (2003). An introduction to visual culture. Routledge. Mirzoeff, N. (2011). The right to look: A counterhistory of visuality. Duke University Press. Monea, B., Andrade, J., Gonzalez, P.  I., & Pozo, M. (2021). Beyond words: Reimaginging education through art and activism. Penn GSE Perspectives on Urban Education. Source URL: https://urbanedjournal.gse.upenn.edu/archive/ volume-­1 8-­i ssue-­1 -­f all-­2 020/beyond-­w ords-­r eimagining-educationthroughart-­and-­activism. Muller, M. G. (2008). Visual competence: A new paradigm for studying visuals in the social sciences. Visual Studies, 23(2), 101–112.

2  “REIMAGINING EDUCATION” IN THE CURRENT NEOLIBERAL ERA… 

37

Mutua, K., & Swadener, B. B. (2004). Introduction. In K. Mutua & B. B. Swadener (Eds.), Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts (pp. 1–26). State University of New York Press. Pauwels, L. (2000). Taking the visual turn in research and scholarly communication key issues in developing a more visually literate (social) science. Visual Studies, 15(1), 7–14. Pels, P. (1997). The anthropology of colonialism: Culture, history, and the emergence of Western governmentality. Annual Review Anthropology, 26, 163–183. Perso, T. F. (2012). Cultural responsiveness and school education with particular focus on Australia’s First Peoples: A review & synthesis of the literature. Darwin Northern Territory. Pink, S. (2013). Doing visual ethnography. Sage Publications. Powell, K., & Serriere, S. (2013). Image-based participatory pedagogies: Reimaginging social justice. International Journal of Education & the Arts, 14(15), 1–27. Prosser, J. (1996). What constitutes an image-based qualitative methodology? Visual Studies, 11(2), 25–34. Romm, N. R. A. (2015). Reviewing the transformative paradigm: A critical systematic and relational (Indigenous) lens. Systematic Practice & Action Research, 28, 411–427. Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies. An introduction to researching with visual methods. Sage publications. Sikes, P. (2015). Decolonizing research and methodologies: Indigenous people and cross-cultural contexts. Journal of Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 14(3), 349–358. Stanczak, G. C. (2007). Visual research methods. Image, society, and representation. Sage Publications Inc.. Tuhiwai Smith, L. (1999). Decolonizing methodologies. Research and Indigenous peoples. Zed Books. Weber, S. (2008). Visual images in research. In J.  G. Knowles & A.  L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the Arts in Qualitative Research (pp. 41–53). Sage Publications.

CHAPTER 3

Entanglement: Theory, Visual Methodology, and Intersectionality

In the context of the tensions, struggles, and violence characterizing today’s Western world, researching with marginalized groups (e.g., Indigenous, First Nation people, People of Color, Aborigines, LGBTQIA+ community members, women, Latinx, poor people) while working against racisms, sexism, homophobia, ableism, anti-Asian and anti-Semitic violence, and intolerance is at the forefront of the current social justice agenda in education (Durie, 1999; Ndimande, 2004; Sallah et al., 2018). To resist current neoliberal imperatives that disregard the need to address persistent social inequalities in education (Apple, 2001), there is a need to embrace decolonizing research methodologies in education. While the task of decolonizing research is not easy, visual research for social justice can resist the acculturation of students from historically oppressed groups to white upper-class standards in education dictated by a “neoliberal and neoconservative’s agenda” (Ndimande, 2004, p. 199), countering the neoliberal homogenization of “Other” students while opening up a generative theoretical space for producing non-Western epistemologies. The goals of visual research for social justice that aims at the realization of social change intersect with theories, epistemologies, and methodologies. Visual research for social justice aims to assist education scholars who seek to problematize “White, hetero, Western identities sanctioned as ‘normative’ and seek to do ethically responsible activist research that centers the voices of minoritized populations” (Davis, 2021, p. 114). Social justice research in education not only calls for the researcher’s awareness of her/his positionality, reflexivity, and subjectivity but also demands sophisticated theory-work to embrace and sustain emancipatory, anti-racist, and decolonizing visual research projects. To this end, there is a need for visual researchers to appreciate and incorporate decolonizing theories into visual inquiries, including intersectionality as a crucial component of critical race theory (CRT), Indigenous theory, post-feminism, queer theory, and trans theory;

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_3

39

40 

L. AZZARITO

to resist and disrupt normative and colonial research paradigms; and to advance a critical dialogue in education, centering and validating the complexity and diversity of cultures. In the struggle against the oppression of minoritized communities, this chapter advocates for the importance of incorporating theoretical reflections into visual research projects in the effort to provide decolonizing, critical, and interpretative theoretical lenses through which the researcher sees, makes sense of, analyzes, and disseminates the data collected. The chapter first advances the notion of the “entanglement of theory and methodology” (Pink, 2013, p. 4) as key to the task of decolonizing visual research in education and, second, discusses the usefulness of incorporating the intersectionality framework into visual research to produce counter-visualities for social change in education.

Entanglement of Theory and Visual Methodology Research paradigms, theories, research questions, and research methods cannot be separated, as they intertwine in their ontological, epistemological, and methodological assumptions. While links between social justice theories and research methods are often overlooked, those theoretical and methodological alignments are key to producing theoretically sophisticated visual research projects for the recovery of the knowledge of marginalized groups. Visual methods are always grounded in theory, and, importantly, theories underpinning visual methods frame the ways in which images are collected, used, and interpreted throughout the research process to uncover and produce subjugated knowledge. To this end, visual research for social justice aims to provide new analytical tools, rich data sources, and greater theoretical attention, allowing the researcher to use visual methods with more malleability than conventional qualitative approaches (Stanczak, 2007). Visual methods as “methodologies” (Pink, 2013, p. 7) move beyond the notion of a single, fixed method: Methodologies are characterized by flexibility and creativity and theorized as “always becoming” (Koro-Ljungberg & Mazzei, 2012). Likewise, Fenton and Baxter (2016, p. 5) noted, Method is commonly referred to as a tool for accumulating data to be analyzed (e.g., interviews) while methodology (e.g., community-based participatory research) refers to the combination of those tools framed within a theory or concepts that guide how and why data are to be collected.

From this viewpoint, visual methodologies are open-ended, theoretically driven approaches that the researcher employs to undertake critical inquiries that demand constant invention, recrafting, and reworking of methodological procedures with creativity. Pink (2013, p. 7) further clarified, the relationship between theory and methods is important for understanding any research projects. Similarly, an awareness of the theoretical underpinnings of

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

41

visual research methods is crucial for understanding how those images and the processes through which they are created produce new ethnographic knowledge.

Concurring with Pink (2007), Prosser (1996) too underscored the importance of theory as intrinsically linked to visual methodologies and research processes, including the conceptualization, interpretation, and writing up of research findings. As Prosser (1996, p. 29) contended, we need to establish a visual methodology which stresses a framework [emphasis added] which directs and informs image-based research…we need to achieve consensus and make explicit our rationale for using images and our application of an image-based approach in the research enterprise. I see seven features as central to a visual methodology: words and images, frameworks, and context; data collection; the recording of data; interpreting images; ethics; and the research report.

The theoretical framework guides the research process, offering theoretical lenses through which the researcher makes sense of the visual data collected critically. To frame visual studies for social justice, the methodological procedures, data collection, data analysis, and findings are all intrinsically linked to theory with a clear and focused alignment. This means that an explicit alignment between research methodology and theory-work is crucial in visual research for social change. In this way, theory plays a crucial role in creating a fresh and critical perspective for the visual researcher to capture, understand, interpret, and make visible complex issues, events, people, and experiences as embedded in marginalized communities with a focus on seeking social change. As “frame-building,” theory provides a conceptual framework for the researcher to analyze, understand, and represent the experiences of individuals from marginalized groups, envisioning solutions to advance the knowledge of subjugated groups. Embracing a wide range of decolonizing theories, including for instance, intersectionality as a critical component of CRT, Indigenous theory, queer theory, post-feminism, and trans theory, visual research for social justice calls for education researchers to employ methods as methodology with “appropriateness” (Delgado, 2015, p. 6), imagination, and flexibility, blurring the lines between method and theory (Pink, 2013) to produce new knowledge from the views of individuals from marginalized groups. Working against marginalization toward justice assumes that the aims of the study as well as the methodological tools employed by the researcher to collect and analyze data (e.g., interviews, fieldwork, visual texts) are underpinned by theoretical assumptions and principles with an explicit commitment to social justice. To this end, the notion of the “appropriateness” of visual methods (Delgado, 2015, p. 6) to address particular research aims is intrinsically linked to theory-work as well. Prominent visual scholars (Banks, 2007; Delgado, 2015; Pink, 2013; Prosser, 2006; Rose, 2016) have conceptualized the appropriateness of visual methods into three broad categories: (1) “researcher-found visual data” (e.g., media texts, murals, graffiti), (2) “researcher-created visual

42 

L. AZZARITO

data” (e.g., photos, videos), and (3) “research-participant-generated visual data” (e.g., drawings, photos, videos) (Delgado, 2015, p. 6). While recognizing that the theory-work inherently links to visual methodology, Pink (2013) also suggested that these three broad categories of visual methods need to be understood as flexible and malleable, with the potential for creativity as well. With a focus on appropriateness, visual methodologies for social justice are grounded in theory, and, importantly, theories underpinning methodological approaches frame the ways in which the researcher collects, uses, and interprets images throughout the research process with the explicit aim of generating knowledge of subjugated groups. While Pink (2013) pointed out that a clear alignment of theory, research aims, research methods, and visual data is fundamental to any type of research project, theory-work is particularly important when education researchers conduct critical inquiries into relationships among layers of marginalization, exclusion, discrimination, (mis)representation, and oppression. When social justice scholars undertake visual research, the elaboration of the intimate relationship among visual methodologies, research aims, and theory is central to producing decolonized knowledge. Thus, recognizing the “entanglement of theory and methodology” (Pink, 2013, p. 4) throughout the research process with a focus on social justice (Figs. 3.1 and 3.2) is key to the task of decolonizing research in education for social change.

Fig. 3.1  ENTANGLEMENT, 2021, Visit to the Botanic Garden, Bronx, NYC: Yayoi Kusama, “Cosmic Nature.” Author’s photo

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

43

Fig. 3.2  ENTANGLEMENT, 2022. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

Visual research for social justice provides alternatives to conventional research methods to investigate, theoretically apprehend, and represent the social fabric of a specific context from the views of marginalized groups, offering new insights for understanding how to improve the lives of individuals in oppressed communities. Drawing from a strength-based approach, visual researchers invested in researching and enhancing equity and fairness in the social fabric of school communities (Romm, 2015) view decolonizing theories as key to exploring links between community, culture, identity, marginalized spaces, and places of everyday life. With a focus on humanizing research, another unique approach of theory-driven visual methodologies is to place the views, lives, and experiences of individuals from marginalized groups at the heart of the inquiry process to attend to, center, and bring to light the embodied knowledge of people from traditionally oppressed groups situated at the margins of society. In summary, the framing of theory matters to the researcher’s conceptualization of visual methodologies for a number of reasons: first, to provide a theoretical space for decolonizing the research process; second, to create perspectives to actively engage with history, place, space, marginalization, self-expression, and visual storytelling from the view of individuals from marginalized groups; third, to expose and theorize how sociocultural issues are (mis)represented and perpetuated in the local context of people’s lives; and fourth, to offer decolonizing entry points by mobilizing the agency, energies, social activism, and talents of community members in the effort to reimagine education for social change. In so doing, visual research for social justice creates theoretically framed initiatives with the specific goals of decolonization, affirmation, empowerment, and

44 

L. AZZARITO

transformation of marginalized school communities. Acknowledging the “entanglement of theory and methodology” (Pink, 2013, p. 4) as a key task of decolonizing visual research in education, the next section discusses the usefulness of incorporating intersectionality into visual research to generate countervisualities for social change (Figs. 3.3, 3.4, and 3.5).

Intersectionality: Storytelling and Counter-Visualities As a crucial component of CRT (Delgado & Stefancic, 2012), intersectionality (Crenshaw, 1991) addresses the importance of narration of lived experience and embodiment from the viewpoint of individuals from traditionally oppressed groups, providing a particularly useful framework for decolonizing research in education. Wesp et al. (2019, p. 288) clarified that intersectionality thinking originated within various women of color resistance movements from the 19th and 20th centuries, including abolitionists Maria Stewart and Sojourner Truth, and the Black feminist lesbian organization Combahee River Collective. As well, early Indigenous feminists, such as Zitkala-Sa in the late 1800s, fought against violence that has been gendered, aged, and linked to access to land.

Fig. 3.3  COUNTER-VISUALITIES, 2021. Frederick Douglass, Murals, New Bedford, MA. Author’s photos

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

45

Fig. 3.4  COUNTER-VISUALITIES, 2021. Frederick Douglass, Murals, New Bedford, MA. Author’s photos

Historically rooted in the women of color’s resistance movement, intersectionality provides a particularly useful framework for social justice researchers, educators, and activists invested in examining how multiple forms of oppression constitute one another, resulting in a “matrix of domination” (Collins, 2000). Crenshaw (1991) first used the term intersectionality in critical legal studies to expose how the intersectionality of gender/sex, race, religion, social class disability, and other social categories at both micro and macro levels, reproduces intersecting forms of oppression as well as structural injustice, discriminating against women of color. Delgado and Stefancic (2012, p. 51) explained that “intersectionality means the examination of race, sex, class, national origin, and sexual orientation and how their combinations play out in various settings.” In this vein, Kassan et al. (2020, p. 296) contended that “examining the intersectionality of people’s experiences considers multiple forms of oppression and marginality that are ascribed to people’s cultural identities and social locations through power relations in our society.” Ladson-Billings (2013, p. 39) further elaborated on intersectionality, pointing out that

46 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 3.5  COUNTER-VISUALITIES, 2021. Frederick Douglass, Murals, New Bedford, MA. Author’s photos because our society is organized along binaries, intersectionality is a difficult concept to research. We see things black or white, east or west, rich or poor, right or left. When we move into complexities of real life we recognize that we each represent multiple identities—race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, religion and many more. We perform our identities in myriad ways and can never be certain to which of those identities others react.

Like other decolonizing theories (e.g., Indigenous theory, post-feminism, queer theory, and trans theory) yet with different theoretical assumptions, intersectionality informs how the visual researcher employs images to generate valid social knowledge in education. Four tenets of intersectionality can be applied to visual methodologies for social justice. The four tenets are summarized below: 1. Intersectionality provides a theory-driven framework useful for attending to multiple intersecting forms of oppression, such as sexism, homophobia, racism, anti-Semitism, ableism, transgenderism, and classism (Wesp et  al., 2019). Visual researchers might employ intersectionality to ­critically consider how those multiple oppressions operate and intersect within a specific research context and how the intersecting forms of

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

47

oppression become institutionalized in education, perpetuating structures of oppression and domination. 2. Intersectionality offers an effective framework to interrogate and reveal how individuals from historically oppressed groups are homogenized by dominant discourses rooted in ideals of normativity and, simultaneously, marked by the process of Othering in negative terms. Incorporating intersectionality into visual research can be particularly useful for shedding light on how multiple and intersecting processes of “differentiation” (Wesp et  al., 2019, p.  289), sustained by dominant normative discourses of race at the intersection of other social categories, implicitly operate to homogenize the identity of the Other through a deficit lens. In this way, the incorporation of intersectionality into visual research disturbs homogenization, fracturing normativity upheld by social norms and addressing social disadvantages, power imbalances, and injustices. 3. To address forms of injustice, intersectionality aims to reveal how axes of difference are constituted in relation and opposition to normative social categories, maintaining in hidden ways power relations tied to racism, sexism, ableism, anti-Semitism, transgenderism, homophobia, classism, and other forms of oppression. Intersectionality critically interrogates how power relations take shape and inform the Othering of individuals from oppressed groups as having “deficits” while maintaining privilege among individuals from dominant groups. Employing intersectionality, visual researchers reveal multiple and intersecting forms of injustice, counter-narrating the “deficits” of individuals from marginalized groups while centering and representing cultural diversity from a “different” vantage point. 4. Intersectionality is a particularly useful framework for accounting for, centering, and representing the embodied knowledge of identities situated at the margins (Nash, 2010; Wesp et al., 2019). Recognizing that the embodied identity of individuals is neither stable nor fixed, Nash (2010) underscored the importance of storytelling in understanding the embodied knowledge of individuals from traditionally marginalized groups, breaking away from dominant medical, legal, and biobehavioral dominant discourses produced by “authoritative knowledge.” Regarding this fourth tenet, Wesp et al. (2019, p. 289) contended that intersectionality centers the embodied knowledge of people who experience and resist multiple intersecting oppressions. Within intersectional scholarship, embodied knowledge emphasizes and celebrates the voices, experiences, and situated knowledge and perspectives of those traditionally marginalized and erased. An intersectionality informed approach values embodied knowledge because it is essential for meeting social justice aims, including understanding how processes of oppression work and how to resist them, and requiring researchers to be accountable to people who live in the margins of society.

48 

L. AZZARITO

Because “bodies are a crucial element in personal identity formation and perception” (Nash, 2010, p. 586), through the lens of intersectionality, storytelling offers a useful methodological tool to understand how the inter-layering of gender/sexuality/race/disability/social class/religion is embodied, performed, and represented by individuals from traditionally marginalized groups. Centering embodied knowledge of marginalized identities using an intersectionality framework offers a powerful “way of giving [visual] voice to or recovering the knowledge of marginalized or subjugated groups, particularly women” (Nash, 2010, p.  585), reclaiming subjugated forms of embodied knowledge. In summary, incorporating intersectionality in visual research demands the researcher’s engagement in an ongoing image-driven dialogical relationship with participants, images, (mis)representations, and interpretations to shed light on and disrupt the process of Othering while valuing and acknowledging the embodied knowledge of the Other. Visual research framed by intersectionality has the ability to problematize Western epistemologies and to make visible how social categories of “difference” rooted in dominant ideologies of gender/sexuality, social class, disability, race, and religion demark the identity of individuals from marginalized groups as “Other” or “different,” in opposition to normative ways of being. In this way, intersectionality is helpful to legitimate the significance of centering and making visible the embodied identity of the Other to the public, producing alternative ways of knowing. As Stanczak (2007) noted, “reflexive epistemologies of visual research hold that the meaning of the images resides most significantly in the ways that participants interpret those images, rather than as some inherent property of the images themselves” (p.  11). While the myriad of images that have historically portrayed the Other in negative terms as “primitive,” “savage,” and/or “inferior” played a crucial role in the ideological construction of the colonized through the Western eye (Mirzoeff, 1999; Smith, 1999), incorporating intersectionality into visual research offers a useful framework to counter the Western construction of the Other, generating new epistemologies from the views of the colonized. Counter-Visualities. While images constructed upon “visual encounters between the civilized West and its primitive Other” (Mirzoeff, 1999, p. 133) maintained and reproduced “difference” in negative terms, an intersectionality analysis of images might shed light on the multiple axes as well as intersecting structures of domination, disrupting institutional systems that perpetuate gendered, racialized, sexist, and other intersecting dominant representations. While Pels (1997) maintained that historically, research practices were intimately linked to the regime of (mis)representation of the Other and such a visual system was crucial to the Western use of technologies of dominations and colonization, intersectionality intentionally manifests processes of differentiation or colonization. In particular, intersectionality problematizes how, in the name of scientific research, Western researchers often used a set of empirical investigation modalities to investigate “indigenous people in their struggle”

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

49

to justify the colonial dialectic of Western governmentality (Pels, 1997, p. 164). Intersectionality offers an effective framework to highlight how historically, images of the Other collected through “scientific” investigations “reflect centuries of so-called visualist bias in the culture of Western science” (Pels, 1997, p. 167), providing the Western rationale for its colonial endeavors and subjugation of Indigenous people. In this vein, Sikes (2015) noted that “the term research is inextricably linked to European imperial and colonialism” (p. 352), and images as records of reality were used as colonial practices of Western governmentality. However, images interpreted using an intersectionality framework can also work as data sources for generating counter-stories. While throughout Western history, the ideological construction of the Other took place through “visual encounters” between the “Western men” and the “Other” (Mirzoeff, 2011), visual materials analyzed from an intersectionality framework supply empirical data useful for producing alternative ways of knowing. To recover subjugated knowledge, applying intersectionality to visual research might first engender theoretical reflections for accounting for the colonial essentialization of ethnic identities and disrupting Western ways of seeing the Other and, second, generate storytelling from the viewpoint of non-­ Western epistemologies. Notably, for social justice activists, educators, artists, and visual researchers who work from an intersectionality framework, emphasizing the importance of seeking justice to critically analyze how multiple, intersecting axes of social categories reproduce oppression, storytelling (Solorzano & Yosso, 2002) is a key methodology. For instance, traditionally marginalized groups, including African Americans, Latinx, and Native Americans, have practiced storytelling historically as an important cultural tradition as well as a crucial tool of resistance and liberation (Berry, 2014; Delgado, 2011; Solorzano & Yosso, 2002). Especially for marginalized groups, as Delgado and Stefancic (2001, p. 53) noted, storytelling “provides a language to bridge the gaps in imagination and conception that give rise to the different,” reducing “alienation for members of excluded groups.” Rather than simply incorporating the data from Other people in research in ways that generate a “monovocal study,” inadvertently homogenizing, colonizing, and reproducing patterns of oppression, storytelling embraces the Other’s personal narrative as a methodological means of addressing Whiteness and its interlocking dimensions of gender/sex, race, social class, religion, and (dis)ability (Delgrado, 2000, Delgado, 2011; Munoz et al., 2017; Stanley, 2007). To challenge existing modes of scholarship beyond a mainstream or Western-driven single-sided story, the researcher’s integration of the images into storytelling can offer a useful visual research tool of resistance to a majoritarian story. As a central component of intersectionality, storytelling offers a powerful research methodology for “countering” deficit stories, opening up possibilities for generating counter-stories: new epistemologies grounded in the perspectives and experiences of historically marginalized groups (Solorzano & Yosso, 2002). Through the lens of intersectionality, visual inquiries for social justice function as counter-stories by affirming the oppressive experiences of minoritized

50 

L. AZZARITO

populations and their cultural ways of knowing to begin the transformative process through which the public’s master-narratives are challenged, dismantled, and adjusted toward common humanized goals (Souto-Manning & Winn, 2017). Applying the intersectionality framework to visual research, the researcher’s use of visual storytelling with and for non-White, Black, and Indigenous populations—including American Indian communities in the US, Hawaiians, Indigenous peoples of Canada, and the Maori of New Zealand (Durie, 1999; May, 1999; McCarty, 2000; McGregor, 2018; Mutua & Swadener, 2004; Smith, 1999; Wilson, 1999)—has the potential to produce decolonizing research in education. The integration of images into the research process plays a crucial role in opening up possibilities for visual researchers and activists to reveal the “native point of view” (Wesp et al., 2019, p. 288), representing a “counter-story.” Ladson-Billings (2013) defined a counter-story as a “contrasting story that describes the story from a different vantage point” (p. 42). In this vein, Smith (1999, p. 2) referred to counter-stories as “powerful forms of resistance which are repeated and shared across Indigenous communities.” Intersectionality situates visual inquiry as a form of counter-storytelling to disrupt the normativity attached to a master-narrative. In particular, Solorzano and Yosso (2002) defined counter-story as a “method of telling the stories of those people whose experiences are not often told…Storytelling and counter-storytelling these experiences can help strengthen traditions of social, political, and cultural survival and resistance” (p. 32). Moreover, given that intersectionality is historically rooted in women of color’s activism and their resistance movement, Mirzoeff (2011) expanded on the notion of counter-story as a form of oral history, proposing counter-­ visuality as a powerful means of resistance. According to Mirzoeff (2011, p. 25), “countervisuality is the assertion of the right to look, challenging the law that sustains visuality’s authority in order to justify its own sense of right” (Figs. 3.3, 3.4, and 3.5). To Mirzoeff’s (2011) point, counter-visuality generates a visuality from which the Other can claim her/his own right to “look” and be “seen” in the Master’s House while problematizing and making sense of the authority of the Master’s House. While Spivak (1995) theorized that “considering the epistemological space of the subaltern female—if the subaltern has no history and cannot speak, then the subaltern female is even more deeply in shadow…the subaltern cannot speak, cannot be heard” (p.  25), according to Mirzoeff (2011, p. 148), the subaltern can be “seen.” In Spivak’s terms, the subaltern has no agency because of her social status: It is impossible for the subaltern to “speak” because her communication will always be trapped and interpreted within a hegemonic imperial understanding. However, while Spivak (1995, p. 25) theorized “the impossibility for the subaltern to speak and be heard in the ‘Master’s House,’” Mirzoeff (2011) argued that the material and visual presence of the subaltern creates a position from which the subaltern can claim “the right to be seen as a human being” (p. 148). In this way, the image of the subaltern claims a visuality from her own cultural standpoint, with autonomy and independence, activating her right to be seen in her own

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

51

cultural terms. Counter-visuality proposes an image of the subaltern through her own eyes, taking the public eye in a “different” direction from a mainstream one. In this way, as Mirzoeff (2011, p. 148) further elaborated, counter-visuality activates the subaltern’s “right to look” and “be seen,” claiming a political subjectivity characterized by autonomy and independence. In other words, counter-visuality resists a taken-for-granted visuality rooted in a Western colonial discourse, undermining the authority attached to coloniality. Counter-visuality aims to create a visuality from a decolonial perspective. While images can generate persuasive visualities as a practical strategy of colonial governance, they can also produce counter-visualities as a means of social change (Figs. 3.3, 3.4, and 3.5). In this regard, counter-visuality can work to claim representation of individuals who have been historically marginalized, colonized, and invisible in society. Thus, counter-visuality becomes a pedagogical medium for resisting and subverting the authority that implicitly underpins a dominant visuality. Counter-visuality framed by intersectionality, for instance, can expose deficit-informed research that distorts the epistemologies of people from historically oppressed groups (Azzarito, 2016, 2019; Sallah et al., 2018) and thus advance fresh anti-racist, anti-ableist, anti-sexist, and anti-­homophobic imagery to counter-narrate today’s neoliberal vision of education (Fraser, 2010). Creating a research space from which the visible and material presence of the Other as the subaltern or “local” can “speak back” to the neoliberal colonial gaze can forward powerful counter-visualities for the production of subjugated knowledge. Through the lens of intersectionality, researchers’ use of visual methodologies for social change embraces “other ways of doing research” (Jankies, 2004, p. 80), creating a research context in and through which individuals from minoritized groups can occupy a position from which they can claim visibility and, thus, representation of the self in their own cultural terms. In this way, counter-visualities framed by intersectionality can serve as a powerful research tool for decolonizing research in education and subverting normative visualities to work against racisms, sexism, homophobia, ableism, anti-Asian and anti-Semitic violence, and intolerance.

References Apple, M. W. (2001). Educating the right way: Markets, standards, god, and inequalities. Routledge. Azzarito, L. (2016). “Permission to speak”: A postcolonial view of racialized bodies and PE in the current context of globalization. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 87, 141–150. Azzarito, L. (2019). Social justice in globalized fitness and health: Bodies out of sight. Routledge. Banks, M. (2007). Visual methods in social research. Sage Publications. Berry, T. R. (2014). Internationalization, internalization, and intersectionality of identity: A critical race feminist re-images curriculum. Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 30(1), 4–14.

52 

L. AZZARITO

Collins, P. H. (2000). Black feminist thought: Knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment. Routledge. Crenshaw, K. W. (1991). Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. Stanford Law Review, 43(6), 1241–1299. Davis, C. (2021). Sampling poetry, pedagogy, and protest to build methodology: Critical poetic inquiry as culturally relevant method. Qualitative Inquiry, 27(1), 114–124. Delgado, M. (2015). Urban youth and photovoice. Visual ethnography in action. Oxford University Press. Delgado, R. (2011). Rodrigo’s reconsideration: Intersectionality and the future of critical race theory. Iowa Law Review, 96, 1247–1288. Delgado, R., & Stefancic, J. (2012). Critical race theory. An introduction. New York University Press. Durie, A. (1999). Emancipatory Maori education: Speaking from the heart. In S. May (Ed.), Indigenous community-based education (pp. 67–78). Short Run Press. Fraser, N. (2010). Scales of justice. Reimagining political space in a globalized world. Columbia University Press. Jankies, D. (2004). “Tell me who you are”: Problematizing the construction and positionalities of “insider”/“outsider” of a “native” ethnographer in a postcolonial context. In K. Mutua & B. B. Swadener (Eds.), Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts. Critical personal narratives (pp. 87–106). State University of New York press. Kassan, A., Goopy, S., Green, A., Arthur, N., Nutter, S., Russell-Mayhew, S., Sesma Vazquez, M., & Silversides, H. (2020). Becoming new together: Making meaning with newcomers through an arts-based ethnographic research design. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 17(2), 294–311. Koro-Ljungberg, M., & Mazzei, L. A. (2012). Problematizing methodological simplicity in qualitative research: Editor’s introduction. Qualitative Inquiry, 18(9), 728–731. Ladson-Billings, G. (2013). Critical race theory—What is not! In M.  Lynn & A.  D. Dixson (Eds.), Handbook of critical race theory in education (pp.  34–47). Routledge. May, S. (Ed.). (1999). Indigenous community-based education. Short Run Press. McCarty, T.  L. (2000). Learning to be Navajo: Rough rock and the struggle for self-­ determination in indigenous schooling. Lawrence Erlbaum. McGregor, D. (2018). From ‘decolonized’ to reconciliation research in Canada: Drawing from indigenous research paradigms. ACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies, 17(3), 810–831. Mirzoeff, N. (2011). The right to look. A counterhistory of visuality. Duke University Press. Munoz, S. M., Basile, V., Gonzalez, J., Birmingham, D., Aragon, A., Jennings, L., & Gloeckner, G. (2017). (counter)narratives and complexities: Critical perspectives from a university cluster hire focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion. Journal of Critical Thought and Praxis, 6(2), 1–21. Mutua, K., & Swadener, B.  B. (Eds.). (2004). Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts: Critical personal narrative. University Press, New York. Nash, C. J. (2010). Tran geographies, embodiment and experience. Gender, Place & Culture. A Journal of Feminist Geography, 17(5), 579–595. Ndimande, B.  S. (2004). [re]anglicizing the kids: Contradictions of classroom discourse in post-apartheid South Africa. In K.  Mutua & B.  B. Swadener (Eds.), Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts. Critical personal narratives (pp. 197–214). State University of New York Press.

3  ENTANGLEMENT: THEORY, VISUAL METHODOLOGY, AND INTERSECTIONALITY 

53

Pels, P. (1997). The anthropology of colonialism: Culture, history, and the emergence of Western governmentality. Annual Review of Anthropology, 26, 163–183. Pink, S. (2013). Interdisciplinary agendas in visual research: Re-situating visual anthropology. Visual Studies, 18(2), 179–192. Prosser, J. (1996). What constitutes an image-based qualitative methodology? Visual Studies, 11(2), 25–34. Romm, N. R. A. (2015). Reviewing the transformative paradigm: A critical systematic and relational (indigenous) lens. Syst Pract Action, 28, 411–427. Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies. An introduction to researching with visual methods. Sage publications. Sallah, M., Ogunnusi, M., & Kennedy, R. (2018). Intersectionality and resistance in youth work: Young people, peace, and global ‘development’ in a racialized world. In P. Alldred, F. Cullen, K. Edwards, & D. Fusco (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of youth work practice (pp. 141–153). Sage Publications. Sikes, P. (2015). Decolonizing research and methodologies: Indigenous people and cross-cultural contexts. Journal of Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 14(3), 349–358. Smith, L. T. (1999). Decolonizing methodologies. Research and indigenous peoples. Zed Books Ltd. Solorzano, D. G., & Yosso, T. J. (2002). Critical race methodology: Counter-storytelling as an analytic framework for education research. Qualitative Inquiry, 8, 23–44. Souto-Manning, M., & Winn, M. T. (2017). Foundational understandings as “show ways” for interrupting injustice and fostering justice in and through education research. Review of Research in Education, 41(1), ix–xix. Spivak, G. C. (1995). Can the subaltern speak? In B. Ashcroft, G. Griffiths, & H. Tiffin (Eds.), The post-colonial studies reader (pp. 28–37). Routledge. Stanczak, G. C. (Ed.). (2007). Visual research methods. Image, society, and representation. Sage Publications. Stanley, C. A. (2007). When counter narratives meet master narratives in the journal editorial-review process. Educational Researcher, 36(1), 14–24. Wesp, L. M., Malcoe, L. H., Elliott, A., & Poteat, T. (2019). Intersectionality research for transgender health justice: A theory-driven conceptual framework for structural analysis of transgender health inequities. Transgender Health, 4(1), 287–296. Wilson, W.  H. (1999). The sociopolitical context for establishing Hawaiian-medium education. In S. May (Ed.), Indigenous community-based education (pp. 95–108). Short Run Press.

CHAPTER 4

Photo-Elicitation to Amplify and Elevate the Voices of Research Participants

Photo-elicitation is a widely used research method in the field of education for its reflexive and heuristic potential to legitimate, amplify, and elevate the voice of research participants and thus to better capture, illuminate, and represent the experiences and perspectives of children, teenagers, parents, families, school staff, and school communities as they seek social change for social change (Torre & Murphy, 2015). Simply put, as Harper (2002) suggested, photo-­elicitation is “based on the single idea of inserting a photograph into a research interview” (p.  13). Photo-elicitation is employed in the research interview and includes a number of photos assembled by the researcher and/or created by the research participants to stimulate the interview conversation. Photo-­elicitation opens up an engaging space for the participants to be more fully involved in the research process, creating a welcoming and engaging research space where memories, places, and events are reawakened; voices are elicited; and “deep and interesting talk” is triggered (Harper, 2002, p.  23). Further, photo-elicitation has the ability to trigger the unconscious, evoke emotional responses, and encourage the interviewee to voice their visions in ways the research participant cannot anticipate or realize. Photo-elicitation can also provide “memory anchors” that allow participants to explore their daily life experiences in meaningful ways (Van Auken et al., 2010, p. 375) and express their memories in ways words cannot capture. This means that the images incorporated in the interview process work as a “neutral third party” that anchors the interview in the visual representations, bridging the worlds of the researcher and the participants (Katzew & Azzarito, 2013). Moments of affective attunements can emerge from the photo-elicitation interview process, creating a bond between the researcher and participant that fosters a reflexive space for triggering memories, emotions, stories, and meanings (Gube, 2021). Especially

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_4

55

56 

L. AZZARITO

with individuals from marginalized or oppressed groups, this researcher– participant bond can be particularly important in the restoration, amplification, and representation of silenced or marginalized voices. In general, this chapter argues that the incorporation of photo-elicitation in education holds promise to make visible hidden realities of school communities; to uncover participants’ values, beliefs, or perceptions; to shed light on hidden parts of identity; and to enable and represent the voice of “Other” students, teachers, and families—those who often have no voice in shaping the school institutions in their own communities. The aims of this chapter are four: Drawing from relevant literature on visual research in education for social change (Allen, 2009; Blinn & Harris, 1991; Clark-Ibanez, 2004, 2007; Croghan et al., 2008; Katzew & Azzarito, 2013; Keller et al., 2008; Mannay, 2010; Sensoy, 2011), the chapter first provides a brief history on Collier and Collier’s (1986) original use of “photo interviewing” and suggests that photo-­ elicitation reveals an intimate dimension of the self in relation to society and culture, bringing to light hidden aspects of identities. Photo-elicitation offers a visual vehicle for the representation of research participants’ memories, struggles, thoughts, and feelings that are often hidden or unconscious and that words or oral-driven data cannot provide (Rose, 2016). The second section expands on the Colliers’ original notion of “photo interviewing” (1986) and considers reflexive and auto-driven uses of photo-elicitation methods, drawing attention to benefits and challenges. Third, the chapter suggests that photo-­ elicitation creates a “visual plan” (Clark-Ibanez, 2007) through which the researcher mobilizes the agency of research participants, and thus the “visual voice” (Thompson, 2008) of research participants is enabled and elevated and holds significant promise for grounding the voices of individuals from marginalized groups in their own cultural knowledge. Fourth, complicating the notion of voice as “authoritative,” “critical,” “therapeutic” (Young, 2015), and “visual” (Thompson, 2008), drawing from postcolonialism, this last section engages with the question “can the subaltern speak?” (Spivak, 2006, p. 62). This last section suggests that to mobilize the agency of the “subaltern” and to open up possibilities for the voice of the subaltern to be restored, photo-­ elicitation needs to lay out a visual infrastructure from which the voice of the subaltern can be amplified, legitimated, and expressed, opening up the possibility of advancing an image of “different visuality” in education for social change (Azzarito, 2016; Gube, 2021; Restler & Luttrell, 2018).

A Brief History Photo-elicitation as a research method has theoretical underpinnings grounded in Collier and Collier’s (1986) anthropological work on the impact of environmental factors on community members’ mental health. Collier and Collier’s (1986) mental health research first theorized photography as a research tool and advocated for the integration of photos in the research process as a means of human understanding. Because people perceive the world through

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

57

representations, Collier and Collier (1986) suggested that the integration of images into the interview process can convey meanings and interpretations that go above and beyond what might be obtained simply using conventional qualitative interviews. Positioning “the camera as a research tool” (Collier & Collier, 1986, p. 9), the Colliers use photography as a means for exploring human lives, social interactions, and culture, suggesting that “photographs are charged with unexpected emotional material that triggers intense feeling and divulge truth” (Collier & Collier, 1986, p. 131). Further, the Colliers conceptualized photoelicitation as a research method that works as a “can-opener” (Collier & Collier, 1986, p. 23), bridging the communication between the researcher and participant in meaningful ways and thus working as a valid entry point into participants’ worlds. In addition, as Buckingham (2009) noted, photo-elicitation can be employed beyond photographs, including other methods such as drawings, videos, media texts, maps, paintings, and graphs. While visual research has a long history in anthropological and sociological research (Sensoy, 2011), more recently, photo-elicitation has also increasingly become popular across various academic disciplines for its positive impact on amplifying participants’ voices, including in research on mental health, family, community, identity, culture, education, public health, psychology, marketing, sport, history, and other fields (Lapenta, 2011). Among the various visual methods, Gauntlett and Holzwarth (2006) refer to photo-elicitation as an “enabling methodology” that assumes that “people have something interesting to communicate, and that they do so creatively” (p. 84). In this vein, Schwartz (1989) draws attention to the potential of images to create a “social transaction” for the researcher to probe experiences, memories, and emotions. By asking people to reflect through the lenses of photos, the researcher can explore people’s taken-for-granted assumptions and implicit values, attitudes, or beliefs. The use of photo-elicitation can then generate informative, reflexive, and rich accounts of people’s lives in unique ways. Harper (1994) also noted that the integration of photos in the interview process elicits a rich exchange of information between the researcher and interviewee that can generate more emotional, personal, and cultural interpretations and accounts. This is because photo-elicitation taps into “informants’ tacit, and often unconscious, consumption of representations, images and metaphors; and produces different and richer information than other techniques” (Van Auken et  al., 2010, p. 373). In line with this viewpoint, moving beyond logocentric methods, Rose (2016) suggested that to be useful, photo-elicitation methods “rely on the unique abilities of visual materials to convey information or affect in ways that words find hard or impossible; both also rely on some kind of spoken or written work to make the effects of those visual material evident, and many photo-­ elicitation methods also depend on other forms of data” (p. 328). The image holds “intrinsic potential,” and the interview serves as a methodological tool to trigger that potential, eliciting and delving into the unexpected, implicit, and multiple meanings the image represents to the interviewee (Lapenta, 2011, p. 203). Rose (2016) eloquently pointed out that the image is a representation

58 

L. AZZARITO

of something, and the interview explores those representations through human meaning-making. The usefulness of photo-elicitation as a methodological tool for amplifying the voice of individuals from marginalized groups to explore social inequalities and seek solutions to improve schools is well established (Lapenta, 2011; Rasmussen, 2004; Walls & Holquist, 2019). Because photo-elicitation involves “the brain in a different way, drawing a different kind of response” (Gauntlett & Holzwarth, 2006, p. 85), photo-elicitation recognizes the creativity, reflexivity, and thoughtfulness of people, offering a “different way” into people’s daily lives. Clearly, to promote social justice–oriented education research, photo-elicitation has significant potential for better incorporating the voices of participants on improving school communities, including shedding light on hidden curricula, advocating for policy changes, and amplifying the voices of students, community members, families, and teachers from traditionally oppressed and minoritized groups. As Torre and Murphy (2015) pointed out, photo-elicitation “puts the voice of the participant front and center” (p. 18), and thus, in diverse educational contexts, the application of photo-elicitation as a novel methodological tool “can help researchers to ‘see’ cultural knowledge that may have otherwise been missed” (Walls & Holquist, 2019, p.  154). Images evoke memories, situations, cultural practices, and events that the use of conventional interview methods alone cannot elicit (Rose, 2016). While photo-elicitation overcomes the limitations of talk-based methods (e.g., interviews, focus groups), the incorporation of photography as a visual tool of reflection and representation (Buckingham, 2009) might also reveal “hidden curricula” in the context of schools (Prosser, 2007). Thus, photo-elicitation has the ability to shed light on and expose cultural patterns of gender/sex at the intersection of other social categories institutionalized in the school community that teachers, students, and school staff might be unaware of and struggle to identify and overcome (Prosser, 2007). For education researchers, photo-elicitation can offer a fresh methodological tool to increase, empower, and amplify the voice of individuals from marginalized and minoritized groups in unique and creative ways, providing an enabling space for exploring the complex ways in which research participants construct, make sense of, and represent the social inequalities they experience in their daily lives. Benefits and Challenges. In general, photo-elicitation integrated into the interview process seeks to “see” the world through the eyes of the research participants and shed light on ways of knowing that are different from the researcher’s views. However, participants’ responses and meaning-making of the images are highly impacted by the context of their lives. With the specific aim of amplifying the voices of research participants, building up mutual trust, rapport, and respect between the researcher and participants is central to photo-elicitation. In general, photo-elicitation methods have both benefits and challenges (Buckingham, 2009; Rose, 2016; Torre & Murphy, 2015). Several advantages of using photo-elicitation are as follows: First, photo-elicitation can generate a great deal of information about a social problem that other methods

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

59

relying solely on conventional verbal interviews cannot provide. Second, photo-elicitation encourages a “talk” that is more affective, emotional, cultural, and personal and can be fun, creative, and interesting, especially for children and teenagers. Third, because images work as the “focus of the encounter” between the researcher and participant (Leonard & McKnight, 2015), photoelicitation dissolves the presence of the researcher, creating a comfortable space for the interviewee. Fourth, photo-elicitation helps the researcher to imagine through participants’ eyes and worlds, triggering different kinds of knowledge than other verbal interview methods. Finally, photo-­elicitation mobilizes participants’ agency to enable, elevate, and/or amplify their voices. However, there are also some challenges to using photo-elicitation methods. First, researchers might face some logistical difficulties. For instance, purchasing cameras or mobile phones or turning photos into prints might be expensive. Second, participants might be inexperienced with using a camera (Packard, 2008), or they might feel uncomfortable taking photos of themselves (Azzarito, 2012). In some instances, participants might lose the camera (Orellana, 1999) or break the camera. Third, when participants use their own mobile phones, they might lose control over photo production and inadvertently delete relevant photos or take photos with family and friends beyond the scope of the research. Importantly, the erasure of relevant photos might raise concerns about the validity and trustworthiness of the data (Rose, 2016). Fourth, photo-elicitation might inadvertently be disempowering for some individuals from marginalized groups (e.g., homeless people, drug users) whose social identity is constructed upon their desire to remain “hidden” in society (Barrett, 2004; Packard, 2008). Fifth, because photo-elicitation has the potential to trigger the unconscious, in research on issues of trauma and pain, photo-elicitation might trigger traumatic life events, creating significant distress for the participants (Lynch & Glass, 2020). When working with extremely vulnerable populations, researchers investigating issues of trauma must utilize extreme sensibility, awareness, and thoughtfulness, and they need to be trained in trauma support. Sixth, because photo-elicitation demands the researcher to allow time for reflection, providing a copy of the printed photos to the participants before the interview takes place is key. This is important because participants should always have a chance to look at and reflect upon the meanings of the photos. In this way, participants can also remove photos that they do not wish to include or discuss in the interview. Finally, it is also a good practice for the researcher to number each photo to facilitate probing during the interview and the accurate recording of the photos.

From Classic Photo-Elicitation to “Reflexive Photography” and “Auto-Driven Photo-Elicitation” Since the Colliers’ original use of “photo interviewing” in the late 1950s, the application of photo-elicitation has evolved significantly. While the Colliers’ “classic photo-elicitation” (Lapenta, 2011) called for the researcher to select

60 

L. AZZARITO

photos to trigger participants’ meaning-making, more recently, variants of photo-elicitation aim to involve participants in producing and interpreting the photos and thus to increase the voice and authority of the participants. In line with the Colliers’ position, Leonard and McKnight (2015) challenged the post-positivist assumption that the camera never lies, emphasizing that theoretical underpinnings of photo-elicitation construct photos not as a record of reality but rather as subjective in both the taking and the viewing process. Building on the Colliers’ original notion of “photo interviewing” (1986), a decade later, Harper (1994) theorized photo-elicitation as a “reflexive” and “non-directive method” that integrates photos into open-ended interviews to enhance participants’ engagement in the interview process. Meaning-making is thus a subjective process and emerges from the participant–researcher interaction with the visual material. Expanding on classic photo-elicitation, the following section discusses reflexive and auto-driven uses of photo-elicitation. While in general, the integration of images into the research process invites research participants to take the lead on relevant research topics, leveraging participants’ voices, Epstein et al. (2006) outlined three broad photo-­elicitation methods. The three methods are conceptualized based on who produces the images: (1) researcher-produced images, (2) participant-produced images, and (3) images coproduced by the researcher and participant. While each approach is broadly categorized based on the Colliers’ (1986) theorization of classic photo-elicitation, each method entails a different level of participant involvement in the research process and differs based on whose knowledge the photos aim to represent. For example, in classic photo-elicitation, the researcher produces or selects the images for the interview to focus participants’ attention on specific issues. In particular, the researcher’s selection of images aims to explore specific research topics that might range from mapping spaces to categorizing objects or subjects, enabling voices, producing a cultural inventory, studying marginalized groups, interviewing children and teenagers, eliciting hidden knowledge, or shedding light on hidden, oppressed, or marginalized identities. Classic photo-elicitation is prescribed by the research questions framed by the researcher and driven by the researcher’s research topic, and the photo prompts incorporated in the interview aim to explore the researcher’s research interest. In other words, the selection of images reflects the researcher’s research interest and questions rather than the participants’ (Leonard & McKnight, 2015). Further, visual researchers employ the researcher-produced-images method, or classic photo-elicitation, when their research questions aim to explore new theoretical concepts, new hypotheses, deductive studies, or theory-building studies using deductive and inductive reasoning. Classic photo-elicitation explores specific theoretical concepts and enables the researcher to develop new theories or novel interpretations. In general, the researcher-produced-­ images method is characterized by a highly organized structure, though this method calls for some flexibility during the interview process to probe or trigger participants’ responses. In their work, Katzew and Azzarito (2013), for example, employed the classic photo-elicitation method, using a “cultural

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

61

inventory” of media-driven body images to trigger students’ narratives of ideal bodies. In this study, classic photo-elicitation was particularly beneficial to the researcher’s theorization of the impact of the intersectionality of gender, race, and social class on youth’s embodiment. The use of classic photo-elicitation played a crucial role in revealing how gender is not an isolated category but intersects with other social constructs such as race, social class, and ableism, having an impact on embodiment (Azzarito, 2009). As Katzew and Azzarito (2013) demonstrated, without the implementation of the researcher-­produced-­ images method, or classic photo-elicitation, students’ body narratives around the intersectionality of race, gender, and social class would have remained hidden. Likewise, in another study, in the context of schools in Bangladesh, Shohel and Mahruf (2012) used classic photo-elicitation to gauge disadvantaged children’s experiences of transitioning from primary to secondary schools and generated rich and thoughtful responses from the children, highlighting how the experience of discontinuity of schooling evoked feelings of nostalgia for the past, mourning, and pain. Reflexive and Auto-Driven Photo-Elicitation Methods. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in “collaboration production” methods because of their potential to position participants as “storytellers” through their own production of photos to represent their own experiences in thoughtful, authentic, and creative ways (Buckingham, 2009, p. 636). Shifting away from researcher-produced images or the classic photo-elicitation method, participant production of images and researcher and participant coproduction of images use more participatory research approaches to photo-elicitation. Such approaches encourage more collaborative forms of photo-elicitation research, aiming to reduce the power imbalances between the researcher and participants and increase participants’ agency as they individually or collaboratively with the researcher produce the image. Building on classic photo-elicitation, both methods of participant production and researcher and participant coproduction of images are defined as “reflexive photography” (Hurworth, 2003) or “auto-driven” approaches (Clark, 1999) because they aim to mobilize and increase the agency of the participants, amplifying their voices through their own production or selection of images. While with classic photo-elicitation, the researcher maintains control over the production and selection of images, when the researcher and participants coproduce images, such a collaborative methodological practice offers participants greater control over what they wish to articulate, voice, and represent in their own cultural terms. As an alternative to classic photo-elicitation, participant-produced images, for instance, position the researcher as a facilitator of a research context, supporting and guiding the participants in determining where, how, and under what conditions they are experiencing a particular issue in their daily lives (Keller et al., 2008). When the classic photo-elicitation method shifts toward more reflective and auto-driven methodologies, such participatory research practices of photo-elicitation are conducted with, for, and about participants to elevate and amplify their voices.

62 

L. AZZARITO

Epistemologically, reflexive photography and auto-driven photo-elicitation methods position the participants as more centered in the research process, giving them more ownership over the process. In this way, photo-elicitation becomes an auto-driven and reflexive methodology. In an effort to elevate the voices of research participants, reflexive and auto-driven methods invite the participants to tell their own stories and represent their daily lives through the lenses of the photos they create. In particular, reflexive photography and auto-­ driven photo-elicitation methods construct research participants as “expert of their own lives,” encouraging a research context where their voices are amplified and their reflections and self-expressions are enhanced, expressed, and validated (Lapenta, 2011). As participants create, share, and reflect upon relevant photos they produce, photo-elicitation nurtures a research space for enhancing reflexivity and for opening up the participants’ worlds—worlds they construct, represent, and express from their own points of view. As a result, researchers’ decisions on the content of the images are significantly reduced, while the interviews become driven by the participants’ own selection of images, meaning-­making, and interpretation (Heisley & Levy, 1991). Reflexivity provides a methodological means for legitimating and amplifying the voice of research participants (Walls & Holquist, 2019), and the auto-driven method enables participants to collect, record, reflect on, and express how they feel, how they view themselves, and how they represent their identities. As the voice of the research participants gets amplified throughout the research process, research participants are enabled to portray their routines, daily lives, identities, events, and community lives in meaningful, contextualized, and creative ways (Gauntlett & Holzwarth, 2006). Auto-driven and reflexive photo-elicitation methods create research conditions in which participatory stories can emerge through participants’ voices, agendas, meanings, identities, and experiences. Participants’ production, analysis, and interpretation of images increase ownership and authority over the research process as participants’ expertise. Reflexive and auto-driven photo-elicitation methods are engaging, creative, and interesting for participants (even fun for children), as they both provide a highly collaborative research space.

Photo-Elicitation: Grounding the Voices of Participants from Minoritized Groups in Their Own Cultural Knowledge and Contexts Recently, education researchers have increasingly advocated for the use of photo-elicitation as an innovative research method, recognizing its positive impact on the research process and its usefulness for elevating the voices of individuals from traditionally oppressed groups. According to numerous scholars, photo-elicitation holds significant promise for grounding the voices of minoritized people in their own cultural knowledge and experience to identify specific issues embedded in the contexts of their lives. Incorporating the voices of students, parents, teachers, and community members into the research

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

63

process is also crucial in the effort to create more engaging, authentic, and meaningful initiatives to support school community changes. At the culmination of the research projects, the researcher in collaboration with the research participants can organize school- or community-based photo exhibitions and share their voices and views with the public, including school administrators, to promote social change (Azzarito & Kirk, 2013; Burke, 2008; Prosser, 2007; Walls & Holquist, 2019). The voices, concerns, and views of research participants can also be shared with policymakers to advocate for social justice. Recently, as Gube (2021) theorized, photo-elicitation has had the potential to mobilize the agency of individuals from traditionally oppressed groups to voice how their experiences are impacted by “taken for granted and common space— especially those aspects of society that contradict and maintain oppressive structures along racial, cultural, gendered and age boundaries” (p. 2). In this vein, Bugos et al. (2014) suggest that, especially in disadvantaged communities, photo-­elicitation is well suited for conducting research with vulnerable populations, including elevating the voices of low-income children and youth, LGTBQIA+ individuals, people with disabilities, homeless people, and minoritized groups. Especially when the voices of individuals from underserved groups are silenced, photo-elicitation as an innovative methodology can enable them to “speak up” on how educational, cultural, and contextual factors play a role in constraining their education, health, and well-being. In this regard, Leonard and McKnight (2015) pointed out that when the researcher explores the experiences of individuals from marginalized populations, photo-elicitation can tap into experiences that are not easily conveyed or captured verbally. Clark-Ibanez’s (2004) study, for instance, demonstrated how the use of photo-elicitation amplified the voices of children, eliciting storytelling grounded in daily experiences of their school life. In this study, photo-­ elicitation worked as a useful methodology not only to mobilize children’s agency and legitimate their views but also to challenge the stereotypical construction of poor inner-city Latinx and African-American children positioned as “bad students” or at risk of dropping out of school. Clark-Ibanez’s (2004) implementation of photo-elicitation created a research space in which children themselves made visible hidden aspects of their inner-city lives, voicing important insights about what it meant for them to live in poverty. Making children’s experiences visible provided alternative views of childhood development traditionally rooted in upper-middle social class normative models, shedding light on poor children’s harsh experiences of discrimination. Likewise, Weinger (1998) used photo-elicitation to demonstrate how children’s growing up in poverty negatively impacted their self-confidence, belief in themselves, educational attainments, and aspirations for the future, leaving them with feelings of hopelessness and disillusion. Rather than having children be shaped by adults’ views, which often ignore their voices, advancing research with children from the new childhood paradigm (Thompson, 2008), Clark-Ibanez (2004) noted that “photo elicitation as a method is good at giving children agency because the images and explanation mainly come from the kids themselves” (p. 78).

64 

L. AZZARITO

Enabling children’s voices to be “heard” through visual representations creates a research space for adults to “see” children in a different light. Thus, photo-­ elicitation can uncover the social worlds of children, helping the public (e.g., adults, families, school administrators, policymakers, and teachers) see socio-­ educational and economic barriers children face in their daily lives (Horstman & Bradding, 2002). Both Weinger’s (1998) and Clark-Ibanez’s (2004, 2007) research with poor inner-city children underscored how photo-elicitation was particularly useful for elevating and amplifying the voices of children, uncovering institutionalized practices and contextual constraints that, in hidden ways, maintained economic and socio-educational inequalities. However, Clark-­ Ibanez (2004) also captured how children negotiated inequalities, resisting stereotypical constructions of gender by performing femininity and masculinity in fluid and contradictory ways. Making the gender performances of children visible subverted teachers’ gendered codes and thus destabilized gendered norms institutionalized in school. While poverty, like gender, race, disability, and other social categories, has a huge impact on children’s experience in society, when the voices of children are elevated and children are positioned as active agents in the research process, children’s own agendas can come to light and alter adults’ normative views of childhood. Clearly, photo-elicitation becomes a methodological tool useful for social change in education when children and young people are enabled to record their stories, reflections, and accounts with imagination. The Shooting Back project (Hubbard, 1991) enabled youth from inner-city homeless shelters and Native American reservations to use their creative energies to offer vivid and powerful visual accounts that voiced poverty, dehumanization, and marginalization. As Hubbard (1991) noted, providing youth with cameras in the Shooting Back project enabled young people to “make something of themselves” in affirmative terms, taking photos that forwarded their own visions— an “alternative vision” that transcended their own circumstances, opening up possibilities for altering the social and economic disparities that framed them in degrading and damaging ways. Unlike Clark-Ibanez and Hubbard’s (1991) use of photo-elicitation, more recently, Leonard and McKnight (2015) adopted a researcher-generated-images method to investigate relationships among social class, culture, place, and space. Recognizing the long history of violence and contestation in the Belfast area, Leonard and McKnight (2015) used photo-elicitation to explore what it is like for White working-class teenagers to live and grow up in Belfast. Complementing quantitative-driven methods, the researchers’ selection of the photo prompts used for the focus-group interviews represented “lived texts” in which teenagers inserted their identities in contextualized and meaningful ways. The photo prompts not only triggered layers of meanings but also enabled young people to situate themselves within local and central places and gave them an active role in the interpretative process of meaning-making of their everyday practices and spatial patterns. The range of images used facilitated young people connecting their self to society, culture and history. (p. 640)

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

65

In the same vein, Sanchez (2015) used photo-elicitation as a methodological means of exploring young people’s visual constructions of political space, opening up a window for young people to see problems, inequalities, and opportunities in their day-to-day life experiences. Different from Leonardo and McKnight’s (2015) study, however, Sanchez (2015) increased students’ ownership over the research process, positioning students as “photo activists” in school in an effort to elevate their voices. As “photo activists,” “experts” of their lives, critical thinkers, and artists, students engaged, problematized, and represented unjust situations, using their voices to become “advocates” for social justice. Expanding on the photo-elicitation methods, from classic photo-elicitation to reflexive and auto-driven methods to photo activism, Sanchez (2015) maintained that in the effort to pursue democratic ends in education, photo-­ elicitation can be used as a “visual testimony for understanding the world” (p.  163). To this end, positioning research participants as photo activists, photo-elicitation can foster community awareness, community engagement, social justice, and social change (Moller, 2013). Especially in deprived communities where the voices of many community members are often silenced, photo-elicitation can amplify their voices as they “speak up” about the impact of poverty, racism, sexism, or ableism on life stressors. Unless the voices of individuals from underrepresented, marginalized, and historically oppressed groups are elevated and, simultaneously, grounded in the contextual factors that maintain health disparities, their voices, views, and experiences will continue to be silenced (Azzarito, 2016; Bowleg, 2012; Fleury et  al., 2009). Photo-elicitation can also mobilize the agency of community members from marginalized groups to shed light on how institutionalized barriers limit community members’ access to high-quality education, well-being, and healthcare services. On this matter, Fleury et al. (2009) draw attention to how the voices of Hispanic women and Latinas continue to be silenced, leaving the socio-­ educational, gendered, racialized, and economic barriers they face in their daily lives unexplored. These barriers have a hugely detrimental impact on their well-­ being and health. Advocating for tackling health disparities, Fleury et al. (2009) implemented photo-elicitation to enable Hispanic and Latina women to speak up about the complexity of their lives as they negotiate multiple contextual factors. Fleury et al. (2009) noted that, as an innovative method, photo-elicitation revealed “vivid and personally meaningful data which captured a range of experiences that might have been overlooked using interviews alone” (p. 2). With the implementation of photo-elicitation, Fleury et al.’s (2009) study demonstrated how, while Hispanic and Latina women took pride in self-describing as physically active, they had to deal with a wide range of complex, difficult struggles, from negotiating multiple jobs and family responsibilities to managing childcare, caring for their home, sharing concerns about neighborhood safety, and attempting to engage in healthy practices such as walking. The “visual voices” (Thompson, 2008) of Hispanic and Latina young women, grounded in the contextual factors of their daily lives, spoke clearly to the need for

66 

L. AZZARITO

community-­based interventions to increase access to, opportunities for, and support for health education, physical activity practices, and well-being. The continual silencing of voices goes hand in hand with persistent experiences of denigration and social marginalization in society. Like poverty and health disparities, other persistent issues of sexuality, race, (dis)ability, and religion play a huge role in the “Othering” process and its constructions of “social difference” in negative terms. To advance research on the relationship between the Othering process, social difference, and social marginalization, Gauntlett and Awan (2012, p. 592) argued that photo-elicitation as a creative and innovative visual method offers “unique methodological advances for exploring sociological questions.” In this vein, Walton and Niblett (2012) used photo-­ elicitation to investigate sociological issues around students’ experiences of peer pressure, devaluation, social marginalization, and denigration. When students do not “fit” within a normative school culture, students feel voiceless; they feel that they are perceived as “different” and that their viewpoints do not matter. Feeling “different” from normative ways of being, they become “Othered,” constructed in deficit terms, and are more likely to face discrimination and bullying. Regarding this matter, Walton and Niblett (2012) used photo-elicitation to attend to sociological questions around relationships among the normative dominant culture, the “Othering” process, and forms of discrimination. The researchers’ employment of photo-elicitation afforded a research space for young people to voice “how racism, homophobia, physical and mental disability, body size and other aspects of difference tend to give rise to actual bullying moments” (Walton & Niblett, 2012, p.  6). When voices traditionally silenced or marginalized are elevated with innovative methodological tools, research participants are enabled to picture complex stories about race, class, disability, or gender/sex issues as situated in their own lived experiences and contexts to reveal hidden pathways for deeper sociological examination (Sensoy, 2011). Sanchez (2015), too, suggested that to interrupt silence and, thus, discrimination, photos integrated in the interview process “are intended to capture circumstances that remain ignored, misunderstood, or underprivileged within the normative structures of an individual’s life environment” (p. 167). In line with Sanchez’s viewpoint, Walton and Niblett’s use of photo-­ elicitation (Walton & Niblett, 2012) demonstrated how the voices of students grounded in bullying moments disrupted normative binaries constructed upon fixed, unitary social categories of discrimination, bringing to light how the intersectionality of a wide range of social categories (e.g., gender/sexuality, race, social class, disability) impacted bullying that might have been hidden in conventional interviews. Notably, the voices of students elevated through their own visual representations and meaning-making allowed researchers to reconceptualize bullying beyond the narrow notion of normative behavior. Listening to the “visual voice” (Thompson, 2008) of students allowed researchers to theorize bullying as a complex social problem that mirrors a broader context of prejudice embedded in the school environment. Further, in thinking about

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

67

similar sociological issues, Thompson and Gunter (2008) also implemented photo-elicitation to position research participants as “student researchers” to explore bullying from their own viewpoints and thus “open a window on the peer power relations at work in the school” (p. 193). When the voices of youth were amplified, the voices raised in moments of bullying cried out for the need to foster a school culture that does not just discourage or dismiss discrimination but rather deals with social difference and its “Othering” process overtly as a crucial step toward social inclusion, justice, and social change (Walton & Niblett, 2012).

Photo-Elicitation to Create “Visual Encounters” in Education: “Can the Subaltern Speak?” This last section suggests that to mobilize the agency of the Other and to create a space for the Other to be seen in her or his own cultural terms, photo-­ elicitation needs to lay out a visual infrastructure from which the voice of the Other can be restored, legitimated, and expressed, opening up possibilities for advancing a “different” visuality in education for social change (Azzarito, 2016; Gube, 2021; Restler & Luttrell, 2018). The Colliers’ argue that photo-­ elicitation has the potential to offer “ways of penetrating the cultural cliché— the projection of our Western patterns for organizing the visual world onto non-Western people” (Collier & Collier, 1986, p. xv), allowing the point of view of the non-Western individual to be voiced, performed, and represented. More recently, Gube (2021) suggested that, especially when working with minoritized people in ethnically diverse contexts, the use of photo-elicitation can allow the public to reimagine participants beyond the “ethnic label” (p. 5), breaking away from the Othering frame. Social difference constructed upon rigid axes of race, (dis)ability, religion, gender/sex, and social class often creates an image of “Other” students, teachers, and community members as “different” within a deficit-oriented image: a vision through which the Other is forced to see herself or himself through a normative gaze. As a result of the “Othering” process, the Other comes to construct her or his identity through the eyes of normativity as “different” and thus comes to experience the self as having a particular subjectivity in negative terms. The process of subjectification can, then, result in the devaluation or alienation of a sense of self. To counteract the subjectification of the Other faces, the use of photo-elicitation can create a visual infrastructure through which the Other can disturb the (Western) normative gaze and present a “different” image of the self in affirmative and creative terms: a new, alternative, positive vision through which the Other can recognize herself or himself, be interpellated, be seen by the public, and gain recognition from others. Considering the theoretical underpinnings grounded in the Colliers’ argument and complicating the theoretical assumption that photo-elicitation amplifies the notion of voice as “authoritative,” “critical,” and therapeutic” (Young, 2015) or “visual” (Thompson, 2008), this last section engages with the

68 

L. AZZARITO

postcolonial question of “can the subaltern speak?” (Spivak, 2006, p.  62). How can photo-elicitation create a culturally relevant and inclusive research space in and through which the subaltern and/or non-Western participants have “permission to speak” (Azzarito, 2016)? How can photo-elicitation create an enabling space in which the voices of marginalized individuals can be heard, recognized, and validated? How can photo-elicitation create a research space in which the Western gaze gets to see how the subaltern imagines her own world? While postcolonial scholar Spivak (2006) theorized that the subaltern cannot speak within a Western frame, Mirzoeff (1999) suggested that a way out of this colonial Western frame is for the subaltern to be seen in her own cultural terms. Spivak argued that it is impossible for the Western colonizer to hear the voice of the subaltern, describing the colonizer’s attempt as a vanishing act, but the Colliers’ suggestion that photo-elicitation holds the potential to break away from the Western frame opens up possibilities for seeing the world through a “different” lens (Mirzoeff, 1999), in the subaltern’s own cultural terms. Problematizing the potential of photo-elicitation to mobilize the agency of the subaltern, however, demands that visual scholars theorize how to create a visual infrastructure allowing the visual voice of the subaltern—the Other or non-Western participants—to be recognized, restored, and legitimated (Restler & Luttrell, 2018). While Spivak (1993, 1995) recognizes that the subaltern’s voice is never separate from but always dependent on the dominant mainstream culture, the use of photo-elicitation might produce new images that work to disturb the subjectification process that often prevents the “subaltern” from seeing her or his subjectification to the oppressor as a racialized, gendered, disabled, classed identity. However, unless photo-elicitation creates a visual infrastructure for the subaltern to speak—in other words, for her visual voice to come to representation—giving the subaltern “permission to speak” remains a “position without identity” (Spivak, 2006, p. 74). In Spivak’s terms, this means that photo-elicitation does not offer “authentic voices” but rather that photo-elicitation might visually stage “a position from which to speak” (Spivak, 1995, p. 36). Only when photo-elicitation creates a visual infrastructure from which the visual voice of the subaltern might come into representation can her voice be recovered, restored, and represented. When the subaltern comes to be seen in her own cultural terms, such visual representation can then legitimate, recognize, and articulate the subaltern’s “difference” within a space of marginality, generating an alternative visuality for her voice. The visuality of “difference” opens up a critical space for an alternative kind of entry into the subaltern’s social and emotional world, lifting up the Western normative and invisible veil that covers her. In other words, when the Other comes alive, the staging of a “different” visuality from a position of marginality unlocks a window for the subaltern to be seen through non-Western lenses. For the subaltern to be seen, however, her visual voice needs to be grounded in the non-Western epistemological assumptions of her knowledge, context, image, and life experiences (Mirzoeff, 1999). In line with subaltern studies

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

69

(Spivak, 2006), while the (mis)representation of individuals from minoritized groups as Other is always filtered by the normative Western dominant culture of Whiteness, photo-elicitation can foster “visual encounters” between the Other and Whiteness. Such visual encounters might create a “third space” (Soja, 1996) to trigger a new image of how the Other wants to be seen. Fostering visual encounters through photo-elicitation can create a “visual plan” (Clark-Ibanez, 2007) that neutralizes “otherness” in deficit terms while visually restoring an identity in positive terms. In other words, photo-elicitation creates possibilities for “visual encounters” in and through which minoritized participants positioned as Other by the Western gaze might see themselves in their own culturally relevant terms, in a positive light, revealing parts of their identities that might otherwise have remained hidden (Gube, 2021). In particular, images coupled with participants’ narratives might overcome the limitations of logocentric Western biases, offering useful strategies to enable non-Western participants to define the problem of interest in their own non-­ Western cultural terms and to picture the self through their own eyes. Especially when researchers work with minoritized people in ethnically diverse contexts, the use of photo-elicitation can allow the public to reimagine research participants beyond Otherness or the “ethnic label” (Gube, 2021, p.  5). Photo-­ elicitation can then allow the researcher to look more closely at the lives of individuals from historically oppressed groups, think more deeply, and explore their social worlds beyond normative assumptions. However, in the effort to displace Western normative lenses and destabilize neoliberal trends toward homogenization, the challenging task for forwarding the Other’s vision in diverse educational contexts remains how to articulate the photo-elicitation methodological steps to clearly lay out how the “act of voice-­ giving” takes place throughout the research process (Gube, 2021). This means that the “images do not speak for themselves” (Buckingham, 2009, p. 648); rather, photo-elicitation demands laying out a visual infrastructure in which the subaltern is enabled to stage what she wishes to say and how she wishes to be seen. As Buckingham (2009) stated, “data from visual research cannot be seen as transparent evidence…any more than language can” (p. 648); rather, photo-­ elicitation can establish a position from which “it is possible for participants to speak, to perform, and to represent” (p.  648). While the subaltern cannot speak and be heard within a Western colonized frame (Spivak, 2006), Mirzoeff (1999) suggested that when a visual infrastructure is put into place from a position of marginality, the subaltern can be seen and represented in her own cultural terms. However, the visual voices of non-Western people can only be represented in terms of the cultural context in which the visual voices were expressed. This means that photo-elicitation might create a visual platform from which a position for the subaltern to speak can be enabled, restored, and amplified within her own cultural context, generating non-Western research participants’ ways of seeing that may have otherwise been misrepresented. In this vein, Lynch (2006) suggested that when images are inserted into the interview process, photo-elicitation might provide a “different” visuality that

70 

L. AZZARITO

displaces Western normative lenses, opening up a space for “visualizing as a matter of disclosing, exposing, uncovering, disturbing, or revealing phenomena that were hidden from view” (p. 30). While in the current neoliberal educational regime of power, the vision through which individuals from minoritized, LGBTQIA+, First Nation, Indigenous, and historically marginalized groups are seeing remains articulated through deficit-oriented lenses, photo-elicitation has the potential to create a position of strength from which they can counteract deficit lenses. Photo-elicitation has the potential to offer researchers the methodological tools to negotiate, refuse, and revise the Western gaze dictated by today’s educational neoliberal context, producing a visually driven “third space” for social justice (Soja, 1996). Disrupting the homogeneity dictated by neoliberal globalization, photo-elicitation holds the potential to reveal, disrupt, or dismiss stereotypical constructions of race at the intersection of gender, sexuality, disability, religion, and social class, creating a position of marginality from which the visual voice of individuals from marginalized groups can restore the image of the Other in affirmative terms and might work as a form of displacement of Western normative lenses for social justice in education.

References Allen, L. (2009). “Snapped”: Researching the sexual cultures of schools using visual methods. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 22(5), 549–561. Azzarito, L. (2009). The panopticon of physical education: Pretty, active, and ideally white. Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy, 24, 19–41. Azzarito, L., & Kirk, D. (2013). Pedagogies, physical culture, and visual methods. Routledge. Azzarito, L. (2012). Girls looking for a “second home”: bodies, difference, and places of inclusion in girls’ eyes. Physical Education and Sport Pedagogy, 1–25. Azzarito, L. (2016). “Permission to speak”: A postcolonial view of racialized bodies and PE in the current context of globalization. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 87, 141–150. Barrett, D. (2004). Photo-documenting the needle exchange: Methods and ethics. Visual Studies, 19(2), 145–149. Blinn, L., & Harris, A. W. (1991). Combining native instant photography and photo-­ elicitation. Visual Anthropology, 4, 175–192. Bowleg, L. (2012). The problem with the phrase women and minorities: Intersectionality—an important theoretical framework for public health. American Journal of Public Health, 102(7), 1267–1273. Buckingham, D. (2009). ‘Creative’ visual methods in media research: possibilities, problems and proposals. Media Culture Society, 31, 633–652. Bugos, E., Frasso, R., Fitzgerald, E., True, G., Adachi-Mejia, A.  M., & Cannuscio, C. (2014). Practical guidance and ethical considerations for studies using photo-­ elicitation interviews. Preventing Chronic Disease. Public Health Research, Practice, and Policy, 11, 1–9. Burke, C. (2008). “Play in focus.” Children’s visual voice in participative research. In P. Thompson (Ed.), Doing Visual Research with children and young people (pp. 1–19). Routledge.

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

71

Clark, C. D. (1999). The auto-driven interview: A photographic viewfinder into children’s experience. Visual Studies, 14(1), 39–50. Clark-Ibanez, M. (2004). Framing the social world with photo-elicitation interviews. American Behavioral Scientist, 47(12), 1507–1527. Clark-Ibanez, M. (2007). Inner-city children in sharp focus: Sociology of childhood and photo-elicitation interviews. In G. C. Stanczak (Ed.), Visual Research Methods: Image, Society, and Representation (pp. 167–196). Sage. Collier, J., & Collier, M. (1986). Visual anthropology. University of New Mexico Press. Croghan, R., Griffin, C., Hunter, J., & Phoenix, A. (2008). Young people’s construction of the self: Notes on the use and analysis of the photo-elicitation methods. Journal of Social Research Methods, 11, 365–356. https://doi.org/10.1080/ 13549831003677670 Epstein, I., Stevens, B., McKeever, P., & Baruchel, S. (2006). Photo elicitation interview (PEI): Using photos to elicit children’s perspectives. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 5, 3. Fleury, J., Keller, C., & Perez, A. (2009). Exploring resources for physical activity in Hispanic women, using photo elicitation. Qualitative Health Research, 19(5), 677–686. Gauntlett, D., & Awan, F. (2012). Action-based visual and creative methods in social research. In I.  Heywood & B.  Sandywell (Eds.), The handbook of visual culture (pp. 589–606). Berg. Gauntlett, D., & Holzwarth, P. (2006). Creative visual methods for exploring identities. Visual Studies, 21(1), 82–91. Gube, J. (2021). Photo-elicitation technique as an integrated meaning-making practice: An introspective look at diversity, identities, and voice-giving. Visual Studies, 86, 1–12. Harper, D. (1994). On the authority of the image: Visual methods at the crossroads. In N.  K. Denzin & Y.  S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of Qualitative Research (pp. 403–412). Sage publications. Harper, D. (2002). Talking about pictures: A case for photo-elicitation. Visual Studies, 17, 13–26. Heisley, D., & Levy, S. (1991). Autodriving: A photo-elicitation technique. Journal of Consumer Research, 18(3), 257–272. Horstman, M., & Bradding, A. (2002). Helping children speak up in the health service. European Journal of Oncology Nursing, 6, 75–84. Hubbard, J. (1991). Shooting back: A photographic view of life by homeless children. Chronicle Books. Hurworth, R. (2003). Photo-interviewing for research: Social Research Update, 40 [Online]. Retrieved May 20, 2021, from http://sru.soc.survey.ac.uk/SRU40.pdf. Katzew, A., & Azzarito, L. (2013). From media images to body narratives: Photo elicitation as a method for triggering young people’s ‘body talk.’. In L.  Azzarito & D.  Kirk (Eds.), Pedagogies, physical culture, and visual methods (pp.  62–75). Routledge. Keller, C., Fleury, J., Perez, A., Ainsworth, B., & Vaughan, L. (2008). Using visual methods to uncover context. Qualitative Health Research, 18, 428–436. Lapenta, F. (2011). Some theoretical and methodological views on photo-elicitation. In E.  Margolis & L.  Pauwels (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of visual research methods (pp. 201–213). Sage Publications. Leonard, M., & McKnight, M. (2015). Look and tell: Using photo-elicitation methods with teenagers. Children’s Geographies, 13(6), 629–642.

72 

L. AZZARITO

Lynch, M. (2006). Discipline and the material form of images: An analysis of scientific visibility. In L. Pauwels (Ed.), Visual cultures of science. Rethinking representational practices in knowledge and science communication (pp.  195–221). Dartmouth College Press. Lynch, R., & Glass, C. R. (2020). The cost of caring: An arts-based phenomenological analysis of secondary traumatic stress in college student affairs. The Review of Higher Education, 43(4), 1041–1068. Mannay, D. (2010). Making the familiar strange: Can visual research methods render the familiar setting more perceptible? Qualitative Research, 10, 91–111. Mirzoeff, N. (1999). An introduction to visual culture. Routledge. Moller, F. (2013). Photo activism in the digital age: Visions from Rio de Janeiro. In N. S. Love & M. Mattern (Eds.), Doing democracy: Activist art and cultural politics (pp. 29–52). State University of New York Press. Orellana, M.  F. (1999). Space and place in an urban landscape: Learning from children’s views of their social worlds. Visual Studies, 14(1), 73–89. Packard, J. (2008). ‘I’m gonna show you what it’s really like out there’: The power and limitations of participatory visual methods. Visual Studies, 23(1), 63–77. Prosser, J. (2007). Visual methods and the visual culture of schools. Visual Studies, 22(1), 13–30. Rasmussen, K. (2004). Places for children—Children’s places. Childhood, 11(2), 155–173. Restler, V., & Luttrell, W. (2018). Gaze interrupted: Speaking back to stigma with visual research. In P. Alldred, F. Cullen, K. Edwards, & D. Fusco (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of youth work practice (pp. 454–469). Sage. Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies. An introduction to researching with visual methods. Sage publications. Sanchez, L. (2015). Students as photo activists: Using the cameras in the classroom for social change. Theory into Practice, 54(2), 163–171. Schwartz, D. (1989). Visual Ethnography: Using photography in qualitative research. Qualitative Sociology, 12(2), 119–153. Sensoy, O. (2011). Picturing oppression: Seventh graders’ photo essays on racism, classism, and sexism. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 24(3), 323–342. Shohel, M., & Mahruf, C. (2012). Nostalgia, transition and the school: An innovative approach of using photographic images as a visual method in educational research. International Journal of Research and Method in Education, 35(3), 269–292. Soja, E. (1996). Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and other real-and-imagined places. Blackwell Publishing. Spivak, G. C. (1993). Outside in the teaching machine. Routledge. Spivak, G. C. (1995). Can the subaltern speak? In B. Ashcroft, G. Griffiths, & H. Tiffin (Eds.), The post-colonial studies reader (pp. 28–37). Routledge. Spivak, G. C. (2006). Conversations with Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Seagull Books. Thompson, P. (2008). Doing visual research with children and young people. Routledge. Thompson, P. & Gunter, H. (2008). Researching bullying with students: A lens on everyday life in an ‘innovative school.’ International Journal of Inclusive Education, 12, 2, 185-200. Torre, D., & Murphy, J. (2015). A different lens: Using photo-elicitation interviews in education research. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 23, Article 111. https://doi. org/10.1080/14725860220137345

4  PHOTO-ELICITATION TO AMPLIFY AND ELEVATE THE VOICES OF RESEARCH… 

73

Van Auken, P. M., Frisvoll, S. J., & Stewart, S. I. (2010). Visualising community: Using participant-driven photo-elicitation for research and application. Local Environment, 15(4), 373–388. Walls, J., & Holquist, S. E. (2019). Through their eyes, in their worlds: Using photo-­ elicitation to amplify student voice in policy and school improvement research. In K. K. Stunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research Methods for Social Justice & Equity in Education (pp. 151–162). Palgrave Macmillan. Walton, G., & Niblett, B. (2012). Investigating the problem of bullying through photo elicitation. Journal of Youth Studies, 1, 1–17. Weinger, S. (1998). Children living in poverty: Their perception of career opportunities. Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services, 79(3), 320–330.

CHAPTER 5

Participatory Visual Research for Community Empowerment and Social Change: Photovoice, Visual Diary, Photojournalism, and Fotonovela The current neoliberal globalized educational landscape in which social inequalities persist calls for social justice researchers to problematize and counter the impact of corporatization, deterritorialization, homogenization, and Westernization on the local context of diverse school communities. Today’s “market-driven” education (Giroux, 2003) dictated by neoliberalism demands that education researchers consider what participatory research for social change in oppressed communities looks like in the effort to contextualize research and involve community members as research activists to generate community and policy dialogue for social justice. While research under the guise of “objectivity” and “neutrality” continues to silence and distort epistemologies of minoritized groups (Darroch & Giles, 2014), participatory visual methods (PVMs), in line with the goals of participatory action research (PAR), aim to address issues of social inequalities, with a focus on the experiences, voices, and actions of marginalized groups, not from a deficit position but as a source of strength (Mitchell, 2015; Mitchell & De Lange, 2011). Inspired by Paulo Freire’s groundbreaking philosophy of education for social justice (Freire, 1985), participatory visual research (PVR) is a qualitative approach used by activists, educators, and researchers in action research projects with the specific intent of empowering participants to study, address, and change social inequalities (Rose, 2016). Shifting away from conventional qualitative forms of PAR toward more visual-centric approaches to action research, PVR uses photos, documentaries, films, and other visual texts as primary sources of data to invoke and represent stories, experiences, and ideas from the perspectives of research participants for social justice and policy change (Finney & Rishbeth, 2006; McIntyre, 2003; Packard, 2008; Wang, 1999). In general, the chapter claims that as participatory methodologies, PVMs center the community members throughout the research process and have the ability to not only reveal hidden power relations embedded in a specific © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_5

75

76 

L. AZZARITO

community but also enhance positive social change. This chapter first emphasizes that the transformative aspect of PVMs often results in the co-researchers changing and making visible to the public unjust power relations embedded in specific social situations to enhance social change (Mitchell, 2015). The chapter then provides an overview of different methodological approaches to PVMs, from photo diaries and video diaries to photovoice, photojournalism, and fotonovela, suggesting that these approaches are useful when community members as co-researchers investigate hidden social relations and issues troubling them in their communities (Aldridge, 2007; Baker & Wang, 2006; Barrett, 2004; Becker, 1995, 1998; Burke, 2008; De Lange et  al., 2016; Hecht, 1998; Hubbard, 1991; Lee & Azzarito, 2020; Wang, 1999; Wang & Pies, 2004). While these range of research approaches center research participants in the research process and participants decide what story to tell, the aims and methodological procedures among the five PVM approaches differ. Nevertheless, they all have the potential to transform the research participants’ social conditions. With a methodological stance toward humanizing research throughout the implementation of PVMs, the last section of the chapter advocates for visual researchers to embrace dialogic consciousness-raising and relationship-­ building through dignity, respect, and care, with a commitment to work with and for oppressed and marginalized school communities to humanize rather than colonize those communities.

Empowerment, Ownership, and Imagination for Social Change PVR embraces community-based participatory/action research about, with, and for marginalized communities to address social justice–oriented and sensitive research topics (Mitchell et al., 2017; O’Fallon et al., 2000). In particular, PVR enables individuals from marginalized populations to express their own ideas around a socio-educational issue, giving them a chance to “portray what is often difficult to express in words” (Guillemin & Drew, 2010, p. 178) and an opportunity to collect visual data to investigate and shed light on community-­ based problems in order to propose solutions for social change. Underpinned by critical, participatory/action, and transformative research paradigms, PVMs are committed to participant-generated data and embrace community participatory action research built on a strong foundation of social justice, activism, and social change. Mitchell and De Lange (2011, p.  22) emphasized that “empowerment,” “engagement,” “ownership,” and “agency” are all key features of the transformative aspect of PVMs. While the potential of creative participatory visual methodologies to explore community members’ social and life worlds is well established (Delgrado, 2015; Knowles & Cole, 2008; O’Neill, 2012), PVMs are also concerned with decolonizing theories that aim to humanize research participants, revealing subjugated knowledge while producing new epistemologies generated from the vantage point of the “Other.” In

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

77

line with community-based research and interventions for social justice, Delgrado (2015) maintained that PVR “serves the critical dual purposes of generating knowledge and being integral part of a social intervention” (p. 3) with the specific aim of bringing positive social change and transformation to marginalized communities (Titchen & Horsfall, 2011). Listening to the concerns of community members is a key factor in the successful establishment of a community agenda for social change. Moving away from deficit research paradigms that frame individuals from traditionally oppressed groups in negative terms, PVMs embrace an asset-focused approach as an engaging research practice for building strong, trusting, and positive relationships between the researcher and the community members, sharing efforts to address localized manifestations of injustices. PVMs foster affirmative, supportive, and caring relationships among co-researchers, creating an empowering research space for community members and the researcher to make decisions together regarding the visual inquiry process, the research design, and the dissemination of the findings to the public (Young, 2013, p. 311). As a result, PVMs can strengthen the social conditions of community members’ lives. Thus, in the process of self-generating images for inquiry, learning, and empowerment, community members positioned as co-researchers take both an activist and a collaborative approach to research problems with a commitment to identifying solutions for social change. This is also true for innovative participatory internet-based research methods (e.g., visual research in social media), as they can potentially create virtual communities for investigations of online cultures, social engagement, and social inequalities (Literat & Markus, 2020). Internet research with a focus on youth from disenfranchised groups, empowerment, agency, and creative participation has the potential to foster civic dialogue and support social activism for social justice (Liou & Literat, 2020). PVMs implemented on social media can also create virtual communities as alternative sites of public pedagogy for social activism, with the potential to empower and transform individuals from traditionally marginalized groups while disrupting negative stereotypes of the Other (Lee & Azzarito, 2020). In the current globalized era, the internet-mediated construction of self in concert with the Other, co-shared meanings, and sociocultural structure constitute unique phenomena to study. Whether in virtual or in “real-world” communities, to undertake participatory visual research with the specific purpose of generating new knowledge that can be translated into social action, the researcher and the community members come together as co-researchers, becoming “social activists” (Delgrado, 2015, p. 3), and/or as “research activists” (Mitchell et al., 2017, p. 20). As a social activist, too, the researcher shifts ownership of the research process to the research participants to re-center, change, and/or enhance the lives of members of marginalized communities. In PVMs, both the researcher and the community members are co-researchers, social activists, and co-producers of knowledge. According to Mitchell et al. (2017), PVMs

78 

L. AZZARITO

enable participants who are implicated but often marginalized to address their own problems, express their own knowledge, reflect on their knowledge, and offer an analysis of how to contribute to taking action and bringing about change. The purpose of such work is not to tell truth about the world but open up spaces that allow us all to think about how our words might be changed. (pp. 23–24)

As social activists, the research participants and the researcher together design and employ a critical participatory methodology and use their knowledge and imagination to take action to bring about positive social change in their own community. Disrupting the traditional hierarchical power relations between the researcher and participants, PVMs position marginalized community members as “experts” of their lives in their own communities and use democratic processes to conduct inquiries that aim to address issues with constructive, critical, and creative responses for social change in their own communities. With a commitment to social justice as well as collective responsibility for and ownership over the research process, PVMs aim to develop positive partnership responses to facilitate a thoughtful, critical, and reflective inquiry and social activism. PVMs lead to more equitable power relations between marginalized community members and researchers, while the research participants’ explorations, reflections, and actions can also become transformative for themselves and their communities in positive ways. As Mitchell et al. (2017) eloquently put it, the potential for social change is thus in the hands of research participants and their community since they have the necessary strengths and resources, and in the researchers establishing a relationship of trust to deepen their engagement in the community so as to carry out research alongside its members. (p. 22)

As social activists, the researcher and community members who undertake participatory visual research work in a collaborative way throughout the research process to enhance imagination, reflexivity, and self-expression, with a serious focus on bringing changes to their own communities. The transformative aspect of PVMs often results in the co-researchers changing and making unjust power relations embedded in specific social situations visible to the public. This participatory research process usually culminates in community members’ investment in spreading the new knowledge to a wider audience outside of academic boundaries, sharing the research findings with policymakers, families, teachers, and school administrators (Knowles & Cole, 2008). Reimagining Communities Through Participatory Arts-Based Inquiry. PVMs enact social activism with imagination to enhance the lives of community members and transform communities. In this vein, D’Amico et al. (2016) emphasized that PVMs might also be appropriate for research activists and/or artists who use arts-based inquiries to engage community members in a creative inquiry process that can generate a new vision for social change. Imagination is critical for enacting social justice. Greene (1995) eloquently

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

79

emphasized that “participatory involvement with many forms of art can enable us to see more in our experience, to hear more on normally unheard frequencies, to become conscious of what daily routines have obscured, what habit and convention have suppressed” (p.  123). When imagination is released, resistance can be enacted and social change attained. Inspired by the power of arts, sociologist O’Neill (2012) too underscored that when participatory arts-based inquiry is used to empower traditionally oppressed groups and incorporated in participatory/action research to enhance social justice, the potential transformative aspect of the arts can be evoked and put into action. O’Neill emphasized, art is also a way of overcoming barriers, challenging stereotypes, producing more complex knowledge, and creating safe spaces for dialogue to listen and communicate experience across linguistic and cultural divides. Research findings offer social and cultural impact…and participatory methods can also elicit economic impact too. (p. 169)

In line with O’Neill’s perspective, Finley (2008) also noted that participatory arts-based inquiry can become useful in giving voice and representation to marginalized groups, engaging marginalized community members with creative art activities, raising critical consciousness, and helping them imagine alternatives for re-building a “different” and better world. As a result of the research process, the artistic representation of a community’s struggles, needs, hopes, and vision for social change, as imagined by the research participants themselves, can then be shared with and accessed by other community members, including stakeholders for community and policy change. Moving beyond the dissemination of findings within a narrow academic audience, the culmination of participatory arts-based inquiry can stage “data” through museum or gallery exhibitions and/or community-based events, representing the views of community members with creativity. Such arts- or community-based exhibitions work as sites of public pedagogy to initiate meaningful dialogue among community members, educators, stakeholders, and policymakers. As bell hooks (1995) stressed, representation with imagination is “a crucial location of struggle for any exploited and oppressed people asserting subjectivity and decolonization of the mind” (p. 3). As creative research approaches, PVMs explore the sociocultural and lived worlds of marginalized populations and their knowledge, experiences, expertise, and concerns from their own viewpoints, bringing meaningful dialogue for social justice and transformation with imagination (Titchen & Horsfall, 2011). Flicker et al. (2014, p. 29) underscored, the very strength of using arts inquiry is that it reveals multiplicities, strengthens intersectional identities, creates accessibility, and tells the stories of those who have often been unheard or whose stories have been erased. The power of art is in its evocation of meaning, and in its ability to heal, to provoke, and to stimulate change. (p. 29)

80 

L. AZZARITO

Because of its potential to capture worldviews from the vantage point of research participants’ own experiences, participatory arts inquiry can thus be particularly useful in work with marginalized groups (e.g., Indigenous people, First Nations people, people of color, Aborigines, LGBTQIA+ community members, women, Latinx, and poor people) and/or research to struggle against anti-Asian and anti-Semitic violence and intolerance. As Flicker et al. (2014) maintained, often, the worldviews of individuals from historically marginalized populations that value “holistic interconnectedness, collaboration, reciprocity, spiritualist, and humility stand in stark contrast to Western notions of dichotomous thinking, rationality, and individualism” (p.  17). Working against neoliberal ideals of competition, individualism, self-determination, and self-responsibility, creating a research space with and for research participants who use imagination and social activism combined throughout the participatory visual research process can help community members reimagine their own worlds in their own cultural terms in meaningful ways (O’Neill, 2012). To advance a new vision for social change, PVMs promote critical consciousness (Freire, 1985); generate empathetic and reciprocal relations (Flicker et  al., 2014); work against stigmatization; and enable research participants to identify, voice, and express community problems and concerns (Mitchell et  al., 2017), helping them overcome negative stereotypes with new visions of education for social change. In this regard, Delgrado (2015) stressed that “visually based arts are particularly conducive for engendering empathy and helping participants to exercise social justice” (p. 40). Like Delgrado, more recently, activist scholars Capous-Desyllas and Mountz (2019) tackled homophobia and queer issues, asserting that “arts-based research takes academic knowledge and shares it with the community, diverse groups of people, and beyond, facilitating new ways of seeing and understanding lived experiences of LGBTQIA+ former foster youth” (p. 300). For extremely hidden populations, such as LGTBQIA+ youth of color, participatory arts-based inquiry can be therapeutic, empowering, and transformative for their communities, bringing a positive social change to their lives in their own communities. Reflexivity and Self-Expression. Expanding on central notions of inclusion, self-expression, community-building, social activism, collective representation, empathy, creativity, and empowerment, reflexivity is also a defining feature of PVMs. Reflexivity enhances the trustworthiness of the visual researcher, aiming to make the research process as well as the inquirer’s epistemological stance as transparent as possible. Recently, Mitchell (2015) suggested that “as a starting point in this work, we can begin with ourselves and our own reflections as researchers. What can we learn by looking inward, and how can we contribute to a cumulative body of knowledge about audience engagement through our own first-person reflexive accounts?” (p.  57). Likewise, Young (2015) pointed out that reflexivity as a crucial feature of PVMs problematizes the “intimate relationship between the researcher and researched,” and helps the visual researcher and participants “critically reflect on the methods they choose, the roles they play, and the power relationships

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

81

they create in the research setting” (p. 100). In PVMs, both community members and researchers engage in reflexivity, creating a research space for considering their lived experiences, community problems, and needs for social change thoughtfully. Expanding on Young’s (2015) viewpoint, Darroch and Giles (2014) defined reflexivity as a strategy that both researchers and research participants as co-researchers use to promote self-awareness throughout the research process, to become aware of power relations, to encourage questioning, and to understand how to enhance more equitable community practices and outcomes. In summary, key features of PVMs aim (1) to enhance reflexivity for social change; (2) to position community members as co-researchers, social activists, and/or co-producers of visual data; (3) to incorporate a participatory/action research component in the design (e.g., photo diary, video diary, photovoice, photojournalism); (4) to promote policy dialogue between the community and stakeholders or policymakers for social change; (6) to disseminate research findings through arts-based or photos exhibitions to engage the public and policymakers; and (7) to provoke collective action for social justice and social change. While PVMs include a range of research aims committed to social activism, the following section provides an overview of different methodological approaches to PVMs that position participants as co-researchers to investigate hidden social issues embedded in their communities.

Photo Diary, Video Diary, Photojournalism, Photovoice, and Fotonovela PVMs include a wide range of approaches defined as discovery and/or action research methods for social change. As Mitchell (2015) noted, “deepening an understanding of those making the images, and those engaging with the images, can offer an even richer picture for visioning and re-visioning research for social change” (p. 58). The following section discusses the wide range of methodological approaches to PVMs that position participants as co-­researchers to investigate hidden social relations and issues troubling them in their communities (Aldridge, 2007; Baker & Wang, 2006; Barrett, 2004; Becker, 1995; Burke, 2008; De Lange et  al., 2016; Hecht, 1998; Hubbard, 1991; Lee & Azzarito, 2020; Wang, 1999; Wang & Pies, 2004; Wang & Redwood-Jones, 2001). While research participants in photo diaries, video diaries, photovoice, and fotonovela decide what story to tell and how to represent it, the aims and methodological procedures among the various PVM approaches differ. Nevertheless, they all have the potential to transform the social conditions under which research participants live. Photo Diary, Photojournalism, and Video Diary. Among the various PVMs, the visual diary technique includes photo diaries or video diaries and has the capacity to engage research participants, eliciting meaning-making and interpretations of social injustices, inequities, and difficult emotions. The usefulness of the implementation of visual diaries as a research method to engage

82 

L. AZZARITO

and explore the experiences of underrepresented or vulnerable populations is well established in education (Burke, 2008; Noyes, 2004, 2008). The visual diary method does not simply record participants’ daily activities but has the dual capacity to both represent research participants’ concerns and generate empirical data. As a result of research participants’ active involvement in the research process, data produced by visual diaries does not offer certain knowledge claims about a “true” interpretation of the images. Rather, the participants’ emotional, sociocultural, and interpretative engagement with the visual data generated by the visual diaries opens up possibilities for multiple expressions, understandings, and interpretations. Because the visual diary method offers a personal, private, and intimate “forum” for recording, exploring, and expressing daily lives from the “ways of seeing” of the research participants (Burke, 2008, p. 28), visual researchers have primarily used visual diaries as a methodology to explore the complexity of the embodiment, sociocultural practices, schooling, daily reflexive accounts, identities, and social histories of the research participants (Arnold & Casellas Connors, 2021; Azzarito, 2012; Bates, 2013; Chaplin, 2004; Mizen, 2005; Noyes, 2004, 2008). With regard to the photo diary methodology, Mizen (2005, p. 125) emphasized that while “photographs alone tell us very little,” positioning research participants as “photo-diarists” enables research participants to record glimpses of their daily lives, revealing their cultures, contexts, embodiment, and emotions for social change. For instance, Mizen (2005) used a participant-­generated photograph approach and positioned children as photo-diarists in the context of the UK to open a “window on the world” (Drew & Guillemin, 2014, p. 56) of children’s working lives. This latter research showed how the visual diaries provided 69 working children with an engaging research tool to explore and document the unique personal, subjective, and contextualize dimensions of their work and employment. As Mizen (2015, p. 137) noted, “the very process of placing the children in the role of research photographers brought to the surface tensions and ambiguities in relations with employees that had only been hinted at before.” The findings that emerged from this study clearly revealed a humanizing dimension of children at work and established that children’s “light work” should not be underestimated. While child-generated photographs become a record or evidence of their own reality through the eyes of children, the images need to be named, represented, and situated by children themselves in their daily contexts. Similar to Mizen’s implementation of photo diaries with working children, Hecht’s (1998) use of photojournalism to document many “things” street children do in Northeastern Brazil offered a distinguished and humanizing series of photographs that countered the public portrayal of children as “troubling.” However, while the method of photojournalism has the ability to provide an important visual testimony about people’s lives, unlike Mizen’s (2005) use of photo diaries that aimed to probe working children’s subjective accounts, Hecht’s photojournalism method was primarily illustrative. In other words, Hecht’s photojournalism method aimed to let the photos “speak for themselves” about street children’s daily lives, intending to

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

83

stage how photos as data tell and make the story itself. However, Becker (1995) cautioned researchers who use photojournalism as a methodological tool to pay particular attention to how “to protect the integrity of the photograph itself” (p. 396) and that “control becomes an ethical issue, needed to preserve photojournalism’s status and to safeguard the credibility of the photograph as a document of reality” (p. 381). According to Becker (1998), when researchers use photojournalism for primarily illustrative purposes, this methodology calls for photojournalists to attend to issues of (mis)representation with caution. As photo diarists, research participants are invited to record their daily lives, picture important aspects of their identities, and reflect on their visual accounts, bringing to light the complexity, ambiguity, and fluidity of their personal and subjective experiences as embedded in the context of their daily lives. Importantly, to explore subjectivity, photo diaries are usually accompanied by descriptive verbal and/or written narratives (Chaplin, 2004). For example, Woodley-Baker (2009) positioned young women from low-income households in post-compulsory senior secondary school as research photographers to investigate how they constructed, negotiated, and represented multiple identities—moms, working parents, sole parents, homemakers, and secondary education students. In this study, young women’s photo diaries, accompanied by written accounts, provided a glimpse into the multilayered worlds they inhabited in their daily lives, highlighting the complexity and diversity of young women’s lives. In particular, Woodley-Baker (2009, p. 22) demonstrated how young women’s photo-narratives not only challenged policymakers’ definition of those young women labeled “at-risk” of dropping out of school but also provided an alternative view to policymakers’ normative, universal, and linear models of “growing up.” In unique ways, Woodley-Baker’s use of photo diaries offered an understanding of the nuanced conceptualizations of young women’s identities. Moreover, the heterogeneity of young women’s daily personal accounts of “growing up” undermined homogenizing views of youths’ transition to adulthood, opening up a new path for policymakers to redefine linear and simplistic models of “growing up.” More recently, also researching at-risk youth, Arnold and Casellas Connors (2021) employed a participant-­ generated Instagram approach to investigate the college experiences of underrepresented students. In this participatory visual study, the researchers invited college students to become co-researchers, positioning them as photo-diarists to create photos and audio-diary recordings to produce a counter-cultural use of Instagram. Defined as an “anti-Instagram” methodology, the researchers encouraged college students to avoid “curated images” and asked college students to create and post images that captured “frank” tales of their daily lives. The visual images combined with the audio-diary entries the participants generated not only created an inclusive space that centered student’s eye and student’s voice, but also promoted an engaging multi-voice dialogue among underrepresented college students. While Arnold and Casellas Connors’ (2021) use of the participant-generated Instagram photos and audio-diary method created a research space in which college students engaged in

84 

L. AZZARITO

empowering and meaningful dialogue, this anti-Instagram methodology was also particularly useful for recruiting and retaining low-income, first-­generation, and racially underrepresented students. When researchers use photo diaries as a photographic participatory method, the visual diary has the potential to actively involve individuals from marginalized and underrepresented groups and to engage individuals from vulnerable populations in more inclusive and therapeutic ways. Aldridge (2007), for instance, emphasized the social and therapeutic benefits of photographic participation employed with young people with learning disabilities. Like Aldridge’s argument, Mathers (2005) maintained that “people with learning disability respond well to methods [of visual communication] that allow them to be involved as an active contributor” (p.  5), creating an empowering research space that can transform negative self-concepts. Both Aldridge (2007) and Mathers (2005) positioned research participants with learning disabilities as “diarists,” enabling them to record something for themselves and give meanings and interpretations to the photos and narratives included in their personal diaries. As both studies demonstrated, the photo diary research method provided young people with learning disabilities not only an alternative mode of communication and self-expression but also a pedagogical means for others to gain an understanding of their lives, cultures, emotions, and embodiment. However, this photographic participatory methodology demands that education researchers carefully avoid misrepresentation and decontextualization of the photos by ensuring that visual diaries are deeply contextualized within the daily lives and personal narratives of the research participants. By looking at the photos critically, research participants feel actively involved in the research process in many ways: They feel validated throughout the research process, they feel inspired to explore subjective accounts, and they feel encouraged to problematize taken-for-granted daily practices. In other words, when the researcher implements a task-oriented activity, photo diaries can encourage research participants to consider the significance of what they are seeing in the photos in affirmative ways. Centering research participants throughout the photographic participatory process validates their experiences and brings therapeutic changes to the ways they see themselves. In this regard, using a photo diary approach to elicit emotions among individuals with HIV/AIDS, Thomas (2007) pointed out that the “diary-keeping process was found by some to be therapeutic and the involvement in the research has made them feel that their opinions were valid” (p. 80). Clearly, photo diaries exhibit autoethnographic features, including personal accounts represented through a collection of photos, drawings, or snapshots combined with written texts or videos that can be intimate, therapeutic, and transformative of research participants’ senses of self (Chaplin, 2004). Within the sociology of the body, education, and health, the photo diary method is also considered an innovative method because of its ability to address growing concerns of health disparities, especially impacting the embodiment of individuals from historically oppressed groups (Azzarito, 2012; Bates, 2013).

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

85

For instance, Azzarito (2011) gave high school students from low socioeconomic backgrounds digital cameras to record, picture, and represent their embodiment in the context of their daily lives. Positioned as student-­researchers, young people used digital cameras to create visual diaries entitled Moving in My World to express their thoughts, feelings, and ideas and to “speak for themselves” about their body knowledge. What Moving in the World meant to young people varied significantly based on differences in cultural background, gender, race, and social class, as well as disparity of access, choice, and opportunity for meaningful engagement in sites of physical culture. Imagining embodiment in their own terms, students’ visual diaries contextualized in the lives of students countered the public dominant discourse of healthism dictated by neoliberalism that framed them in negative terms as “unfit,” “lazy,” “inactive,” and “fat.” Unlike Azzarito’s (2012) photo diary research, Bates (2013) used a video diary method to explore the relationship between the body, health, and illness in everyday life. Both the photo diary and the video diary can offer useful participatory research methodologies to explore, record, and display a wide range of body practices, body experiences, sensations, and activities, from domestic to recreational and exercise practices. Video diaries, like photo diaries, do not intend to provide a “realistic tale” but to express the wide range of body performances of the everyday. However, unlike the photo diary method, Bates (2013) suggested that the video diary method can display the “moving images of the everyday” in motion and thus capture the “intangible aspects of bodily experience” in unique ways (Bates, 2013, p. 32). In this way, the video diary method might be particularly useful for presenting findings in more experiential, creative, and dynamic ways. Expanding on the participatory use of video diaries to explore embodiment for social justice in education, Holliday (2007, p. 255) suggested that video diaries can be used as a “queer methodology” to counter heteronormative bodies and heterosexist culture. Given that the body expresses the self, heterosexual culture can function as a powerful normalizing mechanism of the body in society, discriminating against queer-embodied subcultures. To transgress heteronormative ways of seeing the body, video diaries can then encode and decode the wide range of body practices that research participants who self-­ identify as queer take on, disrupting the fixed boundaries of heterosexist culture. Encouraging reflection on personal visual accounts, photo diaries or video diaries might, in different ways, offer significant empirical evidence, “different” visualities, and unique interpretations of subjective accounts (Noyes, 2004). Another key advantage of using the video diary method is to stimulate social imagination to explore the “unknown unknowns” and thus to understand how everyday life (e.g., families, household contexts, body practices) impacts research participants’ embodiment, dispositions of the habitus, and cultural capital (Noyes, 2008). This methodology creates a research space for video diarists to name, negotiate, and resist the heteronormative frame imposed on their bodies, affording video diarists a safe space to validate and represent

86 

L. AZZARITO

themselves in affirmative ways. In summary, photo diaries and video diaries are both useful methodologies when education researchers aim to picture the complexity of social injustices and/or difficult emotions, to record and express daily reflective accounts with imagination, to shed light on the humanizing dimension of research participants’ engagement with a specific issue, to conduct research with and for research participants from vulnerable groups in affirmative and therapeutic ways, and to capture and represent body performativity of the everyday in experiential, creative, and “moving” ways. Photovoice. Unlike the photo diary and video diary techniques, photovoice is a research method that captures the socio-educational knowledge, contextual issues, strengths, and resources of a specific community. In particular, photovoice positions community members as co-researchers to identify a community’s deficits and assets (Strack et al., 2004), with a focus on having an impact on policy and policymakers. Photovoice also brings visibility to hidden social identities and marginalized communities. Wang (1999) originally developed the photovoice method, a community-based participatory research method, to enable Chinese women to photograph the realities of their work and health in their everyday lives. Wang (1999) first conceptualized photovoice as a specific photographic technique used to enable participants to identify, represent, and provide suggestions for changing social issues embedded in their own communities. Expanding on her initial work, a few years later, Lopez et  al. (2005) described photovoice as “a process by which people can identify, represent, and enhance community” (p. 1). Drawing from Wang’s work, Keller et al. (2008) suggested that photovoice is a research method that encourages “participants to take photographs of themes important to them” (p. 429). Overall, the goal of photovoice is to enhance personal as well as social and educational benefits for community capacity building and social change. Photovoice aims to achieve three goals: “1) to record and reflect on their personal and community strengths and concerns; 2) to promote critical dialogue and knowledge about personal and community issues through group discussions of photographs; and 3) to reach policy makers” (Wang, 1999, p.  185). Expanding on Wang’s original work, Finney and Rishbeth (2006) described three main characteristics of photovoice: (1) to give voice to people otherwise marginalized from mainstream public discourses, (2) to empower research participants through the photovoice research process, and (3) to design an action/participatory research purpose. More recently, Delgrado (2015, p.  9) elucidated that photovoice is a useful participatory visual methodology for the following reasons: there is an immediacy to the rewards of taking pictures; 2) photography can be fun and an outlet for creativity; 3) photographs of familiar scenes and people can alter perceptions of social and physical context; 4) photography is relatively easy to learn and lends itself to use by a wide range of people; 5) a picture is worth a thousand words; 6) photographic images can be understood regardless of language, culture, literacy levels, or other factors; and 7) policy makers can’t deny reality when it’s staring them in the face. (p. 9)

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

87

In line with Delgrado’s (2015) viewpoint, Mitchell et al. (2016) summarized that the photovoice method creates opportunities for marginalized populations to “1) develop strategies to reach policy-makers; 2) critically reflect on the issues; and 3) develop strategies to reach policy-makers” (p.  244). For instance, “We live in the shadow” (Kaplan, 2008) photovoice study brings hidden stories to the surface, displaying a visual testimony of inner-city kids’ experiences of their schools, neighborhoods, and family life. As a participatory arts community-based project, “inner city kids tell their stories” (Kaplan, 2013) in a neighborhood of high poverty and use photography to reveal the hidden and harsh realities of poverty and exclusion, reaching out to the public for critical reflection and social change. Further, photovoice is a research methodology that emphasizes the intrinsic relationship between photo, voice, and “seeing,” opening up a wide range of empowering ways for research participants to “see” a problem and thus to offer alternative ways for the public to “look” at the issue. A “different” look at a problem can establish the need for policymakers to address the problem. For instance, using cellphilmmaking, Yang (2015) employed photovoice with young people in the context of South Africa to explore their responses to HIV-­ related issues, using social media as a site of public pedagogy to disseminate young people’s video production with policymakers and advocating for social change. The participatory video-making task resulted in a powerful tool of engagement for young people in an underserved school community and generated rich and thoughtful data. However, reflecting upon the research process, Yang (2015) cautioned researchers that young people’s self-generated visual data disseminated on social media requires adequate and careful provision of care and safety by adults. Especially when researchers deal with socially sensitive issues (e.g., drug abuse, HIV and AIDS, teen pregnancy) and/or with vulnerable populations, centering young people in the participatory research process calls for the researcher to work with and for young people with ethics of care. While participatory videos aim to reduce stigmatization, without cautious attention to the ways in which young people decide to represent themselves on social media, research participants’ video production might unintentionally reproduce stereotypes. To avoid unintentional misrepresentations, putting the themes and messages that emerged from photovoice’s research on display at public venues or exhibitions to share with community members, policymakers, and families needs careful consideration. As Fleming et al. (2009) noted, only with thoughtful curation does photovoice have the ability to capture a visual image in humanizing ways and then transform the image into a pedagogical vehicle for disseminating new information beyond the academic sphere among community members and policymakers for social change. Community-based research can also be beneficial to other marginalized populations, such as LGBTQ youth of color, whose voices and experiences continue to be hidden, excluded, and altered by the racialized heteronormative gaze. To respond to the absence of research on the voice of LGBTQ youth of color, recently Capous-Desyllas and Mountz (2019) employed a photovoice

88 

L. AZZARITO

methodology to explore the history, pathways, and life trajectories of youth before, during, and after foster care. This photovoice study aimed to bring to light and re-center the visual voices of LGBTQ youth of color to foster self-­ expression, collective representation, and community (dis)connections. Concerning findings emerged from this photovoice study: LGBTQ youth of color’s photos conveyed a deep sense of abandonment, betrayal, and rejection by family and captured a sense of dehumanization and voicelessness institutionalized in the foster care system. Obviously, without the support of a sense of family and a feeling of belonging to a caring community, LGBTQ youth of color experienced isolation, marginalization, and disconnection, and those experiences had a huge negative impact on their everyday life, including school life. However, despite their struggles, LGBTQ youth of color mobilized their agency to build upon these extremely difficult experiences with strength, resilience, and hope. Investing in the power of education to change their lives, LGBTQ youth of color actively inserted, organized, and represented themselves in their own school communities, reconstructing themselves in affirmative ways. Their investments in education resulted in powerful testimonies of overcoming socioemotional and mental health struggles and evidenced how “the significance of education in participants’ lives came up again and again in their photos. For those youth who had access, education was a source of resilience and empowerment” (Capous-Desyllas & Mountz, 2019, p. 294). For some populations often hidden in society, the use of photovoice also integrates a social justice research agenda and thus works as an empowering methodology for re-centering marginalized community members. In this way, in community-driven photovoice research, “visibility becomes a form of activism” (Allen, 2019, p. 75). For instance, drawing from critical disability studies in education, Mitchell et  al. (2016) employed a photovoice study with girls with disabilities in Vietnam to enable the “voices and bodies of excluded or marginalized persons to be heard and seen” (p. 249). This participatory aspect of photovoice provided young girls with a methodological tool to reframe their embodied identities, moving away from the mainstream notion of disability defined in deficit terms, constructing, staging, and performing their bodies with confidence. More recently, Allen (2019) argued that while from a medicalized paradigm, disabilities have been traditionally conceptualized as “deviant,” “abnormal,” or “inferior,” constructing the person with disability with stigma, the incorporation of the visual into participatory research projects sustains social justice practices, confronts ableism, and plays a huge role in changing this negative image. When a new vision emerges from photovoice, this new image can then become pedagogical in and outside of school, facilitating disability identity development in positive and empowering ways (Allen, 2019). In the photovoice research with girls with disabilities, as Mitchell and Summer (2016, p. 246) emphasized, “listen[ing] to what disabled people say,” along with visually driven messages on embodiment, brought to light the visual voice of girls and issues of exclusion and inclusion they face in their school life. While Mitchell and Summer’s (2016) photovoice study made girls’ experiences

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

89

of bullying, gender-based violence, and being expelled from school visible to the public, the photovoice project also provided girls with opportunities to reimagine and stage a “different” image of their performing body. This new image of girls with disabilities altered the normative image of ableism framed in negative terms and, moreover, gave girls the right to portray themselves how they wanted to be seen. Clearly, another advantage of the photovoice method is that it creates a research space for the visual voices of the research participants to emerge and be represented and expressed in authentic ways. The representation of the visual voices of young girls transforms the medicalized focus on the “deficit” of people with disabilities, circulating a new representation of young girls with disabilities that validates research participants’ identities in their own terms. Importantly, as Mitchell and Summer (2016) demonstrated, the visual voices of girls with disabilities challenged the dominant image of the body constructed upon ideals of normativity and ableism, opening up new and empowering images of girlhood. New ways of seeing girlhood disrupted ableist normative views and provided powerful evidence that supported advocacy for more critical disability studies in education. Fotonovela. Expanding on visual participatory methods, Kirova and Emme’s (2008) use of the fotonovela method with non-native speakers of English has shown significant promise for stimulating multiple expressions of voices and positions, raising cultural awareness, legitimating embodied ways of communicating, studying intercultural communication, and changing power relations established by English-speaking dominant culture (Emme, Kirova, & Cambre, 2006a; Emme, Kirova, Kamau, & Kosanovich, 2006b; Kirova & Emme, 2008). More recently, Hidalgo (2015) described fotonovela as a “traditional print medium with a long history in Spain, Italy, Portugal, Mexico, Latin America and the Caribbean” (p.  301) that uses “photo-based comics combining elements of written text, bubble dialogue captions, sequential photographs, and artistic alterations” (p. 300). While fotonovela has a long tradition in Latin America and Southern Europe, in the US, education researchers have used fotonovelas with Spanish-speaking immigrant populations as a methodological tool for “innovation in literacy and research” (p. 302) and as a culturally relevant methodological tool among the Latina/o community for critical public health research. According to Hidalgo (2015), fotonovela draws from activist research with an explicit social justice agenda, engages community members as collaborators, and offers a powerful methodological tool to research asset-based counter-narratives from the vantage points of immigrants, people of color, and poor people. To enhance intercultural communication in education, fotonovela implements a hybrid photo-image-text method, combining visual texts, embodied representations, and reflective performances with written texts. To explore non-verbal strategies that go beyond the literal, words-driven translation, fotonovela can be a useful methodological tool when researchers work with new immigrant students who do not share an English-speaking dominant culture and are suddenly immersed in a new language and in a new school they view as

90 

L. AZZARITO

“foreign.” For newcomers who are often “outsiders” of the dominant culture institutionalized in schools, fotonovela can create a research space for resistance and intercultural dialogue and a site of representation that validates multiple voices and generates new ways of knowing. In the context of school, the fotonovela research method positions research participants as “reporters” of their school lives and invites children and/or young people to create a hybrid photo-­ image-­text that can open up a more inclusive space for students not only to translate the verbal into visual representations according to their cultural heritages and native languages but also to promote and legitimate multiple expressions of voices. Given that the “Self-Other relationship and identity is typically situated in a context of an imbalance of power between majority and minority cultural groups” saturated by an English-speaking dominant culture (Kirova & Emme, 2008, p.  36), fotonovela can be particularly beneficial in a diverse school context because of its potential to destabilize hierarchical power relations through intercultural communication, to validate different languages and cultures, and to enhance polyvocality. In summary, fotonovela can work as a culturally relevant methodology in work with Latina/o communities and is particularly useful in research with newcomers and/or non-native English speakers in an English-speaking dominant school culture. In this way, as a research method, fotonovela can enhance intercultural communication, re-­ establish and balance power relations between a school’s dominant culture and minority cultural groups, and create more inclusive communities of learners.

Participatory Visual Methods for Humanizing Research With a methodological stance toward humanizing research, PVR is meant to be enabling, creative, humanizing, and transformative. Throughout the implementation of PVMs, education researchers must embrace dialogic consciousness-­ raising and build relationships of dignity, respect, and care with a commitment to work with and for oppressed and marginalized communities. The intent of PVMs is to transform and humanize rather than colonize those communities. The use of PVMs, however, demands that education scholars design theoretically informed inquiries, using a wide range of interpretative lenses for exploring community-based problems while “promoting dialogic consciousness-raising and the building of relationships of dignity and care for both researchers and participants” (Paris, 2011, p. 137). Drawing upon interdisciplinary, innovative, participatory, and performative-oriented research, PVR is rooted in decolonizing theories (e.g., queer theory, post-feminism, postcolonialism, Critical Race Theory (CRT), intersectionality, trans theory) with a commitment to work with oppressed and marginalized communities in meaningful and supportive ways. To foster humanizing research, PVMs offer opportunities for research participants to debunk negative stereotypes and/or counter identities with deficits to self-represent in constructive and positive ways and to reclaim marginalized identities of community members from a position of strength. Moreover, PVMs can be useful to a wide range of community members,

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

91

including researchers, families, young people, students, community activists, artists, and educators, who come together in the quest for mutual humanization (Freire, 1970) to connect to each other, to strengthen community, to tackle social inequalities, to connect to policymakers and stakeholders, and to suggest changes in their community from their own viewpoints. The viewpoints of community members become the “vantage point” from which the neoliberal view of “deficient institutions” is dismantled and the reconstruction of school communities as empowering institutions becomes possible. Working toward humanizing research, PVR problematizes traditional inquiries that colonize and look for deficits in marginalized communities. In contrast to objectifying and dehumanizing research participants framed by deficit paradigms, VPR embraces a strength-based approach to research with the specific educational goal of creating a “different” and more humanistic image of marginalized communities. While images historically used in the production of Western knowledge were deeply embedded in the racialized imagination of the imperial power of the West and functioned to uphold the Western superior civilization and its whiteness, VPMs create a humanizing research space to “research back,” “write back,” or “speak back” to Western ideological constructions of the Other (Mitchell et al., 2016). Against the dehumanization of the Other, VPMs work with “stereotypical subjects,” at-risk identities, and marginalized or vulnerable populations to promote purposeful decolonizing knowledge that might be transformative for members of those marginalized communities (O’Neill, 2012, p.  153). As Bessell et  al. (2007) emphasized, “the importance of providing participants with a ‘voice’ that not only validates their positions, ideas, experiences, and feelings but also substantiates that they have been ‘heard’ cannot be underscored enough” (p. 568). Through participatory visual or art-based inquiries, the visual voices of community members can come to the surface so that the public can “see” from the viewpoint of the Other. In this way, VPMs work to humanize research participants for transcending oppression, offer an affirmative space for moving beyond the deficit paradigm, and thus provide a new image of marginalized communities through positive lenses for highlighting strengths and possibilities for social change (Russell & Diaz, 2011). In conclusion, making room for decolonizing research in educational contexts calls for the implementation of PVMs with a focus on more humanistic, caring, emotionally sensitive, and interpersonal research approaches. Visual participatory research engages community members struggling with neighborhood change; holds a social justice focus; involves community members with dignity, respect, and caring; and positions community members as active agents to challenge, subvert, and reframe a neighborhood deficit discourse into a “neighborhood renewal” for social justice. In line with the goals of participatory research in community interventions (Darroch & Giles, 2014), VPMs can democratize knowledge; employ research to decolonize oppressed communities; use visual representations to counter negative stereotypes; and simultaneously affirm, validate, and represent the needs of community members in their

92 

L. AZZARITO

own culturally relevant terms. “Humanizing research” (Paris, 2011, p.  137) with, about, and for oppressed marginalized communities is at the very heart of PVMs, with the specific intent to avoid exploitation and, at the same time, to advance local community action for social change. As Paris (2011) asserted, humanizing research is a methodological stance which requires that our inquiries involve dialogic consciousness-­raising and the building of relationships of care and dignity for both researchers and participants. Although such a stance is important in all research, it is particularly important when researchers are working with communities who are oppressed and marginalized by systems of inequality based on race, ethnicity, class, gender, and other social and cultural categories. This ethical need for a humanizing stance emerges as both researchers and participants seek to push against inequities not only through the findings of research but also through the research act itself. (p. 140)

By embracing dialogic consciousness-raising and building relationships of dignity, respect, and care for all the co-researchers—including community members and researchers—the research space VPMs create becomes critical, humanizing, and transformative. To work against structural inequities, marginalization, and exploitation, the methodological posture of PVR intentionally humanizes research participants throughout the research process to foster a genuine, civil, and honest dialogue around community issues of interest, building relationships with research participants with dignity, ethics of care, and mutual respect.

References Aldridge, J. (2007). Picture this: The use of participatory photographic research methods with people with learning disabilities. Disabilities & Society, 22(1), 1–17. Allen, Q. (2019). Photographs and stories: Ethics, benefits and dilemmas of using participants photography with Black middle-class male youth. Qualitative Research, 12(4), 443–458. Arnold, K. D., & Casellas Connors, I. (2021). The ‘anti-Instagram’: Using visual methods to study the college experiences of underrepresented students. Visual Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/1472586X.2021.1893612 Azzarito, L. (2011). “What it was in my eyes”: Picturing youths’ embodiment in ‘real’ spaces. In C. Phoenix & B. Smith (Eds.), The world of physical culture in sport and exercise – Visual methods for qualitative research (pp. 209–228). Routledge. Azzarito, L. (2012). Photography as a pedagogical tool for shedding light on ‘bodies-­ at-­risk’ in physical culture. Visual Studies, 27(3), 295–309. Baker, T., & Wang, C. (2006). Photovoice: Use of a participatory action research method to explore the chronic pain experience of adults. Qualitative Health Research, 16, 1405–1413. Barrett, D. (2004). Photo-documenting the needle exchange: Methods and ethics. Visual Studies, 19(2), 145–149.

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

93

Bates, C. (2013). Video diaries: Audio-visual research methods and the elusive body. Visual Studies, 28(1), 29–37. Becker, H. S. (1995). Visual sociology, documentary photography, and photojournalism: It’s (almost) all a matter of context. Visual Sociology, 10(1-2), 5–14. Becker, H. S. (1998). Forward: Images, ethics and organizations. In L. Gross, J. Kats, & J. Ruby (Eds.), The moral rights of subjects in photographs, films, and television (pp. xi–xvii). Oxford University Press. Bessell, A., Deese, W. B., & Medina, A. L. (2007). Photolanguage. How a picture can inspire a thousand words. American Journal of Evaluation, 28(4), 558–569. Burke, C. (2008). “Play in focus.” Children’s visual voice in participative research. In P. Thompson (Ed.), Doing Visual Research with children and young people (pp. 1–19). Routledge. Capous-Desyllas, M., & Mountz, S. (2019). Using photovoice methodology to illuminate the experiences of LGTBQ former foster youth. Child & Youth Services, 40(3), 267–307. Chaplin, E. (2004). My visual diary. In C. Knowles & P. Sweetman (Eds.), Picturing the social landscape: Visual methods and the sociological imagination (pp.  35–49). Routledge. D’Amico, M., Denov, M., Khan, F., Linds, W., & Akesson, B. (2016). Research as intervention? Exploring the health and well-being of children and youth facing global adversity through participatory visual methods. Global Public Health: An international Journal for Research, Policy and Practice, 11(5-6), 528–545. Darroch, F., & Giles, A. (2014). Decolonizing health research: Community-based participatory research and postcolonial feminist theory. The Canadian Journal of Action Research, 15(3), 22–36. De Lange, N., Nguyen, X. T., & Nghiem, T. T. (2016). Creating dialogue on inclusion in Vietnam: Girls with disabilities exhibiting their work. Girlhood Studies, 9(1), 104–117. Delgrado, M. (2015). Urban youth and photovoice: Visual ethnography in action. Oxford University Press. Drew, S., & Guillemin, M. (2014). From photographs to findings: Visual meaning-­ making and interpretative engagement in the analysis of participant-generated images. Visual Studies, 29(1), 54–67. Emme, M., Kirova, A., & Cambre, C. (2006a). Collaborative storytelling: Researching the spaces between image, text and body. Exposure, 39(2), 45–51. Emme, M., Kirova, A., Kamau, O., & Kosanovich, S. (2006b). Ensemble research: A means for immigrant children to explore peer relationships through fotonovela. Alberta Journal of Research in Education, 52, 160–182. Finley, S. (2008). Arts-based research. In J. G. Knowles & A. L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the arts in qualitative research (pp. 71–82). Sage Publications. Finney, N., & Rishbeth, C. (2006). Engaging with marginalized groups in public open space research: The potential collaboration and combined methods. Planning Theory & Practice, 7(1), 27–46. Fleming, J., Mahoney, J., Carlson, E., & Engebretson, J. (2009). An ethnographic approach to interpreting a mental illness photovoice exhibition. Archives of Psychiatric Nursing, 23(1), 16–21.

94 

L. AZZARITO

Flicker, S., Danforth, J., Wilson, C., Oliver, V., Larkin, J., Restoule, J-P., Mitchell, C., Konsmo, E., Jackson, R., & Prentice, T. (2014). “Because we have really unique art”: Decolonizing research with Indigenous youth using the arts. International Journal of Indigenous Health, 10, 1, 16-34. Freire, P. (1985). The politics of education: Culture, power and liberation. Bergin & Garvey. Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum. Giroux, H. A. (2003). Public pedagogy and the politics of resistance: Notes on a critical theory of educational struggle. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 35(1), 5–16. Greene, M. (1995). Releasing the imagination. Essays on education, the arts, and social change. Jossey-Bass. Guillemin, M., & Drew, S. (2010). Questions of process in participants-generated visual methodologies. Visual Studies, 25(2), 175–188. Hecht, T. (1998). At home in the street: Street children in north east Brazil. Cambridge University Press. Hidalgo, L.  A. (2015). Augmented fotonovelas: Creating new media as pedagogical and social justice tools. Qualitative Inquiry, 21(3), 300–314. Holliday, R. (2007). Performances, confessions, and identities: Using video diaries to research sexualities. In G. C. Stanczak (Ed.), Visual research methods. Image, society, and representation (pp. 255–280). Sage Publications. hooks, b. (1995). Art on my mind. Visual politics. The New Press. Hubbard, J. (1991). Shooting back: A photographic view of life by homeless children. Chronicle Books. Kaplan, E. B. (2008). “We live in the SHADOW”: Inner-city kids tell their stories through photographs. Temple University Press. Keller, C., Fleury, J., Perez, A., Ainsworth, B., & Vaughan, L. (2008). Using visual methods to uncover context. Qualitative Health Research, 18, 428–436. Kirova, A., & Emme, M. (2008). Fotonovela as a research tool in image-based participatory research with immigrant children. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 7(2), 35–57. Knowles, J.  G., & Cole, A.  L. (Eds.). (2008). Handbook of the arts in qualitative research. Sage Publications. Lee, J., & Azzarito, L. (2020). Creating Thirdspace Physical Culture for, with, and about Recent Immigrant Girls: Instagram as a Space of Marginalization and Resistance. Journal of Teaching Physical education. https://doi.org/10.1123/ jtpe.2019-­0232 Liou, A. L., & Literat, I. (2020). “We need you to listen to us”: Youth activist perspectives on intergenerational dynamics and adult solidarity in youth movements. International Journal of Communication, 14(3), 4662–4682. Literat, I., & Markus, S. (2020). ‘Crafting a way forward’: Online participation, craftivism and civic engagement in Ravelry’s Pussyhat Project group. Information, Communication & Society, 23(10), 1411–1426. Lopez, E.  D. S., Eng, E., Robinson, N., & Wang, C.  C. (2005). Photovoice as a community-­based participatory research method. A case study with African American breast cancer survivor in Rural Eastern North Carolina. In B.  A. Israel, E.  Eng, A.  J. Schulz, & E.  A. Parker (Eds.), Methods in community-based participatory research for health (pp. 370–392). Jossey-Bass Imprint. Mathers, A. (2005). Participation of people with learning disabilities in the landscape design process of urban green space. University of Sheffield Department of Landscape.

5  PARTICIPATORY VISUAL RESEARCH FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT… 

95

McIntyre, A. (2003). Through eyes of women: Photovoice and participatory research as tools for reimagining place. Gender, Place and Culture, 10(1), 47–66. Mitchell, C. (2015). Looking at showing: On the politics and pedagogy of exhibiting in community-based research and work with policy makers. Educational Research for Social Change, 4(2), 48–60. Mitchell, C., & De Lange, N. (2011). Community-based participatory video and social action in Rural South Africa. In E. Margolis & L. Pauwels (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Visual Research Methods (pp. 171–185). Sage Publications. Mitchell, C., de Lange, N., & Nguyen, X. T. (2016). Visual ethics with and through the body: The participation of girls with disabilities in Vietnam in a photovoice project. In J. Coffey, S. Budgeon, & H. Cahill (Eds.), Learning bodies. The body in youth and childhood studies (pp. 241–258). SpringerNature. Mitchell, C., & Summer, M. (2016). Participatory visual methodologies in global public health. Global Public Health: An International Journal for Research, Policy and Practice, 11(5-6), 521–527. Mitchell, C., De Lange, N., & Moletsane, R. (2017). Participatory visual methodologies. Social change, community and policy. Sage. Mizen, P. (2005). A little ‘light work’? Children’s images of their labour. Visual Studies, 20(2), 124–139. Noyes, A. (2004). Video diary: A method for exploring learning dispositions. Cambridge Journal of Education, 34(2), 193–209. Noyes, A. (2008). Using video diaries to investigate learner trajectories: researching the ‘unknown unknowns’. In P. Thomson (Ed.), Doing visual research with children and young people (pp. 132–145). Routledge. O’Fallon, L.  R., Tyson, F.  L., & Dearry, A. (2000). Successful models of community-­ based participatory research: Final report. National Institute of Environmental Health sciences. O’Neill, M. (2012). Ethno-mimesis and participatory arts. In S. Pink (Ed.), Advances in visual methodology (pp. 153–172). Sage Publications. Packard, J. (2008). ‘I’m gonna show you what it’s really like out there’: The power and limitation of participatory visual methods. Visual Studies, 23(1), 63–77. Paris, D. (2011). “A friend who understand fully”: Notes on humanizing research in a multiethnic youth community. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 24(2), 137–149. Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies. An introduction to researching with visual methods. Sage publications. Russell, A. C., & Diaz, N. D. (2011). Photography in social work research: Using visual image to humanizing findings. Qualitative Social Work, 12(4), 433–453. Strack, R. W., Magill, C., & McDonaugh, K. (2004). Engaging youth through photovoice. Health Promotion Practice, 5(1), 49–58. Thomas, F. (2007). Eliciting emotions in HIV/AIDS research: A diary-based approach. Area, 39, 74–82. Titchen, A., & Horsfall, D. (2011). Creative research landscapes and gardens. Creative Spaces for Qualitative Researching Practice. Education, Work and Society, 5(1), 35–44. Wang, C. C., & Pies, C. A. (2004). Family, maternal, and child health through photovoice. Maternal and Child Health Journal, 8(2), 95–102. Wang, C. C., & Redwood-Jones, Y. A. (2001). Photovoice ethics: Perspectives from flint photovoice. Health Education & Behavior, 28(5), 560–572.

96 

L. AZZARITO

Wang, C.  W. (1999). Photovoice: A participatory action research strategy applied to women’s health. Journal of Women’s Health, 8(2), 185–192. Woodley-Baker, R. (2009). Private and public experience captured: Young women capture their everyday lives and dreams through photo-narratives. Visual Studies, 24(1), 19–35. Yang, K.-H. (2015). Voice, authenticity and ethical challenges: The participatory dissemination of youth-generated visual data over social media. Visual Studies, 30(3), 309–318. Young. (2013). Participatory video and reflexivity: The experiences of eight adult learners. (Unpublished doctoral dissertations). Montreal, Canada, McGill University.

CHAPTER 6

Visual Ethnography of Decolonization from “Salvage Ethnography” to the “Ethnographic Turn” Historically rooted in anthropology, ethnography as a research method uses photos and extensive observations to produce knowledge about “Other” cultures around the world (Sikes, 2015), aiming to provide detailed observations and descriptions of non-Western people’s cultural patterns of behavior, social practices, values, and customs (Barrantes-Elizondo, 2019; Erickson, 2018). The early form of ethnography can be traced back to nineteenth-century European colonialism, with Christian missionaries’ work on “primitive” populations as well as travelers’, explorers’, and merchants’ colonial descriptions of the “savage” (Kazubowski-Houston & Magnat, 2018). According to Erickson (2018), early ethnographers defined ethnography as “writing about people” (p. 36) by recording “descriptive accounts of the lifeways of particular local sets of people who lived in colonial situations around the world” (p. 38). In the historical context of European civilization, anthropologists used ethnography as a qualitative research method to explore and describe the social practices of “illiterate” non-Western, Indigenous, and American Indian populations “objectively” for the advancement of Western knowledge. The members of non-Western communities were observed and scrutinized with “scientific tales,” “realist tales,” or “absolute truths,” described from the standpoint of the European White male researcher as Other people. In nineteenth-century British imperialism, for instance, European anthropologists used photography as a form of colonialism to picture Other people and classify “different” cultures around the world, producing gendered, classed, and racialized epistemologies that were “culturally bound in their inception of Western ways of knowing” (Goopy & Kassan, 2019, p.  6). Historically in the domain of anthropology, the white male ethnographer occupied the position of the Western connoisseur and conducted research around the world to investigate Otherness, positioning Other cultures as “different” from the White European culture. Drawing from historical anthropology and

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_6

97

98 

L. AZZARITO

early ethnography, scientific tales not only functioned to carry out the classification of culture through Eurocentric lenses but also worked as a strategy of colonial governmentality to construct the Other as “different” in negative terms: “primitive,” “savage,” “uncivilized,” or “inferior” to the White male European. Obviously, the early forms of ethnographic research were not written for the Other people who had been researched but for a Eurocentric academic and upper-class audience. In fact, the aim of early ethnography was to explore, scrutinize, and categorize “difference” as inferior to Whiteness, staging the new knowledge about Other people back in European museums and intellectual circles. For instance, in historical ethnography, both Flaherty’s Nanook of the North (1922) and the fieldwork of anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski (1922, 1929) in Trobiand Island in Papua New Guinea exemplify colonialist work that implicitly “Othered” Indigenous populations. In the American context, too, photography in ethnographic work was a racialized and gendered research practice. Knowles (2006) explained: Cameras, available from 1840, were used in the generation of anthropological fieldwork knowledge to inventory non-Western cultures and people, and in the American South “negroes” appeared in the poor settlements of plantation economies and in depiction of phenotype, fundamental elements in building and maintaining racial hierarchies informing legal and scientific knowledge around 1900. Lynching photographs validated and valorized the mutilation of black bodies in the Jim Crow South and were part of their production as spectacle. Encounters between race and photography “documented” a highly constructed vision of blackness as object of a white gaze and formed the visual archive of American “race” and British anthropological theory. (p. 514)

Further, Harper (2003) noted that the historical use of anthropological photography aimed to offer realist or objective pictures of non-Western populations, and, moreover, pictures of the Other were informed by colonial ideologies and theories such as Social Darwinism and the human Eugenics movement. To advance Western epistemologies, the White male European ethnographer used his “authoritative voice” to identify, describe, and classify Otherness in the eye of Eurocentrism, implicitly sustaining Whiteness while upholding the hierarchical racialized and gendered relationship between the researcher and participants. Since colonial imperialism, ethnography has evolved significantly. The mainstream forms of ethnography research produced through the early 1900s until the 1950s that used photography, video, and fieldwork as methodological means of scrutinizing, classifying, and recording Othered populations are today defined as “salvage anthropology” or “salvage ethnography” (van den Scott, 2018, p.  722). While early anthropology used images as representations of “different” cultures in Eurocentric terms, later beginning with the 1960s, ethnography has progressed from an emphasis on documentary studies to visual ethnography as a visual method (Collier, 1967; Collier & Collier, 1986). In the

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

99

following decades, visual sociologists started to incorporate images into the research process, using photo-elicitation to explore the research participants’ meaning-making of everyday life (Bloustien, 2003; Marion, 2010; Pink, 2013). In other words, visual ethnography has progressed from an emphasis on the anthropological use of documentary studies to the recognition of the polysemic nature of images in terms of multiple meaning-making, interpretations, and storytelling of the everyday (Harper, 2003). Since the 1980s, the “crisis of representation” of post-positivist research has marked an “ethnographic turn,” instigating epistemological challenges to the authoritative position of the ethnographer and advancing critical interrogations of (mis)representation of conventional ethnographic scientific tales, realistic tales, or absolute truths. Aligned with the postmodern subversion of absolute truths in the humanities and social sciences, traditional ethnography confronted new critical questions that aimed to problematize notions of certainty, objectivity, identity, subjectivity, and realist accounts (Kazubowski-Houston & Magnat, 2018). While traditional ethnography was informed by positivistic paradigms, with the ethnographic turn, cultural studies scholars reoriented ethnography toward a more social justice– oriented research methodology. New forms of ethnography informed by constructivist and critical research paradigms emerged in the late 1990s to deal with critical questions of (mis)representation, identity, power, reflexivity, and Western epistemological hegemony. The postmodern “ethnographic turn” of the 1990s problematized the Western colonizing position of the traditional ethnographer and, further, contested the dominance of the Western knowledge system, including its ontology, epistemology, and theories. With the ethnographic turn, the bodies/ politics of Otherness constructed around the axes of race, social class, sex, disability, and gender are made visible, while Whiteness is unmasked, named, and problematized (Knowles, 2006). Today, embracing a social justice–oriented research agenda in the current neoliberal landscape of education, “doing visual ethnography” (Pink, 2013, p.  5) calls for ethnographies of decolonization (Sikes, 2015), including historical inquiries and multisensory and visual forms of research engagement with the intent to engage with hard-to-reach communities meaningfully. In general, this chapter aims to explore possibilities for the imaginative, critical, and meaningful use of visual ethnography for decolonizing goals. To accomplish these aims, first, the chapter suggests that to fully explore the microsociology of daily life for social justice aims, visual ethnography of decolonization demands that researchers extend the use of the visual as a primary source of data to other sensory forms of data, embracing multisensory and embodied methodologies. The second section contends that to generate anticolonial work in education, researchers’ use of visual ethnography needs to commit to “collaborative seeing” (Restler & Luttrell, 2018, p. 456) and incorporate images in combination with other sensory modes as a source of data to explore the sociocultural, political, and economic dimensions of hard-to-reach communities for social change. The conclusion of the chapter draws attention to how visual ethnographies of decolonization integrate visuals

100 

L. AZZARITO

as “cultural probes” (Goopy & Kassan, 2019, p.  7) into the ethnographical argument to challenge the Western normal/Other binary with subversive imagination (Becker, 2013), placing “Otherness” in relation to culture at the heart of the research design to reimagine Otherness in education within a framework of cultural diversity in creative ways.

Toward More Embodied and Multisensory Visual Ethnography for Cultural Transformation Since the “ethnographic turn,” visual ethnography as a research methodology has traveled toward more sensitive, embodied, experimental, multisensory, and social justice–oriented forms of ethnographic practices for cultural transformation. Photography in ethnography is no longer used as an anthropological means of portraying social realities that are “different” from a Western Eurocentric White culture. Today, visual ethnographers employ photography as a decolonizing methodological tool to destabilize the authority of the researcher established in early ethnography, cultivating partnerships with participants; to integrate the visual into the ethnographical argument to challenge the Western construction of the normal/Other binary; to reveal Whiteness at the intersection of other social categories; to center and highlight research participants’ narratives and experiences from their own cultural standpoints; and to generate decolonizing theories for social change and cultural transformation. In particular, Harper (2003) maintained that visual ethnography intentionally interrogates the “visualist bias” constructed around the history of Western science to work against colonial essentialization and to problematize the traditional “authority of the anthropological voice” (p.  243). Recently, Kazubowski-Houston and Magnat (2018) suggested that ethnography as a research methodology, with its unique focus on lived experience, contextual analysis, and its commitment to cultivating deep and long-term ethnographer–interlocutor relationships, has become acutely relevant to the growing transdisciplinary concerns over the relationship between knowledge and power and the ethics of academic research. (pp. 381–382)

Expanding on Kazubowski-Houston and Magnat’s (2018) viewpoint, stressing the collaborative stance of visual ethnography, other methodologists have suggested that to uncover context and bring oppressed cultures to light, the integration of images as primary sources of data in ethnography enables the researcher, in collaboration with the participants, to explore, capture, and represent the wide range of subjective meaning-making (Bloustien, 2003; Marion, 2010; Pink, 2013). Further, Pink (2013) theorized visual ethnography as a methodology approach useful for capturing the process of knowledge-making over the course of the ethnographic inquiry, linking extensive fieldwork to relevant images of people’s daily lives, experiences, histories, contexts, and

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

101

memories. In particular, Pink (2013) maintained that visual ethnography is a place-making research methodology that uses visual data as a primary source of data—including photography, film, web-based images, photo essays, drawing, and arts—to uncover and generate participants’ deep and reflective subjective accounts as intimately connected to places and spaces of their everyday lives. With an anticolonial stance, building upon Pink’s (2013) work, visual ethnography of decolonization aims to open up a sociocultural and critical research space for engendering interlocutor relationships as well as conversations and interpretations about images produced by the researcher and/or the research participants. Visual ethnography of decolonization engages research participants in “imaginative actions” (Trafi-Prats, 2009, p. 19), creating a “forum for the active construction of meanings” (Schwartz, 1989, p.  143) for cultural transformation. Such a social justice–oriented forum offers a generative space for research participants’ construction of fluid, multiple, and contradictory meanings as well as unexpected responses that are dependent on their embodied experiences as emplaced in the daily cultural practices of their own communities. To explore, represent, and share social practices, meanings, embodied identities, and representations as emergent from the “ethnographic place” (Pink, 2014, p. 421), visual researchers’ recognition of the polysemic nature of images in terms of multiple meaning-making and interpretations is also central to visual ethnography of decolonization. With an explicit focus on decolonizing research practices, the incorporation of images in the ethnographic research process can take a wide range of forms, collecting visual data to record and represent complex behavior, different attitudes, and the heterogeneity and diversity of the research participants’ everyday practices. From this perspective, because the embodied identities of research participants are intimately bound to the cultural realities of their own environments, researchers employ ethnography of decolonization to “absorb data through engaged listening” by “immersing themselves in participants’ lived realities, to develop familiarity with norms, practices, and socio-cultural contexts that cannot be obtained from other more commonly used methodologies” (Lenette & Boddy, 2013, p. 74). Visual ethnography of decolonization creates an engaging image-based space for the research participants to look “through photographs’” eyes (Schwartz, 1989, p. 121), eliciting culturally relevant narratives and shedding light on multiple meanings about their everyday practices with the intent to reveal hidden social realities. In thinking about the usefulness of the visual for decolonizing aims, Harper (2003) also noted that visual ethnography offers a valuable approach to put forward subtle yet reflective and persuasive arguments for social justice, collaging photo-narratives into written fieldwork narratives. As Pink (2013) eloquently noted, “visual ethnography does not necessarily involve simply recording what we can see, but also offers ethnographers routes through which to come to understand those very things that we cannot see” (p.  38). Similar to Pink’s viewpoint, Trafi-Prats (2009) suggested that as a decolonizing methodology, visual ethnography reconsiders its historical

102 

L. AZZARITO

anthropological commitment to a “language-centric” orientation by shifting away from written forms of early ethnography that historically colonized “Other” languages. Visual ethnography of decolonization intentionally moves toward exploring, imagining, and representing cultures in ways that cannot be accessed only by extensive written fieldwork. Today, as Powell (2010) pointed out, “visual ethnographers mix images with text, as text supplies a narrative or descriptive context and thus becomes interactive with an image, contributing to the production of ethnographic meaning” (pp. 50–51). Multisensory Ethnography. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in multisensory approaches to ethnography (Pink, 2014). Expanding on the use of the visual as a primary source of data to include sensory forms of data, today’s use of visual ethnography of decolonization calls for a multisensory form of engagement with research to fully explore the microsociology of daily life for social change. To capture the complexity of human embodiment, practices, and traditions and thus produce rich data, researchers must complement the visual as the primary source of data with other sources of data. The visual, combined with other forms of data, captures the multisensory aspects of experience to generate an understanding of the human perception as multisensory. Given that the purpose of visual ethnography is to explore and shed light on the life worlds, places, and spaces of the human practices of everyday life and embodied actions of people, Pink (2011) contended that the ethnographer’s engagement with the wide range of sensory modes, such as auditory, tactile, olfactory, and kinesthetic, greatly adds to the current visually centric model of ethnography. In this way, a visual-sensory approach to ethnography might capture “different” cultural encounters, human practices, and body interactions of the environment more accurately, combining multisensory data with visual data to generate new ways of seeing and embodied knowing. However, Morris (2017) noted that when researchers conduct ethnographic research with visually impaired research participants, using methodologies that depend on non-visual modes is key. While today’s ocularcentrism has a huge impact on embodied identities, in research with visually impaired students, relying on other sensory modes can capture non-visual senses, generating non-­ Western ways of knowing. Visually centric methodologies combined with multisensory approaches have the ability to represent the complexity of the embodied nature of the human experience of everyday lives, with a clear focus on decolonizing the Western body/mind duality still institutionalized in education (Shilling, 2003). The anticolonial stance of visual ethnography, however, is also central to shedding light on the embodiment of people from marginalized groups—the Other’s multisensory ways of knowing and seeing. Visual ethnography of decolonization with a focus on the everyday environment investigates and problematizes concepts of place, space, marginalization, exclusion, embodiment, movement, and sociality in relation to Otherness and structural inequalities as emplaced in a particular context. In the “making of place” (Pink, 2008, p. 178), multisensory visual ethnography has the capability to explore “how

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

103

human practices of everyday life, performance and imagination are implicated in the production of both material and sensory realities and a phenomenological sense of place” (Pink, 2008, p.  178). In the microsociology of a place, “walking, movement, and placemaking” and “being there” (Lee & Ingold, 2006, p. 67) all represent central multisensory research practices for exploring human embodiment, but “our gaze, prompted by the experience of our own body, will discover in all other ‘objects’ the miracle of expression” (Merleau-­ Ponty, 1945, p. 197). While researchers’ exploration of “how human practices of everyday life, performance, and imagination are implicated in the production of both material and sensory realities and a phenomenological sense of place” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, p.  178) is central to producing multisensory ways of knowing, determining what it means to be emplaced in the world from the viewpoint of the Other calls for an anticolonial stance. Visual ethnography of decolonization demands that social justice ethnographers explore how individuals from marginalized groups are culturally situated as human beings in the local contexts of their daily lives; how their experiences, feelings, thoughts, native language(s), and embodiments are contingent upon and intimately connected to a place and space; and how their “sensuous interrelationship of body-­ mind-­environment” (Howes, 2005, p. 7) is shaped by their culture in relation to Otherness. While multisensory visual ethnography has the capability to portray how people perceive the world around them, when ethnographers incorporate anticolonial work into their methodology, researchers’ use of visual ethnography of decolonization can generate multisensory ways of knowing from the embodied experience of non-Western people. Thus, visual ethnography of decolonization demands that ethnographers not only develop an intersubjective relationship with the research participants but also see themselves as “being emplaced” with research participants in their own cultural environment. Like the research participants, visual ethnographers are deeply entangled in the place-making research process. As Pink (2011, 2014) suggested, there is a need for ethnographers to learn how to become attuned to “the impact of the full range of the senses on interactions between people, spaces, and places” (p. 1). In other words, it is critical for ethnographers who practice decolonizing research to see themselves as emplaced in the research context, learning how to become attuned to “Other” research participants’ everyday practices, cultures, and ways of being. In this way, the ethnographer’s use of the visual, combined with multisensory approaches, provides the methodological tools to explore how the embodied selves of the participants from marginalized groups, intertwined with the researcher’s “being there,” are emplaced in the research environment (Figs.  6.1 and 6.2). Methodologically, visual ethnography of decolonization is a “place-making process” (Pink, 2008, p. 175) through which the researcher co-shares multisensory research practices (e.g., photographing, walking, talking, feeling, smelling, listening to, sensing, perceiving, interacting, eating, cooking, imagining) with the research participants, capturing how the cultural practices are enacted, performed, and co-experienced in a particular research environment.

104 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 6.1  BEING THERE, 2016. Frogner Park in Oslo, Gustav Vigeland’s sculptures. (Source: Author’s photo)

In other words, visual ethnography of decolonization demands that the ethnographer adopt a collaborative stance, critical eyes, reflexivity, and multisensory forms of engagement with the participants’ “being there” in places and spaces of everyday life.

“Collaborative Seeing” with Hard-­to-Reach Communities In the current neoliberal landscape of education, there is an urgent need to employ visual ethnography of decolonization to research and understand the daily practices, embodiments, and needs of individuals from traditionally oppressed groups in hard-to-reach communities (Goopy & Kassan, 2016, 2019; Isaac & Bernstein, 2021; Kassan et  al., 2020). Visual ethnography of decolonization employs collaborative methodologies (Barrantes-Elizondo, 2019; Lenette & Boddy, 2013) and uses images in combination with other sensory modes as a source of data (Pink, 2008) to explore the sociocultural, political, and economic dimensions of hard-to-reach communities for social

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

105

Fig. 6.2  BEING THERE, 2016. Frogner Park in Oslo, Gustav Vigeland’s sculptures. (Source: Author’s photo)

change. Conceptualized as a place-based research methodology with a focus on social justice, visual ethnography of decolonization uses multisensory, collaborative, and creative approaches for researching with hard-to-reach communities to generate decolonizing knowledge. In research with hard-to-reach communities, there are four key aspects of visual ethnography of decolonization: (1) creating “collaborative seeing,” (2) positioning research participants as “critical observers,” (3) researching with hard-to-reach communities for social change, and (4) placing “understanding and knowing otherness” (Goopy & Kassan, 2019, p. 3) at the center of the research design. The following sections discuss these four key aspects. “Collaborative Seeing.” Creating a collaborative research space with the intent to generate a solid research partnership between the research participants and the ethnographer is the first key aspect of visual ethnography of decolonization. Inspired by social justice aims, the visual ethnographer strives

106 

L. AZZARITO

to see, listen to, and create photo-narratives in participants’ own cultural terms as intimately connected to the social fabric of their communities, attempting to eliminate power imbalances and tensions (Luttrell, 2000, 2016). Likewise, Pink (2013) emphasized: Visual ethnographers who are seeking to bring about change through their work tend to engage participants in video projects that enable them to reflect on their own circumstances in useful ways, while at the same time are seeking to bring critical or revealing arguments to the general public or to groups in authority or with the power to make change. (p. 117)

To engage with and help research participants in hard-to-reach communities document practices of the everyday, visual ethnography of decolonization aims to capture culture in relation to Otherness as it would naturally occur in a specific context, committing to “collaborative seeing” to preserve the meanings co-constructed by the researcher and research participants (Restler & Luttrell, 2018, p. 455). Ethnographers’ seeking to establish a solid research partnership with hard-to-reach communities, bringing the research participants and visual ethnographer together in “collaborative seeing” can subvert the Other’s deficit frame, disrupt normative discourses of at-risk communities, and possibly forward a social discourse of “beautification” or “positive gentrification” (Isaac & Bernstein, 2021, p. 1146) that emphasizes community strengths as well as the community’s needs for social and structural changes. To this point, Barrantes-Elizondo (2019) underscored that decolonizing research practices calls for researchers’ engagement with a process of “cultural immersion” that enables ethnographers in collaboration with research participants “to read cultural experience and interpret visual text” (p. 4). As a result of cultural immersion, the ethnographer’s and participants’ collaborative seeing can generate a wide range of unanticipated responses triggered by relevant images, offering in-depth cultural insights into community dynamics, people’s relationships, power dynamics, and perceptions of events, places, spaces, and cultural practices. Further, this cultural immersion not only destabilizes the “authority of the anthropological voice” (Harper, 2003, p. 243) but also aims to create a solid research partnership between the ethnographer and the research participants. Enacting collaborative seeing in visual ethnography of decolonization calls for a thoughtful incorporation and/or production of a wide range of context-driven images as primary sources of data and for the creation of a respectful, ethical, and collaborative research space through which rich, unique, subjective, and embodied accounts of research participants can emerge. To this end, the researcher’s establishment of trusting, caring, and respectful relationships with participants can establish a welcoming and meaningful engagement with hard-to-reach communities, creating a research space from which a wide range of visual data about the research participants’ embodied experiences and cultural practices as emplaced in the physical environment come into sight (Powell, 2010). Examples of visual data might include

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

107

participants’ found and/or produced images, photos, drawings, maps, geographic artifacts, graphic elicitation, art-based, graffities, architecture representations, sketches, visual representations, and/or recordings of community-based dance or music performances. Along the lines of Restler and Luttrell’s (2018) notion of collaborative seeing, Lenette and Boddy (2013) proposed visual ethnography as a collaborative methodology that aims to stimulate a dialogical inquiry between the research participant and the ethnographer to generate visual data that is not responsive but rather emergent from participants’ own communities. Further, Barrantes-­ Elizondo’s recent work (2019) suggested that establishing a solid research alliance between the ethnographer and the research participants brings together “participants and researchers as co-researchers of knowledge in order to develop authentic representations of the viewpoints, concerns and lived experiences of participants and communities” (p. 13). Alongside and in collaboration with research participants in marginalized neighborhoods, visual ethnographers employ a context-driven methodology that aims to generate “place-as-­ ethnographic knowledge” (Pink, 2008, p. 176), using embodied, creative, and multisensory research approaches to explore marginalized school communities from a position of strength. Likewise, Powell (2010) contended that as a “place-based research” methodology, visual ethnography of decolonization has a collaborative aspect that can also be particularly useful for exploring cultural, economic, political, and educational power relations, impacting marginalized social identities with the intent to decolonize communities. Positioning Research Participants as “Critical Observers.” The second key aspect of visual ethnography of decolonization is its ability to mobilize the agency of students, teachers, families, and educators in hard-to-reach communities, enabling them to critically explore their embodiment, struggles, difficulties, and needs as embedded in their everyday lives (Barrantes-Elizondo, 2019). Today’s neoliberal-driven schools reproduce the Western body/mind duality implicitly, trapping young people’s physicality within rigid gendered, classed, ableist, and racialized social categories while neutralizing the need for a focus on embodiment and education from a social justice standpoint (Azzarito, 2019). Especially in hard-to-reach communities, the current neoliberal context of education calls for ethnographers to work with young people, positioning them as “active observers,” “visual ethnographers,” or “critical observers” of their own school communities (Powell, 2010, p. 45). To decolonize students’ bodies in today’s schools (Azzarito, 2016a), there is an urgent need for anticolonial work to understand how their embodiment—especially of youth from marginalized groups—ties to everyday places and spaces of the school community. Visual ethnography of decolonization can be particularly useful for positioning young people as critical ethnographers throughout the research process, enabling them to explore how their own school communities are built; how they insert themselves into community spaces and places of their own everyday lives; how they represent and express their (dis)embodiment as

108 

L. AZZARITO

emplaced in their own environment; and how their own ethnographic “fieldwork” can inform school community members, including policymakers, parents, educators, administrators, friends, and family members, for social change (Azzarito, 2019). Shifting away from extensive observations in traditional ethnographic work that construct research participants as “passive,” positioning students as “active observers,” “critical observers,” and “public scholars” throughout the fieldwork enables them to become “visual ethnographers of place and community” (Powell, 2010, p. 45). When social justice researchers position students as visual ethnographers in diverse urban school communities, they encourage young people to learn about the sociocultural, emotional, and educational dimensions of embodiment and its connection to self-identity, the physical environment, and social inequalities (Azzarito, 2016b). This anticolonial ethnographic work in education opens up opportunities for young people to investigate and represent the urban spaces and places of their everyday lives, generating unique narratives from the viewpoints of students that might not be captured with conventional qualitative and/or urban planning research methods. Students’ viewpoints, in turn, provide valid insights to policymakers for social change. Engaging young people as critical ethnographers in micro-ethnographic research practices offers a useful place-based research methodology to critically explore how their embodiment is emplaced in their own school neighborhoods. In this way, micro-ethnography also offers a helpful pedagogical means for young people “to become grounded in a sense of place” (Powell, 2010, p. 44). However, when education researchers employ visual ethnography of decolonization to position students as critical ethnographers in school to actively observe, explore, and problematize the places and spaces of their everyday lives, Powell (2010) suggests some key methodological points, summarized below: • Introduce students to relevant examples of visual ethnography of decolonization that are developmentally appropriate for young people, emphasizing the visual, critical, and multisensory components of ethnographic work. • Consider that while the timeframe for young people’s engagement in ethnographic fieldwork should be shorter than the extensive fieldwork demanded in traditional ethnography, micro-ethnography demands some “immersion” in fieldwork for students. • Choose, in collaboration with students, a visual approach (e.g., scrapbooking, photography, video, drawing, photo diary, mapping, video diary) that is interesting for them, creative, and culturally relevant. • Discuss with students the research process and their involvement as public scholars, visual ethnographers, or critical observers of social practices in their own communities. Encouraging students to engage with micro-­ ethnography can help them situate their embodiment in their own communities in meaningful ways.

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

109

• Promote reflexivity throughout the research process, creating a pedagogical space for students to develop critical reflection throughout the data collection process. This means preparing students to examine, analyze, interpret, and represent the data collected throughout the research process. • Analyze with students the visual and multisensory data collected. As a result of a collaborative data-driven analysis, the findings that emerge from the data analysis can first be organized into themes and then interpreted and staged at community-based art and/or photo exhibitions. • Disseminate research findings through arts-based galleries, exhibitions, or community-based events. In collaboration with students, invite parents, family members, policymakers, teachers, educators, administrators, and other community members while forwarding advocacy for social change in education. In line with Powell’s (2010) focus on visual ethnography with youth, more recently, Carlsen (2018) demonstrated the usefulness of ethnography of decolonization for disseminating “visually-presented empirical material” (p. 1) with students’ parents, teachers, families, and policymakers. To explore, visualize, and represent students’ “embodied making and learning” (Carlsen, 2018, p. 1), visual ethnography of decolonization can shed light on how the microenvironment of the young person regulates, shapes, and links to her/his self-­ identity, everyday practices, and (lack of) access to places, spaces, movement, and play. Participant stories that emerge from visual ethnography of decolonization might work effectively to decolonize the Western body/mind dichotomy promoted by neoliberal narratives of schooling, to reach out to and engage with hard-to-reach communities, and to re-center youth’s embodiment in positive ways in school communities, while making visible the unique narratives of students for cultural transformations (Isaac & Bernstein, 2021). Engaging with Hard-to-Reach Communities. Engaging with hard-to-­ reach communities is the third key aspect of visual ethnography of decolonization (Barrantes-Elizondo, 2019; Goopy & Kassan, 2016, 2019; Kassan et al., 2020; Lenette & Boddy, 2013; Ninomiya et al., 2020). Working with marginalized identities in hard-to-reach communities, ethnographers hope to attain deeper understanding of the needs, oppressions, and struggles oppressed community members face in their daily lives (Kassan et al., 2020). When ethnographers research with hard-to-reach school communities—communities that endure high poverty, low literacy, and health disparities—visual ethnography of decolonization might offer a useful methodology to (re)engage marginalized social identities in empowering ways. In particular, because traditional “language-­centric” forms of ethnography might not reveal but rather implicitly work to maintain the deficit frames of hard-to-reach communities, visual ethnography of decolonization uses images in combination with other data sources to shed light on the privilege of normative dominant groups, power dynamics, and spaces and places of marginalization. Visual ethnography of decolonization

110 

L. AZZARITO

aims to move the marginalized position of hidden identities in hard-to-reach communities to more visible and centered positions throughout the research process, enabling individuals in hard-to-reach communities to explore spaces and places of marginalization. While conventional research practices fail to disrupt the deficit-driven dominant discourse that oppresses marginalized communities, ethnographic practices with a focus on decolonization aim to engage with and recruit research participants in hard-to-reach communities in meaningful ways, creating a research space for advancing social justice and cultural transformation (Goopy & Kassan, 2019; Green et al., 2018). Much of the discussion in the current literature on newcomer research highlights the potential of anticolonial visual ethnographic research to investigate culture from the point of view of marginalized identities, bringing the practices of the everyday of individuals in hard-to-reach communities to the forefront (Green et al., 2018; Kassan et al., 2020; Lenette & Boddy, 2013; Oh, 2012). Goopy and Kassan (2019) refer to newcomers such as refugee seekers or recent immigrants, refugee women, and refugee children who have recently immigrated to Western countries as extremely marginalized populations, and they represent individuals in hard-to-reach communities. Expanding on this definition, Kassan et  al. (2020) refer to newcomers as individuals who experience migration across different marginalized groups, including newcomer women, newcomer children, newcomer youth, refugees, gay, transgender, lesbian newcomers, same-sex couples, and queer newcomers. When working with newcomers in hard-to-reach communities, Green et  al. (2018) advocated for innovative visual-driven research approaches that attend to culturally responsive data. Visual ethnography of decolonization provides a fresh methodology for critically engaging with and re-centering newcomers in their communities in culturally relevant and meaningful ways (Kassan et al., 2020). Visual ethnography of decolonization can be particularly suited to exploring the life stories of people with marginalized or hidden social identities in hard-to-reach communities that are often ignored by mainstream society, producing nuanced and more in-depth understandings of their lived realities as emplaced in the context of their everyday lives. As newcomers, for instance, refugees are not only extremely marginalized and/or disfranchised individuals but also “Othered” identities in the public eye. More recently, researching with hard-to-reach communities, Green et  al. (2018) demonstrated how visual ethnography of decolonization tapped into the embodiment of newcomer women in ways that are meaningful and culturally respectful, developing in-depth and culturally responsive data. Exploring experiences of migration, Lenette and Boddy (2013) worked with hard-to-­ reach communities, employing visual ethnography of decolonization with single refugee women in Australia to explore, understand, and represent the complexity of their experiences and narratives that were hard to put into words. Moving beyond the passive involvement of research participants in traditional fieldwork, Lenette and Boddy (2013) positioned the single refugee women as

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

111

active agents throughout the visual ethnographic research project, created solid research partnerships with the single refugee women, and used a place-based methodology to shed light on the research participants’ social worlds hidden from the public sphere. Positioned as visual critical ethnographers, refugee women documented their everyday realities, revealing unique stories of resilience, agency, a sense of accomplishment, pride, health, and well-being. Likewise, exploring relationships among place, space, marginalization, identity, and migration, Oh (2012) positioned refugee children as visual ethnographers, putting the life stories of newcomers as refugee children at the center of the visual ethnography design to generate a child-generated view and expression. Unique to Oh’s (2012) research design was the incorporation of a “photo-­ friend” technique into visual ethnography design to decolonize the “visual voice” of refugee children (Thompson, 2008, p. 1) by locating the lived experiences of newcomer children at the center of the research design to elicit thoughts, feelings, and memories. In those hard-to-reach communities, children’s decolonized visual voices spoke about difficult experiences of conflict, violence, isolation, and displacement and dreams of a better future. Further, as a form of “community-led environmental activism” (Isaac & Bernstein, 2021), visual ethnography of decolonization might also help students, teachers, educators, school administrators, families, and community members mitigate the deficit narrative often emplaced in hard-to-reach school communities. Moreover, visual ethnography of decolonization has the potential to reinvigorate community-led environmental activism, nurturing alliances between researchers, community members, and environmental activists to create positive environmental change. With a focus on researching human practices of everyday life for social justice, visual ethnography of decolonization welcomes an environmental sustainability agenda (Pink, 2014), emphasizing that ways of seeing, knowing, and showing are central to supporting community-­ based activism for improving the neighborhoods of research participants (Isaac & Bernstein, 2021). Placing “Otherness” at the Center of the Research Design. In the current neoliberal educational landscape that systematically treats newcomers as individuals at risk, in deficit terms, and/or as a “burden” on society, opening up a research space for Otherness to emerge in an affirmative way plays a central role in visual ethnography of decolonization. Working with hard-to-reach communities in collaborative, respectful, and creative ways demands that ethnographers situate both the researcher and the research participants in a research space for “understanding and knowing otherness” (Goopy & Kassan, 2019, p.  3). To research with hard-to-reach communities, making space for “different” social narratives to emerge throughout the research process is key to visual ethnography of decolonization. Researching with marginalized identities in hard-to-reach communities calls for exploring Otherness from a position of strength, welcoming newcomers’ engagement with the research process, while challenging the deficit paradigm that borders the marginalized spaces

112 

L. AZZARITO

and places of their daily lives. This anticolonial visual approach aims to study and locate experiences of Otherness in relation to culture at the center of the ethnographic research practice by legitimating, affirming, and bringing cultural codes, the richness and variation of cultures, multiple voices, and diversity of cultural experiences to the surface. However, as Kassan et al. (2020) contended, researching Otherness in relation to a dominant normative framework might only work as a starting point for raising cultural awareness among research participants and researchers. This is because the Other/normative binary implicitly maintained in a multicultural approach to ethnography fails to position cultural diversity at the forefront of the research practice. In other words, to fracture the multicultural frame of the Other/normative dichotomy rooted in conventional forms of ethnography that maintain Whiteness as normative and invisible, locating Otherness in relation to culture at the center of the research design allows for cultural diversity to become situated, recognized, and represented from within the framework of the newcomers. From this perspective, to critically explore situational problems with marginalized identities in hard-to-reach communities, visual ethnography of decolonization disrupts the multicultural framework of Otherness established in Western terms, revealing, naming, and disrupting Whiteness as a dominant culture. In this way, visual ethnography of decolonization provides a fresh methodological tool to intentionally situate, legitimate, and center the diversity of the culture of newcomers from a position of strength, creating a position of marginality (Spivak, 1995) from which newcomers can “speak” and be heard. However, to center Otherness in relation to culture throughout the ethnographic practice and thus “to actively think, place, and build a space for this diversity to have a voice within their work” (Goopy & Kassan, 2019, p. 3), it is crucial for the ethnographer to maintain a space of liminality while centering the newcomers in the research process. In other words, working with research participants for decolonizing goals demands that the ethnographer destabilize her/his normative position while intentionally situating and centering the diversity of newcomers’ culture to enable newcomers to express themselves within a framework of Otherness. Methodologically, this means not only creating a research space for both the researcher and newcomers to explore cultural difference and Otherness from a position of strength but also moving the traditional, authoritative position of visual ethnographer in the research process from a centered stage to a “position of liminality” (Bhabha, 1994). Unless the researcher occupies a position of liminality in ethnographic research, the knowledge and understanding of culture in relation to Otherness from the point of view of the everyday practices of individuals in hard-to-reach communities will remain obscured. When the ethnographer’s commitment is rooted in anticolonial work and the ethnographer occupies a position of liminality, cultural difference from the perspective of newcomers can come to light (Metcalfe, 2019). In this matter, Goopy and Kassan (2019) noted:

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

113

the discomfort of the unknown, the positioning of Otherness that it offers, provides the opportunity for the researcher to acknowledge their privilege and actively locate their bias in research of their own spirit of alterity. In turn, this enables an exploration of cultural difference and Otherness from the perspective of both the researcher and participant. (p. 6)

Placing Otherness at the center of the research design enables newcomers to explore their sense of identity as emplaced in their new social locations from the framework of Otherness in relation to culture, centering, validating, and highlighting cultural diversity in meaningful and positive ways. Thus, researchers’ implementation of visual ethnography of decolonization with hard-to-­ reach communities calls for a research design that intentionally acknowledges and centers Otherness in relation to culture in the data collection, analysis, interpretation, and dissemination of research findings. Engaging research participants in decolonizing, playful, and imaginative methodological ways creates a decolonizing research space through which marginalized identities in hard-­to-­reach communities can move from a marginalized to a more centered position, occupying a place from which they have “permission to speak” (Spivak, 1995) in validating ways.

Cultural Probes to Decolonize Context and Culture To move beyond normative research with multicultural goals, the ethnographer’s integration of cultural probes into the research process might open up a space for Otherness in relation to culture to emerge and be represented in creative ways (Kassan et al., 2020). Embracing decolonization, Ninomiya et al. (2020) advanced the idea that “decolonizing research requires an epistemological shift in what constitutes scientific knowledge, who controls the research design, and how knowledge is gathered and shared” (p. 220). More recently, Oduaran and Chukwudeh (2021) conceptualized cultural probes as creative and interactive methodological means with a clear focus on decolonizing communities that involve “cameras, maps, diaries, sketchbooks, postcards, [and] timelines” useful “to give appropriate contextual meanings to the data collection” (p. 738). In the African context of decolonization and education, recently, Oduaran and Chukwudeh (2021) contended that the use of cultural probes from a decolonizing framework elicits emphatic engagement and subjectivity and creates a dialogue about difference and culture, helping the ethnographer with participants to disrupt Whiteness within the community being investigated. Similar to Oduaran and Chukwudeh (2021), Goopy and Kassan (2019) suggested that to mobilize Otherness in relation to culture from and within a framework of Otherness, the incorporation of cultural probes into a visual ethnographic design creates a decolonizing research space. In particular, Goopy and Kassan (2019) explained,

114 

L. AZZARITO

as agents, participants are given the space, the permission, and the opportunity to reflect on and verbalize their experiences, feelings, and attitudes as well as to locate and contextualize their experiences. They [cultural probes] are particularly encouraged to visualize their identity as manifest through experiences, action(s), and contexts. (p. 5)

Integrating cultural probes into the ethnographic research design enacts anticolonial work, allowing the ethnographer and research participants to work together to unpack Otherness in relation to culture while troubling any multicultural attempts to maintain Whiteness as the normative frame. In other words, using visual texts as cultural probes from an anticolonial standpoint helps research participants visualize their identities as manifest through body performances and cultural practices while recognizing, acknowledging, and centering the worldviews, languages, and cultural codes and concepts of Otherness in affirmative ways. The use of cultural probes in visual ethnography alters the normative Western frame but also mobilizes and reveals Otherness in relation to culture from a position of strength, generating decolonizing conversations to produce new cultural insights and understandings. Darroch and Giles (2014) explained decolonization as a process of centering concerns and worldviews of the colonized Other so that they understand themselves through their own assumptions and perspectives…decolonization is the ongoing process of exploring and challenging colonialist power, including all the institutional and cultural influences that have remained since colonialism. (p. 29)

In this vein, Oduaran and Chukwudeh (2021, p. 742) claimed that decolonizing ethnographic research should be guided by concern for whose research it is in the first place, whose interests are being served, who benefits the most from the research, who framed the research questions and determined the scope of the study, who implements the study, and how the results will be disseminated.

In other words, the integration of cultural probes as visual texts subverts a Western-centric normative lens to mobilize knowledge from the worldview of marginalized social identities. Cultural probes help the visual ethnographer to center, stage, and privilege cultural diversity in a positive light throughout the research process, supporting community struggles for policy change in public ways. Privileging cultural diversity and Otherness calls for the ethnographer to engage with questions around “who has the power to represent whom, under what circumstances, and for whose benefits” in the research design. Recognizing how research has historically been implicated “in the production of Western knowledge, in the nature of academic work, in the production of theories that have dehumanized” (Smith, 1999, p. 185), the integration of cultural probes in ethnography plays a crucial role in working toward decolonizing knowledge.

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

115

From an anticolonial standpoint, Kaomea (2004) maintained that engaging with decolonization “requires our continual efforts toward questioning and revealing hidden colonial influences in past and current beliefs and practices” (p. 32). In line with Kaomea’s viewpoint, visual ethnography of decolonization aims to interrogate and reveal hidden colonial power relations, to employ a strength-based research approach to prevent and counter community stigma, and to enact collaborative seeing to mitigate deficit frames with a focus on reestablishing relationships of space, place, identity, and culture in affirmative and transformative ways. In this way, the ethnographer’s use of cultural probes offers an anticolonial methodology that recognizes the diverse worldviews of people in hard-to-reach communities with a focus on dismantling colonial policies, relations, and/or practices that benefit only Western normative Whiteness. Visual ethnography of decolonization enables the “voices of minorities in the United States” (Matoba Adler, 2004, p.  112) that have been historically silenced to “speak up” from a position of marginality (Spivak, 1995), moves newcomers and minoritized people from a marginal to a more centered position throughout the research process, aims to deconstruct Western dominant discourses of Otherness as implicated in the historical production of Western knowledge, and inserts Otherness in relation to culture at the heart the research design with the anticolonial goal to reimagine Otherness in education within a framework of cultural diversity in creative ways.

References Azzarito, L. (2016a). “Permission to Speak”: A postcolonial view on racialized bodies and PE in the current context of globalization. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 87(2), 141–150. Azzarito, L. (2016b). Moving in MY World: From school PE to participants-centered art exhibitions. Journal of Teaching in Physical Education, 35, 38–53. Azzarito, L. (2019). Social justice in globalized fitness and health. Bodies out of sight. Routledge. Barrantes-Elizondo, L. (2019). Creating space for visual ethnography in educational research. Educare, 23(2), 1–15. Becker, C. (2013). The subversive imagination. Artists, society, and social responsibility. Routledge. Bhabha, H. K. (1994). The location of culture. Routledge. Bloustien, G. (2003). Envisioning ethnography: Exploring the meanings of the visual in research. Social Analysis, 47(3), 2–7. Bronislaw, M. (1922). Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An Account of Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea. Routledge. [British Library Shelfmark Asia, Pacific & Africa V 10295]. Bronislaw, M. (1929). The sexual life of savages in Northwestern Melanesia. Liveright. [British Library shelfmark General Reference Collection YC.1993. b. 3568]. Carlsen, K. (2018). Visual ethnography as a tool in exploring children’s embodied making processes in pre-primary education. Art, 2(11), 1–16. Collier, J. (1967). Visual anthropology: Photography as a research method. Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

116 

L. AZZARITO

Collier, J., & Collier, M. (1986). Visual anthropology: Photography as a research method. University of New Mexico Press. Darroch, F., & Giles, A. (2014). Decolonizing health research: Community-based participatory research and postcolonial feminist research. Canadian Journal of Action Research, 15(3), 22–36. Erickson, F. (2018). A history of qualitative inquiry in social and educational research. In N.  K. Denzin & Y.  Lincoln (Eds.), SAGE handbook of qualitative research (pp. 36–65). Sage. Flaherty, R. (1922). Nanook of the North: A story of life and love in the actual arctic. Pathe Exchange. Goopy, S., & Kassan, A. (2016). Cultural probes and focus group: A pathway to empathic, engaging, and emancipatory research. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 1–45. Goopy, S., & Kassan, A. (2019). Arts-based engagement ethnography: An approach for making research engaging and knowledge transferable when working with harder-­ to-­reach-communities. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 18, 1–10. Green, A.  R., Kassan, A., Russell-Mathew, S., & Goopy, S. (2018). Exploring newcomer women’s embodied selves: Culturally responsible qualitative research. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 16(4), 513–536. Harper, D. (2003). Framing photographic ethnography: A case study. Ethnography, 4, 241–266. Howes, D. (2005). Introduction. In D. Howes (Ed.), Empire of the senses: The sensory culture reader (pp. 1–17). Berg. Isaac, C., & Bernstein, A. (2021). A visual ethnography of an urban neighborhood. Urban Geography, 43(8), 1129–1149. Kaomea, J. (2004). Dilemmas of an Indigenous academic: A Native Hawaiian story. In K. Mutua & B. B. Swadener (Eds.), Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts. Critical personal narratives (pp. 27–44). State University of New York Press. Kassan, A., Goopy, S., Green, A., Arthur, N., Nutter, S., Russell-Mayhew, S., & Silversides, H. (2020). Becoming new together: Making meaning with newcomers through an art-based ethnographic design. Qualitative Research in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1080/14780887.2018.1442769 Kazubowski-Houston, M., & Magnat, V. (2018). Introduction to special issue: The transdisciplinary travels of ethnography. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, 18, 379–391. Knowles, C. (2006). Seeing race through the lens. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 29, 512–529. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870600597917 Lee, J., & Ingold, T. (2006). Fieldwork on foot: Perceiving, routing, socializing. In S. Coleman & P. Collins (Eds.), Locating the field. Space, place and context in anthropology (pp. 67–86). Berg. Lenette, C., & Boddy, J. (2013). Visual ethnography and refugee women: Nuanced understandings of lived experiences. Qualitative Research journal, 13(1), 72–89. Luttrell, W. (2000). “Good enough” methods for ethnographic research. Harvard Educational Review, 70(4), 499–523. Luttrell, W. (2016). Children framing childhoods and looking back. In J.  Moss & B.  Pini (Eds.), Visual research methods in educational research (pp.  172–188). Palgrave Macmillan. Marion, J.  S. (2010). Photography as ethnographic passport. Visual Anthropology Review, 26(1), 25–31.

6  VISUAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF DECOLONIZATION… 

117

Matoba Adler, S. (2004). Multiple layers of a researcher’s identity: Uncovering Asian American voices. In K.  Mutua & B.  B. Swadener (Eds.), Decolonizing research in cross-cultural contexts. Critical personal narratives (pp. 107–122). State University of New York Press. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1945). The phenomenology of perception. Routledge. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of perception. Routledge. Metcalfe, A. S. (2019). Witnessing Indigenous dispossession and academic arboricide: Visual auto-ethnography as anti-colonial didactic. Visual Arts Research, 45(2), 80–90. Morris, C. (2017). Making sense of education: Sensory ethnography and visual impairment. Ethnography and Education, 12(1), 1–16. Ninomiya, M. E. M., Hurley, N., & Penashue, J. (2020). A decolonizing method of inquiry: Using institutional ethnography to facilitate community-based research and knowledge translation. Critical Public Health, 30(2), 2020–2231. Oduaran, A., & Chukwudeh, O.  S. (2021). Decolonizing cultural probes in ethnographic research: Perspective of African scholars. Journal of Black Studies, 52(7), 736–749. Oh, S.-A. (2012). Photofriend: Creating visual ethnography with refugee children. Area, 44(3), 282–288. Pink, S. (2008). An urban tour: The sensory sociality of ethnographic place-making. Ethnography, 9(2), 175–196. Pink, S. (2011). Images, senses and applications: Engaging visual anthropology. Visual Anthropology, 24(5), 437–454. Pink, S. (2014). Digital-visual-sensory design anthropology: Ethnography, imagination and intervention. Arts & Humanities in Higher Education, 13(4), 412–427. Powell, K. (2010). Viewing places: Students as visual ethnographers. Art Education, 63(6), 44–53. Restler, V., & Luttrell, W. (2018). Gaze interrupted: Speaking back to stigma with visual research. In P. Alldred, F. Cullen, K. Edwards, & D. Fusco (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of youth work practice (pp. 454–469). Sage. Schwartz, D. (1989). Visual ethnography: Using photography in qualitative research. Qualitative Sociology, 12(2), 119–153. Shilling, C. (2003). The body and social theory. Sage. Sikes, P. (2015). Decolonizing research and methodologies: Indigenous people and cross-cultural contexts. Journal of Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 14(3), 349–358. Smith, L.  T. (1999). Decolonizing methodologies. Research and Indigenous people. Zed Books. Spivak, G. C. (1995). Can the subaltern speak. In B. Ashcroft, G. Griffith, & H. Tiffin (Eds.), The post-colonial studies reader (pp. 28–37). Routledge. Thompson, P. (Ed.). (2008). Doing visual research with children and young people. Routledge. Trafi-Prats, L. (2009). Destination Raval Sud: A visual ethnography on pedagogy, aesthetic, and the spatial experience of growing up urban. Studies in Art Education, 5(1), 6–20. Van den Scott, L.-J. K. (2018). Visual methods in ethnography. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 47(6), 719–728.

CHAPTER 7

Drawing as a Research Tool of Child Empowerment

While in the past, research about children was conducted from the perspective of adults, more recently, researchers have pointed out that conventional research on children might miss their views, experiences, and concerns (Thompson, 2008). Children are not simply “objects” of research; they have the capability to express their experiences, sense of identity, strengths, hopes, and aspirations (Burke, 2005). The perspectives of children expressed in personal ways are of particular interest in educational research because they can offer unique insights into social justice issues (Bober, 2011). Especially when researching with and for children from marginalized or vulnerable groups, to take their concerns about equity and social justice seriously, researchers must not censor particular views or modes of expression of children but rather treat children as active subjects, recognizing that they have distinct “voices” on a wide range of issues. Positioning children as the “expert of their own lives,” researchers should consider what research methodologies can best elicit the voice of children, enabling children to “speak for themselves” about important issues (Leitch, 2008, p. 41). In line with Thompson’s (2008) work, this chapter positions children as active agents, “capable of providing expert testimony about their experiences, associations and lifestyles” (p. 1). Drawing from the new childhood paradigm that emerged in the past 40 years in the social sciences (James & Prout, 1990), the chapter challenges the traditional view of children as “passive recipients,” “immature,” and not to be “taken seriously,” advocating for visual research with and for children positioned as active agents (Thompson, 2008, p.  1). Shifting away from conventional adult-centric research methodologies, first, the chapter views children as having their own agendas, capable of providing valuable and thoughtful insights, and able to offer expert testimony about their experiences, lifestyles, and daily practices (Prosser & Burke, 2008; Veale, 2005). From this perspective, the notion of visual voice is not conceptualized as universal, authentic, or fixed but rather theorized as complex, expressive, © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_7

119

120 

L. AZZARITO

multilayered, and multidimensional (Thompson, 2008). Second, the chapter suggests that when researchers implement drawing as a child-centered visual methodology (Martin, 2019), the visual voice of children can emerge and be represented in personal, meaningful, and contextualized ways. Drawing might be a particularly well-suited visual methodology for education researchers who aim to explore the perspectives, struggles, concerns, embodiments, and experiences of children (Mitchell, 2006). When education researchers position children as active agents in creating, representing, and performing visual arts, visual scholars can then begin to inform public policy, opening up possibilities for social change (Finley, 2008). The chapter concludes by suggesting that while drawing is a particularly apt approach in research with children, researchers need to take cautions and limitations into consideration when they implement drawing in research settings.

The New Paradigm of Childhood With the emergence of interpretative, constructivist, and critical research paradigms in the 1980s, many critical scholars started to embrace the notion of “voice” for social justice and social change. In particular, since the 1980s, critical scholars have advocated for qualitative inquiries to explore and incorporate the “unheard” or “hidden voices” of children from marginalized groups and to bring “silenced voices” to light in the effort to recover subjugated knowledge. Driven by a social justice agenda in education, the establishment of the critical research paradigm was inspired by the work of Paulo Freire (1972) to “give voice to the voiceless” and to reveal “untold stories.” This latter perspective was rooted in Paulo Freire’s groundbreaking work, Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1972), and aimed to forward emancipatory, liberatory, and/or empowering research aims. Acknowledging Freire’s critical contribution to education, two decades later, scholars started to problematize the assumption of oppressed people as having “less voice,” suggesting that the notion of an “oppressed condition” denies the role of an individual’s agency (Ellsworth, 1989). More recently, critical scholars have recognized that even “oppressed” individuals have agency, and as active agents, they use their agency to negotiate power relations embedded in their daily lives in specific contexts (Azzarito & Kirk, 2013). This epistemological shift marks a radical change across a wide range of disciplines, acknowledging children as cultural agents in research. Positioning children as producers of knowledge challenges the traditional perspective of “giving voice to the voiceless,” with the intent to listen to the “unheard voice” (Thompson, 2008, p.  3). With the emergence of the new paradigm in childhood in the social sciences, the notion of children as “having a voice” subverts the notion of children as “powerless.” From this perspective, the voice of children is no longer conceptualized as “oppressed” or “singular” but theorized as socially constructed, multilayered, and multidimensional. The new paradigm of childhood emerged in the early 1990s as a result of the international 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

121

mandated respect for children’s perspectives and concerns. Through the lens of this new paradigm, children are neither oppressed nor without agency but rather positioned as cultural agents who use their agency to negotiate power relations in multiple ways and to exercise their rights to “speak up” (Prosser & Burke, 2008). In other words, children are no longer viewed as passive, powerless, or under adults’ scrutiny in research but are constructed as active agents who become “knowledge producers” throughout the research process (Mitchell, 2006, p. 60). Moving away from positioning children as “objects” of an adult-centric perspective in research, the new childhood studies aimed to offer a fresh perspective on research with and for children, recognizing children as competent social actors and producers of knowledge. Children are experts on their lives and thus are viewed as active agents in their construction and expression of knowledge (Johnson et al., 2012). In this vein, Johnson et al. (2012, p. 165) noted, “following the 1989 UN Convention, researchers who recognize the value of children’s epistemologies have suggested we pause to ask whether our standard research techniques, which as social scientists we so readily employ, are indeed most appropriate.” From the 1990s onward, researchers have moved beyond “adult-centric bias” qualitative research methodologies, acknowledging that “the best people to provide information on the child’s perspective, actions and attitudes are children themselves” (Johnson et al., 2012, p. 165). In this matter, Article 12 of the United Nations Convention states that nations shall assure to the child who is capable of forming her or his own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child.

Following the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC, 1989), education scholars and social activists have increasingly explored new methodologies to enable children to “speak for themselves” about relevant issues. Challenging the notion of voice as unitary, Elden (2012) advocated for innovative methodologies that have the potential to reveal the messiness, ambiguity, and polyvocality of children’s stories, amplifying the “multivoicedness” of children (p. 75). In particular, researchers have advocated for innovative qualitative methodological means to involve children as producers of knowledge, recognizing that children, as active agents, have agency and use their agency to exercise their right to voice their opinions. Visual Voice. Moving beyond the notion of children’s voicelessness, visual methodologies might be particularly suited in research with children to mobilize the agency of children and to enable children to “speak” and represent their “voices” in creative ways. Children, as producers of knowledge, “have a say” on important matters and have the capacity to voice their perspectives in subjective, creative, and contextualized ways. This means that the voice of children cannot be conceptualized as universal but rather as culturally represented and situated in a particular context. From this perspective, the notion of voice

122 

L. AZZARITO

is theorized as fluid, socially constructed, and produced by context, culture, identity, and historical contingency. As Thompson (2008) noted, “voice is very dependent on the social context in which it is located” (p. 6). This also means that each child does not have a single spoken voice but can use a wide range of non-verbal means to represent her/his voice. Expanding on this perspective, theorizing voice as multidimensional, children’s communication does not come from an authentic, fixed, or stable voice but rather can be articulated by a wide range of modes of expression, including verbal, written, and visually driven modes of communication. In particular, Thompson (2008) drew attention to two important assumptions underpinning the reconceptualization of the notion of voice in research with children: (1) children have the right to offer their opinions, and (2) children have the capacity to express their opinion. These two assumptions come together with the recent conceptualization of the visual voice of children (Burke, 2005; Thompson, 2008). From this perspective, first, the visual voice of children is theorized as complex, expressive, and multidimensional; and second, the visual voice of children can “speak” in a wide range of ways, including authoritative, critical, therapeutic, consumer, and pedagogic multilayered means of expression (Chalfen et al., 2010). These types of visual voice are summarized below. Authoritative Voice. This voice is intended to make statements on behalf of a group of children as research participants. When children’s statements reflect a majority opinion, their statements are communicated with an authoritative voice, becoming representative of a larger group. The authoritative voice aims to speak on behalf of the children’s perspective. Critical Voice. Different from the authoritative voice, the critical voice of children aims to challenge mainstream assumptions, stereotypes, or the status quo on a particular issue. To address issues of social justice, equity, and exclusion, visual research with children enables their critical voice to express their concerns. Their critical voice might, in turn, help researchers bring changes to children’s lives as well as research practices, policies, and public attitudes. Therapeutic Voice. This voice is elicited in visual research projects conducted with children from vulnerable populations and/or children who are dealing with painful experiences. The therapeutic voice of children can be revealed and amplified in safe research environments, allowing researchers or practitioners to identify ways to offer healing practices to children dealing with difficult experiences. Pedagogic Voice. The pedagogic voice emerges from children’s experiences of being educated in a particular school context. While the pedagogic voice is shaped by dominant discourses produced in a school context, children, as active agents, accept, reject, and/or negotiate the “dominant talk” institutionalized in a school. Children’s pedagogic voice educates adults about what it means for children to experience everyday life in school. Consumer Voice. The consumer voice is socially constructed and, in particular, shaped by market-driven trends. Children’s consumer voice is informed

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

123

by preferences about lifestyles, cultures, and identities. Their consumer voice reveals awareness of their appearance and the ways children see their costumes, cultures, and identities in the world.Visual methodologies have the potential to capture the multidimensionality of the voice of children, employing more child-appropriate modes of communication (e.g., drawing, photos, collages, maps) in creative ways. Innovative visual methodologies are particularly useful for eliciting the visual voice of children, offering more inclusive and interesting approaches in research with children (Leitch, 2008). For instance, many children might take pleasure in engaging with non-verbal modes of expression and communication and might experience drawing or taking photos as fun and interesting. “Having a say” articulated visually with imagination can be especially empowering for some children who might have difficulty in expressing themselves with words. Eliciting the visual voice of children with suitable methodologies might indeed create interest in research among children and, particularly for children from marginalized groups, create more inclusive experiences of research (Blaisdell et al., 2019, p. 14). Doing so also enables children to become active agents, “artists,” and “producers of knowledge” in the expressions of their visual voice. In research with children, to voice their stories in imaginative ways, however, there is a need to use innovative, engaging, playful, and creative research methods (Blaisdell et al., 2019). Visual narration, for instance, offers a more suitable mode of communication for facilitating children’s expressions. In this vein, visual researchers have made a case for moving beyond conventional modes of communication, such as spoken language, using new visual methodologies to mobilize the agency of children and thus creating a research space for the voice of children to be artistically represented (Kim, 2018; Leigh, 2020; Mitchell, 2006). Challenging traditional qualitative methods, visual methodologies can be particularly useful for positioning children as producers of knowledge and for revealing and representing the visual voice of children as context-specific, multilayered, multidimensional, and expressed with complex subjectivities. Drawing from a sociocultural perspective, the implementation of visual methodologies also acknowledges that children’s expression and performance of their identities are crucial sources of knowledge production that can generate critical insights into their own social worlds. Innovative visual methodological means can create enabling research designs that position children as capable of providing expert testimony about their experiences and views. In the past two decades, visual researchers and social activists have increasingly used visual approaches to recognize children as “social actors in their own rights” (Mitchell, 2006, p. 60) and to explore children’s “expert testimony about their experiences, associations and lifestyles” (Thompson, 2008, p. 1). For instance, the development of innovative research methods, such as drawing, can facilitate data production with and for children, creating a research context from which the multidimensionality of children’s narration can emerge and be represented creatively. The next section suggests that drawing, as a visual approach, offers an engaging childlike activity in research with children and has the potential to make the invisible world of children visible to adults (Brown et al., 2020).

124 

L. AZZARITO

From Adult-Centric Methodologies to Child-Centered Methodologies: Drawing Conventional qualitative inquiries that position children as “adults-in-training” (Theis, 2001, p. 100) often overlook children’s interests, concerns, and needs, leaving out the significance of children’s world. For instance, when qualitative researchers are trained to conduct research with adults, adult-centric qualitative inquiries might constrain children’s participation in the research process. Working with children might result in a difficult enterprise unless researchers use child-friendly or child-centered methodologies. Moving away from conducting research on children, working with and for children in research calls for research methodologies that are suitable for children. This demands that researchers theorize methodological approaches capable of acknowledging the child’s ways of being in the world. In this vein, Mitchell (2006) suggested that to mobilize the agency of children and thus enable them to voice their own agendas, there is a need to move beyond adult-centric methodologies and to consider what methods can most adequately elicit the voices of children carefully and thoughtfully (Leigh, 2020). While adult-centered methodologies maintain the hierarchical relationship between adults and children, having adults speaking on behalf of children, visual methodologies might represent child-centered methodologies to encourage children to critically engage and examine the research topic in more personal and intimate ways (Carter & Ford, 2013; Elden, 2012; Hopperstad, 2008). Because children have the capacity to self-reflect and express, when they are encouraged to examine the research topic with imagination, their viewpoint becomes a vantage point. This vantage point represents both a position of strength and a position of knowledge production. While the omission of children’s own views can lead to short-sighted understandings and misinterpretations of specific issues (Thompson, 2008), visual methodologies implemented as child-centered approaches have the ability to amplify the voice of children in education for social change and social justice (Mitchell, 2006). Elevating the voice of children is particularly important when conducting research with and for children from underrepresented groups for several reasons: (1) to re-center subjugated knowledge; (2) to allow children’s views and opinions to emerge, be heard, and be validated; (3) to make room for more diverse meaning-making; and (4) to reach out to the adult world for social change. In this way, dominant forms of knowledge are moved away from the center stage to create a social justice–driven research space for more diverse meanings to emerge and be represented to the public. Among a wide range of innovative visual methods for exploring the visual voice of children—including photography, cartoons, collages, multimedia production, and fotonovela— drawing can be engaging, fun, and interesting for many children. Drawing. Drawing works as an entry point into children’s worlds (Figs. 7.1 and 7.2). Images can be particularly powerful for stimulating the imagination and evoking children’s storytelling. Pinto et al. (2021, p. 6) emphasized that

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

125

“images, more than words, can tell us in which direction the child’s gaze is going, and which desirable scenario reveal themselves in the child’s eye.” While glimpses into children’s viewpoints are not always possible with more traditional research methods (e.g., surveys, questionnaires, interviews), drawing as a research tool can help researchers understand the complex world in which children live (Brown et  al., 2020; Leitch, 2008; Sondergaard & Reventlow, 2019; Thompson, 2008). Leitch (2008), for instance, suggested that drawing as a visual methodology can provide a means for self-reflection, self-expression, and meaningful communication in contextualized ways. In research with children, drawing offers both a play-based pedagogy and a child-centered research methodology for social change. While engaging children in research to enable the voice of children to “speak” can be a difficult enterprise, drawing might offer an empowering research tool to help researchers overcome methodological challenges. As a useful visual approach with children, drawing can serve both as a mode of communication and as a research methodology particularly suited for children to enable them to effectively and creatively express their opinions, knowledge, and ideas in meaningful ways (Pinto et  al., 2021). As an empowering methodological tool, drawing might help children reveal honest, complex, and emotional stories that would not be captured with traditional qualitative

Fig. 7.1  CLIMATE (IN)JUSTICE.  My daughter’s vision of climate injustice. (Source: Author’s photo)

126 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 7.2  CLIMATE (IN)JUSTICE. My daughter’s vision of climate justice. (Source: Author’s photo)

methodologies (Leigh, 2020). In research with children, drawing might also allow adults to see children as they want to be seen and heard in the world. Agarwal et al. (2021) contended that “children’s drawings reflect an image of her or his mind as they provide a window into their thoughts and feelings” (p. 1). Similarly, Carter and Ford (2013) asserted that “drawing can be used as a means of expression in their own right and as an ‘ice-breaker’ to help the child get started on a story…and drawing provides children the freedom to express their views, imagination, and interpretations of their experiences in their own terms” (p.  99). Likewise, Mitchell (2006, p.  69) maintained that “drawing may sometimes express what a child cannot or does not wish to say aloud.” According to Penn (2019), as a result of the process of drawing: (1) images are both locally and globally informed, (2) drawing techniques are learned in both formal and informal ways, (3) drawing emerges in and with ­culture and lends itself to a shared vocabulary, and (4) drawing allows a variety of official and unofficial spaces for children to dwell, including those of imaginative, technological, and material pleasure. (p. 117)

Drawing as a research methodology not only is capable of enabling the child to express their voices but can also represent an empowering experience

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

127

for the child. The use of drawing as a creative visual methodology can be particularly appropriate for conducting research with and for children, as it empowers children to draw what they wish to express and makes adults “see” opinions, concerns, and interpretations through the eyes of children. Drawing is a powerful avenue for children to express their own agendas, allowing them to reflect, express themselves, and be heard (Figs. 7.1 and 7.2). The process of drawing might also support children’s active engagement in research, especially when children are not able or do not feel confident to express themselves with spoken language. For instance, drawing can work as an effective research methodology to facilitate children’s visual communication and reflective engagement with taboo or difficult issues. In this regard, Sondergaard and Reventlow (2019) noted that when children have experiences that are often either difficult to put into words or hard to recall and verbalize, drawing provides a “nonverbal stepping-stone into the world of childhood experiences and emotions” (p.  3). Especially for situations that are consciously and/or unconsciously difficult to talk about, drawing might offer an effective methodology to facilitate conversations about sensitive topics and materialize children’s feelings and experiences. Another key advantage of drawing is its capability to combine both verbal and non-verbal means (Lund, 1994), helping children effectively articulate, convey, and represent their perspectives with creativity (Agarwal et al., 2021). Moreover, as a child-centered research technique, children’s drawing represents both an interactive process and an expressive language of communication and representation (Mitchell, 2006, p. 60). Drawing is rooted in “the idea of visual language” that originated from “the Reggio Emilia concept of graphic language” (Kim, 2018, p. 102), which positions children’s drawing both as an age-appropriate cultural practice and as an empowering visual mode of communication in childhood. As a visual language, drawing can produce children’s meaningful accounts. The Reggio Emilia approach conceptualizes drawing as an engaging, fun, and interesting practice for children: a process through which children interact with other children and with adults and, at the same time, make meanings. Just like spoken language, drawing represents a visual language, a human construction of ideas, and, for children in particular, a playful form of expression. In this regard, the Reggio Emilia school refers to drawing as a form of visual language for children that simultaneously produces interactive means, as a communicative tool, and as an artistic representation. Because the process of drawing generates both social interactions and communication in playful ways, clearly, drawing has the capability to offer a research tool of child empowerment. The visual and verbal dialogue that takes place together during drawing in the research process provides a source of data production, allowing researchers to explore and elucidate children’s symbolic representations of their own worldviews. Those visual narrations—drawings and children’s talking about their drawings—represent rich and multilayered accounts of their own worlds, including children’s reflexive documentaries, experiences, and beliefs (Martin, 2019). As an arts-based mode of expression, drawing

128 

L. AZZARITO

offers an innovative child-centered technique with the capability to create forms of playful expression (Kukkonen & Chang-Kredl, 2018), visual communication, and creative expression of a child’s lifeworld (Penn, 2019). Other scholars have suggested that drawing as a childlike activity offers methodological tools for involving children as producers of knowledge (Chalfen et al., 2010), allowing marginalized or hidden voices to come to the center of the research process. For children from marginalized groups, drawing might provide empowering methodological tools in a process of amplifying, elevating, and revealing their hidden voices (Brown et al., 2020). While “like other groups pushed to the margins of society, newcomer children have often had their voices systematically ignored” (Brown et  al., 2020, p.  4), drawing provides a powerful methodological tool for enabling the voice of nonliterate or newcomer children to convey meaning-making, perspectives, and daily practices. Drawing amplifies the voice of children from marginalized groups and has the ability to bring to light hidden voices with powerful narrations. Methodologically, drawing also has the ability to work as an asset-based approach to empower the voice of newcomer or nonliterate children to share, express, and represent their stories, struggles, hopes, and aspirations with imagination. Drawing might help newcomer children overcome linguistic and cultural barriers and thus visually express meaningful experiences that would otherwise remain undiscovered or unarticulated (Brown et al., 2020). Mitchell (2006, p. 62) underlined that “drawing is seen as appropriate for the cognitive and communicative skills associated with being a child…even nonliterate children [have] an opportunity to portray life as it really is or has been for them.” Clearly, drawing provides a research tool for child empowerment and offers an important data source in education for bringing to light the viewpoints of children from marginalized groups (Brown et al., 2020; Leigh, 2020). Further, Elden (2012) argued that drawing might offer a powerful methodological tool for revealing silenced voices and bringing those voices into public debate. More recently, Pinto et al. (2021, p. 6) added that “drawing is a powerful expressive tool that strengthens children’s ability to cope with poverty and increases heir cognitive, affective, and communicative resources.” For children who live in contexts of extreme poverty, for instance, drawing can represent not only an empowering task but also a transformative experience when dealing with difficult situations. In this matter, Pinto et al. (2021, p. 6) noted that “children seem to think in a resilient way, that beauty and art can contribute to the improvement of their living condition.” When children are encouraged to represent their ideas and experiences with drawing, their engagement with the process of visual communication might help them distance themselves from hard situations and, at the same time, release their imagination to cope with difficult situations to imagine hopes, aspirations, and better environments. This can be a transformative experience for children and, at the same time, can provide adults and policymakers with a vision for social change to support children’s daily lives in positive ways. Social change cannot take place unless researchers create the research conditions for children to imagine themselves in

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

129

the world in which they live in positive, empowering, and creative ways. When education researchers position children as active agents in creating, representing, and performing visual arts, visual scholars can then begin to inform public policy, opening up possibilities for social change. As Finley (2008, p.  692) maintained, “performing social change begins with artful ways of seeing and knowing ourselves and the world in which we live.” While drawing is considered a highly participatory mode of communication, places children at the center of the research process, and offers transformative experiences for newcomer children (Blaisdell et al., 2019), Martin (2019) calls for visual researchers to consider two important issues: (1) the ways in which the research setting is constructed and (2) the researcher/child relationship. These two important concerns are discussed below. Research Context as a Child-Friendly Environment. In research with children in education, a central concern is how to construct a research environment that enables researchers to elicit data that genuinely reflect the views and opinions of children with the specific aim of bringing social change to their lives (Carter & Ford, 2013). However, the ways in which the research space is constructed have a huge impact on the research process. Creating a research context that provides children with opportunities to engage with, reflect on, and interpret their own artistic output is key to producing rich data from the view of the children. While adult-centered environments often control children, offering very little space for children to communicate freely, child-­ centered research contexts aim to create an engaging space for children to express themselves freely. Research with and for children calls for a research setting constructed as a welcoming, child-friendly environment that fosters engagement, fun, and learning (Hopperstad, 2008). A child-friendly environment constructed with and for children creates an inclusive space in which researchers implement drawing as an enabling mode of communication (Pinto et al., 2021) to help children release their imaginations to express and capture their representational intentions. Thus, as a child-centered methodology, drawing should not be implemented in a research space over which children have little or no control. Rather, the research context should be constructed upon researcher–child dynamics that value and nurture an active, inclusive, and respectful collaboration between adults and children. A child-friendly research context is an environment in which the child is treated as the “natural leader” (Martin, 2019, p. 3). In a child-friendly research environment constructed upon values of freedom, creativity, emotional expression, self and social awareness, self-satisfaction, pleasure, and self-development, drawing empowers the child to “take the lead” on a playful mode of expression (Agarwal et al., 2021). In a child-friendly research setting, the researcher’s use of drawing implements a power-leveling approach to destabilize the traditional hierarchical relationship between the researchers/adults and children/participants. In other words, constructing a child-friendly research space demands that the researcher uses drawing as a child-centered methodology that shifts control and power over the research topic to children, offering an enabling

130 

L. AZZARITO

research space in and through which children are positioned as the “real experts of their lives” (Leigh, 2020, p. 132). As a result, the child becomes a leader or expert in conveying their own opinions about relevant issues (Thompson, 2008, p. 3). A child-friendly environment that disrupts adult/child power relations empowers children to “draw” their opinions, knowledge, and ideas in expressive, personal, and meaningful ways, creating a research context from which rich and meaningful data can be generated. Establishing Meaningful Relationships with Children. While drawing has the potential to level the adult/child power imbalance, meaningful relationships with children can be established when trust, respect, and ethics of care are valued and fostered throughout the research process. Active collaborations with children lie at the heart of a child-centered methodology, and trust, respect, and inclusion are all central values in establishing meaningful relationships with children. In a child-friendly research environment, drawing can make space for nurturing relational, imaginative, and sociocultural learning while cultivating meaningful dialogue between the researchers/adults and children. This dialogue between the children and the adults that takes place during the practice of drawing offers important cultural resources for children to make sense of their experiences, to acquire social meanings of the world, and thus to express and represent their worldviews, a crucial source of data production. Setting up a child-friendly research context that nurtures meaningful dialogue with children can help the visual researcher blur the adult/child boundaries, “crossing-over” into the world of the child (Martin, 2019, p.  3). When the researcher fosters trusting and respectful relations with children in a child-­ friendly research environment, data production emerges from an authentic cooperative stance, enhancing the researcher’s understanding of the child’s expression. However, to nurture a collaborative stance in the research context, as Martin (2019) pointed out, the visual researcher should occupy the “least adult role” (p. 3), while being attentive to the child’s engagement with the planned activities. Aiming to capture the child’s interpretative acts and meaning-making without disturbing the child’s engagement in the research process is the key focus of employing drawing as a visual participatory approach with and for children. As a result of an active collaboration between children and adults, building a trusting relationship between the researcher and children “can mitigate power imbalances and reveal the experiences and perspectives of those too often obscured” (Brown et  al., 2020, p.  7). In this way, in a child-friendly research environment that encourages more personal and respectful collaborations, the practice of drawing might result in a playful, empowering, and transformative process through which children create meaningful links between children’s visual representation and their meaning-making. In a child-friendly environment, the researcher implements the “least adult role” approach to level the adult/child power imbalance and create an inclusive research environment for all children, recognizing improvisation, imagination, playfulness, and mindfulness. In summary, in a child-friendly environment, drawing offers both

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

131

a play-based pedagogy and a child-centered methodology that can establish a meaningful relationship between researchers and children, fostering a meaningful dialogue between children and adults.

Cautions and Limitations Drawing is considered as a particularly suited approach for research with children; however, researchers need to take cautions and limitations regarding the implementation of drawing in research into consideration. First, the researcher needs caution not to over-interpret the drawings and, thus, to understand the images always in relation to the children’s day-to-day lives, cultures, contexts, and meaning-making (Mitchell, 2006). Notably, Sondergaard and Reventlow (2019) advised that “drawing is not a magic tool that mysteriously prizes open a black box of otherwise inaccessible data. Drawing always needs to be analyzed and understood in conjunction with other data and on the basis of sound knowledge of their context” (p. 9). In this way, the data generated from the perspective of the child is highly dependent on the context in which the child lives. Recalling Thompson’s argument (2008), the voice of children “is very dependent on the social context in which it is located” (p. 6). Second, while drawing is an age-appropriate cultural practice in childhood and can offer a child-centered approach, not all children enjoy drawing, are willing to engage with drawing, and/or have prior experience with drawing. There are many cases in which children might not take pleasure in drawing and/or might not have any cultural background in drawing. The lack of practice, prior experience, or skills might impact the ways in which the child, as an active agent, views and decides to (dis)engage with drawing. While education researchers might implement drawing as a tool for child empowerment, Scherer (2016) demonstrated that when a disciplinary school environment regulates the voice of children, the children might not experience drawing as a value-free practice. While drawing offers an “age-appropriate” tool for consulting children on important matters, when school rules and/or adults highly regulate the practice of drawing, children might disengage from drawing (Scherer, 2016, p.  3). In a research environment that is not constructed as child-friendly but rather highly controlled by adults’ rules, children as active agents might not experience drawing as a fun or free practice but as an adult-set activity and thus decide to “leave pages blank” (Scherer, 2016, p. 1). When children wish not to engage in drawing, their silences and/or scribbles might, however, offer powerful data on their resistance. Their decision to leave pages blank demonstrates how children, as active agents, negotiate power relations embedded in a research setting, resisting the cultural practice of drawing. Another methodological concern lies with issues of ethics to ensure the anonymity and confidentiality of the child as a research participant. Because drawing might reveal important aspects of the lifeworld of the child, researchers also need to pay careful attention to what images might reveal to the public, and which images to select to minimize the risks of exposing private circumstances

132 

L. AZZARITO

(Sondergaard & Reventlow, 2019). As a child-centered methodology, drawing has the ability not only to shed light on hidden aspects of the life of a child but also to reveal the child’s context, inadvertently and unintentionally, breaching anonymity. As Mitchell (2006) stressed, visual researchers “need to be alert to the risks to privacy, confidentiality, and well-being which drawing might pose to children” (p. 70). Drawing calls for researchers to maintain a focus on generating new knowledge with children while carefully maintaining the children’s anonymity and confidentiality. With the intent of benefiting the everyday lives of children, the researcher must also convey positive narratives and highlight the best possible scenario for children. Finally, while drawing represents a research tool for child empowerment, the notion of empowerment demands careful researcher consideration as well. Notably, the sense of empowerment is not intrinsically inherited with the practice of drawing. Mitchell (2006, p. 70) noted that empowerment “is possible but depends upon having adults who are willing to listen, [and to] relinquish certain elements of control and power.” This means that the process of empowerment can take place only when children experience validation, inclusion, and trusting relationships with the researcher and support for creative expression. For children to experience empowerment, a child-friendly research environment needs to create an inclusive space through which children can feel a sense of security, validation, pleasure, and playfulness, with a focus on releasing imagination while developing an intimate sense of connection with the research context.

References Agarwal, M. K., Sehgal, V., & Ogra, A. (2021). Creating a child-friendly environment: An interpretation of children’s drawings from planned neighborhood parks of Lucknow City. Societies, 11(80), 1–22. Azzarito, L. & Kirk, D. (2013) (Eds.). Pedagogies, physical culture, and visual methods. (2006). Routledge. Blaisdell, C., Arnott, L., Wall, K., & Robinson, C. (2019). Look who’s talking: Using creative, playful arts-based methods in research with children. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 17(1), 14–31. Bober, L. (2011). Visualizing justice: The politics of working with children’s drawing. In L. Theron, C. Mitchell, A. Smith, & J. Stuart (Eds.), Picturing research: Drawing as visual methodology (pp. 63–76). Sense. Brown, A., Spencer, R., McIsaac, J.-L., & Howard, V. (2020). Drawing out their stories: A scoping review of participatory visual research methods with newcomer children. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19, 1–9. Burke, C. (2005). “Play in focus.” Children’s visual voice in participative research. In P. Thompson (Ed.), Doing Visual Research with children and young people (pp. 1–19). Routledge. Carter, B., & Ford, K. (2013). Researching children’s health experiences: The place for participatory, child-centered, arts-based approach. Research in Nursing and Health, 36, 95–107.

7  DRAWING AS A RESEARCH TOOL OF CHILD EMPOWERMENT 

133

Chalfen, R., Sherman, L., & Rich, M. (2010). VIA’s visual voices: The awareness of a dedicated audience for voices in patient video narratives. Visual Studies, 25(3), 201–209. Elden, S. (2012). Inviting the messy: Drawing methods and ‘children’s voices’. Childhood, 21(1), 66–81. Ellsworth, E. (1989). Why doesn’t this feel empowering? Working through the repressive myths of critical pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review, 59(3), 297–324. Finley, S. (2008). Arts-based inquiry: Performing revolutionary pedagogy. In J.  G. Knowles & A.  L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the arts in qualitative research (pp. 407–420). Sage Publications. Freire, P. (1972). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Myra Bergman Ramos. Hopperstad, M. H. (2008). How children make meaning through drawing and play. Visual Communication, 7(1), 77–96. James, A., & Prout, A. (1990). Constructing and deconstructing childhood: Contemporary issues in the sociology of childhood. Falmer Books. Johnson, G. A., Pfister, A. E., & Vindrola-Padros, C. (2012). Drawings, photos, and performances: Using visual methods with children. Visual Anthropology Review, 28(2), 164–178. Kim, H. (2018). Towards a dialogic understanding of children’s art-making process. The International Journal of Art & Design Education, 37, 101–112. Kukkonen, T., & Chang-Kredl, S. (2018). Drawing as a social play: Shared meaning-­ making in young children’s collective drawing activities. The International Journal of Art & Design Education, 37, 74–87. Leigh, J. (2020). Using creative research methods and movement to encourage reflection in children. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 18(2), 130–142. Leitch, R. (2008). Creatively researching children’s narratives through images and drawings. In P. Thomson (Ed.), Doing visual research with children and young people (pp. 37–58). Routledge. Lund, P. (1994). Idea-keepers: Young children’s drawings and writings. Visual Arts Research, 20(1), 20–28. Martin, G. M. (2019). Draw(me) and tell: Use of children’s drawings as elicitation tools to explore embodiment in the very young. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 18, 1–9. Mitchell, L. M. (2006). Child-centered? Thinking critically about children’s drawings as a visual research method. Visual Anthropology Review, 22(1), 60–73. Penn, L.  R. (2019). Drawing, bodies, and difference: Heterocorporeal dialogs and other intra-actions in children’s classroom drawing. Studies in Art Education: A Journal of Issues and Research, 60(2), 103–119. Pinto, G., Tosi, F., & Incognito, O. (2021). Drawing places, recreating spaces: visual voices from at-risk children. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 8, 1–7. Prosser, J., & Burke, C. (2008). Image-based educational research: Childlike perspectives. In J.  G. Knowles & A.  L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the arts in qualitative research (pp. 681–694). Sage Publications. Scherer, L. (2016). Children’s engagement with visual methods through qualitative research in the primary school as ‘art that didn’t work’. Sociological Research Online, 21(1), 1–16. Sondergaard, E., & Reventlow, S. (2019). Drawing as a facilitating approach when conducting research among children. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 18, 1–11.

134 

L. AZZARITO

Theis, J. (2001). Participatory research with children in Vietnam. In H. B. Schwartzmann (Ed.), Children and anthropology: Perspectives for the 21st century (pp. 99–109). Bergin and Garvey. Thompson, P. (Ed.). (2008). Doing visual research with children and young people. Routledge. United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). (1989). Convention on the rights of the child. UN document A/44.25. UN. Veale, A. (2005). Creative methodologies in participatory research with children. In S.  Green & D.  Hogan (Eds.), Researching children’s experience: Approaches and methods (pp. 253–272). Sage.

CHAPTER 8

Dismantling “Remain in Mexico” at the Crossroads: Intersectionality, Counter-­Story, and Un Nuevo Mundo Art Exhibition

“I am thinking of the people who have left their homelands by force or circumstances, not knowing what awaits them at their new destination…I emerge from this rabbit hole thinking of all the people who have left their homelands by force or circumstances, how they’ve experienced their losses, those who they leave behind, not knowing what awaits them at their new destination.” —Katzew, 2021b

“My maternal grandparents left their respective villages in Poland, got married and crossed the ocean to Mexico in 1929. My grandfather, or Zeide, had turned 18, and had to leave Poland to escape military conscription—as a Jewish boy he would be put in the front lines as canon fodder. What did my grandparents experience as they left their land, knowing they would never see their homes and families again? What expectations did they have for the future as they looked out of a porthole for 28 days—ungrounded for the first time in their lives?” (Fig. 8.1). Today, the highly politicized issue of migration in the US circulates dehumanizing and oppressive dominant discourses about newcomers, refugees, and asylum seekers from Mexico, reinforcing xenophobia and anti-Mexican racism. In the past few years, the “Remain in Mexico” policy has intensified and reinvigorated the anti-immigrant rhetoric, increasing discrimination, racism, violence, and the fears of asylum seekers and refugees (Marcado et  al., 2021). While the current Biden administration has made an effort to dismantle “Remain in Mexico,” this policy has exacerbated the risks of traumatic stress, violence, and physical and mental health issues among the most vulnerable immigrant groups. For instance, while many families and children seek asylum to escape dangerous conditions, poverty, unsafe situations, and violence, in their struggle to migrate, they face family separation and experiences of © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_8

135

136 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 8.1  PORTHOLES. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

traumatic stress in refugee camps at the US–Mexico border. Despite the significant work of humanitarian organizations, volunteer associations, and health professionals to mitigate the dehumanizing impact of the “Remain in Mexico” policy on many immigrants’ physical and mental health and well-being, refugees and asylum seekers often live in inadequate refugee camps under inhumane and unjust conditions, struggling to remain visible. In such dehumanizing contexts, there is an urgent need for educators, activists, and researchers to counter and dismantle today’s majoritarian anti-immigrant narrative, opening up a critical dialogue about social injustice, dehumanizing conditions, disenfranchisement, prejudice, and discrimination that newcomers, including asylum seekers, refugees, and immigrants, might face in their migrations (Bagley & Castro-Salazar, 2012). The current troubling landscape of migration calls for artists, scholars, and activists to embrace the “genre of critical arts-based research in education” (Bagley & Castro-Salazar, 2012, p. 239) as a means to evoke, invoke, and enact social justice–oriented conversations to resist and subvert majoritarian narratives with the intent to recover subjugated knowledge from the vantage point of newcomers. One way to challenge the dehumanizing anti-immigrant rhetoric about refugee seekers, immigrants, and asylum seekers rooted in the dominant American white xenophobic culture is through critical arts-based inquiry (Bagley & Castro-Salazar, 2012; Bell, 2007; Keifer-Boyd, 2011; SandersBustle, 2020). The process of art-making represents an inquiry, a research

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

137

methodology, and a praxis with the potential to cultivate a myriad of critical public spaces for the artist as well as the audience to explore, engage with, and reflect upon the embodied experiences of newcomers from minoritized groups who traverse difficult spaces of oppression, marginalization, and isolation. For instance, Bell and Desai (2011) underlined that one way to challenge oppression and marginalization is to embrace social justice arts-based research practices, in particular using aesthetic and multisensory approaches to imagine alternative possibilities for social change. More recently, Davies (2021, p. 116) added that “the field of arts-based methods has embraced notions of criticality to deepen the analysis and usefulness of arts-based methods to identify and call out injustices in society.” In this vein, as Bagley and Castro-Salazar (2012, p. 240) contended, “a critical arts-based approach arguably offers educational researchers new pathways for creating knowledge and critical cultural engagement.” Like Bagley and Castro-Salazar (2012), Barone and Eisner (2006, p. 96) also advocated for the promotion of critical arts-based research in education as a genre that strives to persuade “the percipient to see educational phenomena in new ways, and to enter questions that might have otherwise been left unmasked.” Moreover, Villaverdi (2008, p.  123) emphasized that when social justice is enacted through arts-based inquiry, critical arts-based research has “the potential to excavate the recurrent patterns of inequity and oppression, as well as the acts of transformation and activism.” Emphasizing the social justice goal too, Finley (2008, p.  72) asserted that “arts-based inquiry is uniquely positioned as a methodology for radical, ethical, and revolutionary research that is futuristic, socially responsible, and useful in addressing social inequities.” In the context of issues of migration stamped by today’s anti-immigrant rhetoric about newcomers, critical arts-based research can be particularly useful for reclaiming the voices of minoritized individuals whose stories have been silenced over and over again. Kassan et al. (2020, p. 295) asserted that arts-based research can be especially useful with groups who have been disenfranchised, such as newcomers (i.e., individuals who migrate, seek refuge, or claim asylum in a new country) who may have been silenced or overlooked by traditional forms of research in psychology…allowing them to create art and talk about their experiences through it. Arts-based research allows a more direct expression of lived experience particularly in areas, and with people, that might otherwise remain invisible with mainstream approaches.

According to Kassan et al. (2020), because newcomers are particularly vulnerable, critical arts-based inquiry can enrich their lives in meaningful ways. Critical arts-based research can create experiences for newcomers that are embodied, sensory, and experiential in affirmative ways. In line with Kassan et  al.’s argument, in an effort to bring visibility to a group of marginalized Bedouin women in Israel, Huss (2009) too advocated for the usefulness of arts-based research to offer “the opportunity to express alternative perspectives

138 

L. AZZARITO

and hybrid identities that challenge dominant paradigms, often in a way that is perceived as less threatening than words” (p. 613). Researching Bedouin women’s experiences of cultural transition during their migration to Israel, for instance, Huss (2009, 2018) employed critical arts-based inquiry with Bedouin women to create a safe space for them to voice, share, and represent concerns of violence, poverty, and health in their new community in Israel. Moreover, in this arts-based study, Bedouin women’s art reached out to the public, stimulating critical conversations about actions for social change. Similarly, Guyotte, Hofsess, Wilson, and Shields (2015, p. 108) underscored the social-justice goal of critical arts-based inquiry, reminding researchers, educators, and artists that the unique mode of “thinking about ABR [arts-based research] is the focus on the arts’ ability to not just speak to, but also against social inequities.” In this way, critical arts-based inquiry creates a public space through which the “voices and experiences of subjects whose stories are otherwise restrained [and] out of reach” can come to light “in order to publicly offer emancipatory knowledge and discourses of social justice” (Madison, 2005, p.  5). Simply put, for Bell (2007, p. 2), incorporating social justice into the arts enable[s] people to develop the critical analytic tools necessary to understand oppression and their own socialization within oppressive systems, and to develop a sense of agency and capacity to interrupt and change oppressive patterns and behaviors in themselves and in the institutions and communities of which they are a part.

Thus, as a form of inquiry, cultural change, and contestation, critical arts-­ based inquiry plays a crucial role in exploring and making visible the stories, voices, and experiences of newcomers who continue to be marginalized and made invisible by current structures of domination and oppression. In this way, one of the important goals of critical arts-based inquiry is to create arts-based exhibitions as a form of public pedagogy to engage, intervene in, make visible, and transform mainstream conversations about migration, newcomers, and refuge seekers. To this end, the empowering and transformative capacity of the arts can be enacted to bring the voices of those on the margins to the center. As critical sites of public pedagogy, arts-based inquiry intentionally cultivates democratic dialogues to decolonize communities in the public sphere. Art releases imagination while evoking critical reflection to provoke action for social change (Greene, 1995). When a social justice approach is incorporated into arts-based inquiry, complex relationships among insights, imagination, embodiment, relationality, discrimination, and inquiry can emerge from the art-making process (Keifer-Boyd, 2011) and be co-shared with the audience in arts-based exhibitions. In this way, the ultimate goal of art-based exhibitions to engage the public is enacted in a local community, facilitating socio-educational and critical conversations about newcomers from minoritized groups who struggle against prejudice, marginalization, social inequalities, and disenfranchisement. Notably, a social-­ justice approach to art-based exhibitions creates a community space for

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

139

engaging with, confronting, and dismantling hegemonic anti-immigrant discourses that oppress newcomers while raising critical consciousness on the disproportionate impact of race, gender, disability, sexuality, social class, religion, and the complexity of the intersectionality of social categories on the life of newcomers. As the culmination of critical arts-based inquiry, arts-based exhibitions have the potential to offer critical sites for cultural transformation, recovering, making visible, and legitimating hidden histories while evoking and amplifying the voices of minoritized individuals who have been historically left out and silenced. Embracing the powerful, inspiring, and transformative capacity of arts, critical arts-based exhibitions offer vital community sites for restoring and amplifying the voices of minoritized groups, activating a transformative space for their stories to come alive, while generating counter-histories and counter-­stories for the reimagining of education. To counter-narrate today’s majoritarian anti-immigrant narrative, I turn to Adriana Katzew’s artwork (Katzew, 2021a, 2021b, 2021c, 2021d; Katzew & Wassner, 2022) as a means of demonstrating the potential of critical arts-based inquiry enacted in an urban community for the recovery of subjugated knowledge. To this end, the following sections first consider Adriana’s critical artwork But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) to attend to, explore, and stage the multiple, hidden, and vulnerable aspects of her own identity from an intersectionality framework and, second, offer a glimpse into Adriana’s Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition as a way of exemplifying the powerful and transformative capacity of arts-based exhibitions as critical sites of public pedagogy for social justice.

But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish): Intersectionality Lens While immigrants of Mexican origin are often stereotyped as “Other,” “illegal,” or “inferior” in the dominant American white xenophobic culture, being a Mexican Jewish woman not only traverses racialized boundaries and barriers but also intersects with other forms of discrimination at the crossroads of sexism, religion, social class, and so on. To this point, while Bagley and Castro-­ Salazar (2012, p.  242) explained that the term “Mexican” “operates as a dehumanizing signifier denoting xenophobia and anti-Mexican racism; the illegality situated in the body of the individual rather than any law they may have breached,” Adriana interrogated how a Mexican identity fluidly intersects with other minoritized identities: being a Latina Mexican Jewish woman. As a social justice artist, educator, and researcher, Adriana immersed herself in the process of crafting art while deeply reflecting on her Latina and Jewish identities, excavating into her own family history, stories, and upbringing. Adriana’s art-making attends to, explores, and stages the multiple, hidden, and vulnerable aspects of her own identity. As a socially engaged artist, Adriana uses her critical art to challenge and subvert dominant discourses and conventional ideas about newcomers from minoritized groups in society, crafting an entry point for the complexity of her identities to be “seen” while creating access for her own voice to

140 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 8.2  BUT YOU DON’T LOOK MEXICAN (LATINA & JEWISH), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

emerge and become heard. But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) exemplifies how critical artwork has the ability to create subjugated knowledge, opening up a space for the audience to capture the complexity of minoritized identities through an intersectionality lens. With her art practice, Adriana critically engages with the merging, fluid, intertwining, and multifaceted aspects of identity, picturing her sense of self in But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) (Fig. 8.2). “A sense of vulnerability emerged with each of my identities, which was largely shaped by the contexts and circumstances of my geographies” (Katzew, March 2021a). As Kassan et al. (2020, p. 296) suggested, the intersectionality framework can be particularly useful for shedding light on “multiple forms of oppression and marginality that are ascribed to people’s cultural identities and social locations through power relations in our society.” In her praxis, Adriana’s arts-­ based inquiry is informed by the intersectionality framework; nevertheless, she engages with, connects with, and speaks to a diversified public audience beyond the academic sphere (Bagley & Castro-Salazar, 2012) with the intent to raise cultural awareness, resistance, and cultural transformation. For instance, transcending the academic boundaries, in one of her articles recently published for Jewish Boston (Katzew, 2021c), Adriana explores the complexity of the intersectionality shaping her identity, bringing hidden, vulnerable aspects of her identities to light from the vantage point of being a Jewish Mexican Latina woman (Fig.  8.2). Connecting to other community members, But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) is an entry point for the audience to “see,” explore, and navigate how the complexity of an identity marked by the intersectionality of gender, race, and Judaism deeply shapes a sense of self. Moreover, this artistic piece offers the public access to a life history, meanings, interpretations, and voices associated with Adriana’s lived diversity, intersectionality, and social justice. In her article (Katzew, 2021c), Adriana publicly shares her own deeply personal reflection displayed in But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish)

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

141

with the Jewish Arts Collaborative’s community (Katzew, 2021c). With a vivid narrative, Adriana disclosed, …I go back in time to my childhood in México City, and my school uniform comes to mind. I went to a Jewish school, as did the majority of Jewish children, and our school’s sweater had a badge on the chest that included a Star of David with our school name embroidered on it. Once in a while I would run errands after school or go to the corner store with my sweater still on. While most of the time this did not pose a problem, what’s etched in my mind are those times when someone walked past me, looked at my sweater and said, “Pinche judía” [F#@*ing Jew] loud enough for me to hear. I never responded, too shocked by the comment and shaking with fear. How could I not feel fear, knowing too well that my grandparents left Europe due to antisemitism, or knowing the history of the Holocaust, which I had been learning since my early years? I wonder why my school chose to include a Star of David as our school badge for all to see, and to place it in the exact same spot as the yellow Stars of David that Jews were forced to wear during the Nazi era. Surely it must have been a purposeful decision, a way to reclaim our Jewish identity, just as the LGBTQ community reclaimed the pink triangle after it was used as a badge of shame for homosexual and bisexual men in Nazi concentration camps. When I moved to Dallas, Texas, at the age of 14, my Jewish identity moved to the background as my Mexican identity moved to the forefront, especially when folks heard my “accent” and asked where I was from. The racism against Mexicans was such that some of my classmates never spoke to me after I told them I was Mexican. And being Jewish didn’t open doors either. I was an outsider to the long-established Jewish Texan culture. Little by little my Jewish identity was limited to my private sphere. A sense of vulnerability emerged with each of my identities, which was largely shaped by the contexts and circumstances of my geographies. I grew to learn that many people had a hard time understanding the fact that I could be both Mexican American/Latina and Jewish. It was not a “combination” most people had encountered, so they would often choose one identity over the other to define me, depending on their own perspectives, biases or needs (“Let’s count her as Latina for our demographics,” or, “She’s not really Latina because she’s Jewish!”). While my “accent” shaped how others saw me and identified me as an outsider within the U.S. context, I could exercise some control over my Jewish identity. I could choose who I would tell I was Jewish. I shared it with the people who I thought would not discriminate and with those who I thought would understand or welcome my Latina Jewish identities. With the passing of time, it became too draining to explain how I could be Mexican American and Jewish, and I often had to use my instinct to determine whether the question came from a good place before investing time and energy explaining it and making myself vulnerable in the process.

But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) (Fig. 8.2) stages Adriana’s embodiment of her making sense of and negotiating the intersecting, multiple, fluid, and multifaceted forms of her Jewish, Mexican, Latina woman identities, though as she pointed out, her Jewish identity “does not fall squarely within the U.S. Ashkenazi culture” (Katzew, 2021a). Through the process of deeply

142 

L. AZZARITO

reflecting on her personal experience, Adriana puts the fragility of her identity on display with an inspiring work of art, bringing to light the weaving of social categories in her imagining of how the intersectionality of gender, race, religion, and nationalities shapes her own identity (Fig.  8.2). Nevertheless, But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish) problematizes, undermines, and destabilizes the rigidity of normativity attached to the social categories of race, gender, sex, religion, and nationality that frames minoritized identities in deficit terms. In the practice of her art, immersing herself in a process “through which ideas, emotions, and experiences are critically analyzed and made public, not for the sake of disclosure in and of itself but for the furthering of collective knowledge production” (Villaverdi, 2008, p. 122), Adriana reclaims her cultural identity, history, and voice, co-sharing new knowledge with her own community. Building upon Adriana’s But You Don’t Look Mexican (Latina & Jewish), the following section offers a glimpse into Adriana’s Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition as a way of exemplifying the powerful and transformative capacity of arts-based exhibitions as critical sites of public pedagogy with the goal of advancing a “collective knowledge production” (Villaverdi, 2008, p. 122).

A Counter-Story of Migration: Un Nuevo Mundo Through the practice of art, Adriana takes a social justice approach to arts-­ based inquiry, creating a wide range of critical sites of public pedagogy (e.g., art exhibitions, blogs, community workshops) through which the audience engages with arts-driven storytelling for social justice. The creative process of art-making enables Adriana to craft her own “storytelling” that not only destabilizes master narratives of minoritized groups in deficit terms (Solorzano & Yosso, 2002) but also intentionally uses arts exhibitions as a form of “public art intervention” for social justice (Desai & Darts, 2016, p. 184). As a researcher, educator, and activist, in her praxis, Adriana uses her arts-based inquiry to encompass “arts-insight, arts-inquiry, arts-imagination, arts-embodiment, and arts-relationality” (Keifer-Boyd, 2011, p.  5) and generate storytelling to enhance cultural awareness and resistance for social change (Giroux, 2004). Emerging from her Boston-based Community Creative Fellowship, the Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition represents the culmination of her arts inquiry into her personal history and family’s migration. Un Nuevo Mundo stages and cultivates a public space through which she engages in dialogue with other community members, raising consciousness about issues of migration, marginalization, and social justice. The Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition intentionally builds a pedagogical space for critical conversations, bringing emotions, memories, historical photos, texts, and stories alive for the promotion of cultural transformation. Adriana (Katzew, 2021a) explained, As part of the Community Creative Fellowship, I’m excited to explore the multi-­ layered and complex aspects of our Jewish identities. As I delve into the history of my own family’s migration from Poland to Mexico in the late 1920s, I have been excavating the threads of many stories.

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

143

Through the exhibition of photos, narratives, videos, and objects, Adriana’s storytelling came to representation in July 2022 at the Gorse Mill Gallery, Needham, MA (Fig. 8.3). The Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition stages, in visual form, questions, gaps, stories, objects, and insights into Adriana’s family

Fig. 8.3  A NEW WORLD/UN NUEVO MUNDO, 2022. Gorse Mill Exhibition poster. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

144 

L. AZZARITO

migration from Poland to Mexico to escape persistent anti-Semitism in the late 1920s. In the process of art-making, Adriana explored a central question: “What did they experience as they left their land and looked at a vast empty ocean for 28 days?” (Katzew, 2021b). In her practice of art, Adriana engages with photos, stories, and artifacts embedded in her cultural memory and family to tell her own story, reshaping her subjectivity while exploring the sociohistorical context of her grandparents’ migration from Poland to Mexico to escape anti-Semitism. This art exhibition is an entry point for the audience to feel, perceive, and “see” a portrayal of Adriana’s embodied and historical self, constructed upon the matrix of social processes as well as processes of physical engagement with historical images, texts, artifacts, and so on. As a way of sharing a flavor of the Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition, some examples of Adriana’s artistic work are displayed below (Figs. 8.4, 8.5, 8.6, and 8.7). “While photographing my grandfather’s tallit (prayer shawl), I discovered a stain. It turned out to be a spot of mole, a Mexican sauce made with chocolate and spices. Here was my grandfather, always impeccably dressed, impatiently rushing to taste my grandmother’s mole before even taking off his tallit. Food carries memory.”“My grandmother, Bobe, was justifiably proud of her cooking, and there were recipes she was reluctant to share even with me. At home, she would invariably wear her “baberito” or delantal, the universal Mexican kitchen apron. I can still see the enormous key ring she would put in her right pocket, together with candies, pesos and crumpled tissue.” For the audience, Un Nuevo Mundo opens up a site of exploration, imagination, and embodiment of her grandparents’ migration to generate memories of, reflection on, and consciousness of the difficult experience of migration. As Adriana immersed herself in the art-making journey, she started traveling with her maternal grandparents (Zeide and Bobe in Yiddish), who, after 28 days on a steamship, finally arrived at the Nuevo Mundo, Veracruz, in 1929. Imagining her Zeide and Bobe leaving their family, lands, and Polish life behind at the young age of 18, Adriana questioned, crafted, imagined, and expressed the experiences of loss, deep senses of dislocation, fears of the unknown, and expectations for the future her grandparents might have embodied. At the opening of the Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition, in her talk (Fig. 8.3), Adriana emphasized the need for physical, direct engagement with her grandparents’ photos, texts, and artifacts to use multisensory ways of feeling, exploring, and imagining what migration meant for her grandparents. The embodied experience of making art is a powerful form of expression (Kassan et al., 2020). Because art embodies knowledge, art-based inquiry offers an alternative lens for exploring a life situation, migration, and history. For example, Keifer-Boyd (2011) theorized that “art embodied how humans perceive their experiences and other intangible concepts, sensitivities, and ideologies” (p. 13). As an artist, in the process of imagining her grandparents’ migration to Un Nuevo Mundo, Adriana makes art as a means of

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

145

Fig. 8.4  (a, b, c) PORTHOLES (close-up), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

intimately connecting to her Jewish grandparents she grew up with as a child back in Mexico, inserting herself in their migration and new life in the new world of Mexico while reconstituting her identity in the act of learning. In this way, Adriana’s artwork offers a means to legitimate, authorize, and empower her own voice as a Latina Mexican Jewish woman while simultaneously recovering hidden stories of minoritized identities in the memories of her grandparents.

146 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 8.5  BOLSITAS de INMIGRACION (IMMIGRATION BAGS), 2022. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

Fig. 8.6  (a) TALIT con MOLE (closed), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew. (b) TALIT con MOLE (open), 2021. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

147

Fig. 8.7  EL BABERITO de BOBE (Bobe’s Apron), 2022. Printed with permission from Adriana Katzew

Community Engagement. The Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition creates an inspiring social justice–oriented public space for cultural understanding about issues of migration, resistance, and hope for social change. It “offers visual language forms that crack the hermetic seal of hegemonic perceptions” (Keifer-­Boyd, 2011, p. 4), enacting the empowering capability of the arts to intervene in the public space and creating a critical pedagogical site for enhancing community members’ dialogue, conversations, and contestation. Kassan et al. (2020) suggested that critical arts exhibitions might operate as a “cultural exhibit to open communal spaces where people can see, touch, talk about, read, write on, interact with, or reflect on the artifacts being displayed” (p. 305). As the culmination of Adriana’s social justice art practices, Un Nuevo Mundo problematizes, intervenes in, and uses public spaces for conversations and dialogue about migration, creating a community’s space “to unearth and confront concealed (or ghost) stories of racism that run through contemporary life and enact new transforming stories to challenge racism and perform counter practices to it” (Bell & Desai, 2011, p. 291). In particular, Adriana’s artwork staged at Un Nuevo Mondo evoked, invoked,

148 

L. AZZARITO

and conveyed emotional experiences, understanding, and interpretation capable of transcending academic boundaries, reaching out to the wider Jewish and Jewish Latinx community in her urban community. For instance, endorsing the notion of “arts-relationality” (Keifer-Boyd, 2011, p.  5), Adriana spoke about “community engagement for social justice” in one of her blogs (Katzew, 2021a), inviting community members to join her in the process of arts-based inquiry and engage together in dialogues about migration. In Adriana’s eyes, practicing art for community engagement through workshops engenders a collective consciousness, bringing other hidden stories to light while providing an educational space for fostering “new pathways for creating knowledge” (Leavy, 2009, p. ix). Welcoming other community members in the art-making process for social justice, Adriana reached out to her community (Katzew, 2021d): While 2021 will allow me as an artist to explore my family’s history, as well as my intersecting identities and cultures as a Jewish Latina (or a Latina Jew, depending on the day!), I am as eager to bring people together through a number of community-­ engaged workshops. These workshops are a vital aspect of the Community Creative Fellowship. I envision workshops where the participants can explore, through the arts, their own (family) histories and stories, and their own intersectionalities; workshops where unique and universal stories emerge from such explorations and reflections.

Adriana’s artwork is passionate, personal, and public. Adriana’s critical arts-­ based practices enacted in her own urban community engage with and welcome other minoritized individuals, creating a community space for majoritarian stories of newcomers in deficit terms to emerge, be subverted, and be transformed. Adriana’s community engagement through arts inquiry generates a collective consciousness about issues of immigration, struggle, and marginalization toward social justice, sparking alternative and positive images of minoritized identities for social change. Inviting community members to engage in arts-based inquiry workshops sustains and validates their histories, epistemologies, languages, and literacies. The Un Nuevo Mondo art exhibition offered an entry point for community members to engage with a critical dialogue, authorizing individuals from minoritized groups—including newcomers, refuge seekers, and immigrants— to excavate, problematize, and share their personal experiences, histories, memories, and feelings about migration. This entry point affords opportunities for community members to be part of a democratic forum where social justice can take place. The Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition offered a “context of discovery” as well as a “context of presentation” (Plath, 1990, p.  367) from the vantage point of Adriana’s being a Mexican American and Jewish artist, educator, and researcher for cultural change. Adriana’s artwork

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

149

generates “different” ways of seeing newcomers or asylum seekers and migration, interrupting, evoking, and problematizing stereotypical constructions of “immigrant.” While Bagley and Castro-Salazar (2012, p. 243) contended that “Americans of Mexican origin are positioned as one of the most vulnerable and subjugated groups in USA,” the photos and artifacts exhibited at Un Nuevo Mundo tell the audience a different story from today’s dehumanizing majoritarian anti-­ immigrant rhetoric denoted by “xeno-phobia and anti-Mexican racism” (Bagley & Castro-Salazar, 2012, p. 243). Like the Un Nuevo Mundo, of key importance to knowledge mobilization is the use of critical arts exhibitions as cultural exhibits (Kassan et  al., 2020). With her artwork, Adriana’s cultural identity, languages, and history create an inspiring, interesting, humanizing, and empathic story for the public to engage with, enacting the “process of adjustment in the audience’s beliefs” and reminding “them of their common humanity” (Davies, 2021, p.  120). In today’s troubling context of migration, Adriana’s artwork inspires the audience to imagine how Un Nuevo Mundo needs to be rebuilt in the current dehumanizing landscape of migration to dismantle the anti-immigrant rhetoric at the crossroads of other forms of discrimination, advocating for the creation of more welcoming, inclusive, humanizing, and respectful environments for newcomers. Un Nuevo Mundo establishes an inspiring counternarrative that breaks away from today’s dominant American culture of migration viewed through deficit lenses, reduces stigmatization of immigrant populations, and takes the audience in another direction: toward the recovery of subjugated knowledge. The Un Nuevo Mundo art exhibition was personal, intimate, and political: An action for social change. Dedication  This chapter is dedicated to my dearest friend and “sister,” Adriana Katzew. I am grateful for your deep friendship, love, caring, and genuine commitment to social justice, marginalized identities, and storytelling. Your amazing art, unique heritage, stories, and sense of humor inspire and enrich my life and the lives of those around you. I am immensely thankful for the opportunity to write about Un Nuevo Mundo. 

References Bagley, C., & Castro-Salazar, R. (2012). Critical arts-based research in education: Performing undocumented historias. British Educational Research Journal, 38(2), 239–260. Barone, T., & Eisner, E. (2006). Arts-based educational research. In J.  Green, G.  Camilli, & P.  Elmore (Eds.), Complementary methods in research in education. Lawrence Erlbaum.

150 

L. AZZARITO

Bell, L. A. (2007). Theoretical foundations for social justice education. In M. Adams, L. A. Bell, & P. Griffin (Eds.), Teaching for diversity and social justice (pp. 3–15). Routledge. Bell, L. A., & Desai, D. (2011). Imagining otherwise: Connecting the arts and social justice to envision and act for change: Special Issue Introduction. Equity & Excellent in Education, 44(3), 287–295. Davies, C. (2021). Sampling poetry, pedagogy, and protest to build methodology: Critical poetic inquiry as culturally relevant method. Qualitative Inquiry, 27(1), 114–124. Desai, D., & Darts, D. (2016). Interrupting everyday life: Public interventionist art as critical public pedagogy. The International Journal of Art & Design Education, 35(2), 183–195. Finley, S. (2008). Arts-based inquiry: Performing revolutionary pedagogy. In J. G. Knowles & A. L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the arts in qualitative research (pp. 681–694). Sage Publications. Giroux, H. A. (2004). Public pedagogy and the politics of neo-liberalism: Making the political more pedagogical. Policy Futures in Education, 2(3), 494–503. Greene, M. (1995). Releasing the imagination. Essays of education, the arts, and social change. Jossey-Bass. Guyotte, K. W., Hofsess, B. A., Wilson, G. J., & Shields, S. S. (2015). Tumbling from embodiment to enfleshment: Art as intervention in collective autoethnography. Art Research International: A Transdisciplinary Journal, 3(2), 101–132. Huss, E. (2009). A case study of Bedouin women’s art in social work: A model of social arts intervention with “traditional” women negotiating western cultures. Social Work Education, 28, 598–616. Huss, E. (2018). Arts as a methodology for connecting between micro and macro knowledge in social work: Examples of impoverished Bedouin women’s images in Israel. British Journal of Social Work, 48, 73–87. Kassan, A., Goopy, S., Green, A., Arthur, N., Nutter, S., Russell-Mayhew, S., Sesma Vazquez, M., & Silversides, H. (2020). Becoming new together: Making meaning with newcomers through an arts-based ethnographic research design. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 17(2), 294–311. Katzew, A. (2021a). Let’s Start: Community Creative Fellowship. JewishBoston. https://www.jewishboston.com/read/lets-­start-­community-­creative-­fellowship/ Katzew, A. (2021b). Down the First Rabbit Hole: The Transatlantic Voyage. JewishBoston. https://www.jewishboston.com/read/down-­the-­first-­rabbit-­hole-­ the-­transatlantic-­voyage/ Katzew, A. (2021c). On identity and vulnerability: Latina & Jewish. JewishBoston. https://www.jewishboston.com/read/on-­identity-­and-­vulnerability-­latina-­jewish/ Katzew, A. (2021d). Weaving our stories together through Art. JewishBoston. https:// www.jewishboston.com/read/weaving-­our-­stories-­together-­through-­art/ Katzew, A., & Wassner, D. (2022). Narrating belonging: The art of memory. Brandeis University’s Hadassah-Brandeis’ Institute Project on Latin American Jewish and Gender Studies. Conversation with LAJGS Director Dalia Wassner. https://ensemble.brandeis.edu/hapi/v1/contents/permalinks/g6R7Ffx2/view

8  DISMANTLING “REMAIN IN MEXICO” AT THE CROSSROADS… 

151

Keifer-Boyd, K. (2011). Arts-based research as social justice activism. Insight, inquiry, imagination, embodiment, relationality. International Review of Qualitative Research, 4(1), 3–19. Leavy, P. (2009). Social research and the creative arts. An introduction. In P.  Leavy (Ed.), Method meets art: Arts-based research practice (pp. 23–56). Guilford. Madison, D.  S. (2005). Critical ethnography: Methods, ethics and performance. Sage Publications. Marcado, A., Garcini, L., Venta, A., & Paris, M. (2021). ‘Remain in Mexico’: Stories of trauma and abuse. Health Affairs, 40(7), 1170–1173. Plath, D. (1990). Field notes, filed notes, and the conferring of note. In R.  Sanjek (Ed.), Fieldnotes (pp. 10–46). Cornell University Press. Sanders-Bustle, L. (2020). Social practice as arts-based methodology: Exploring participation, multiplicity and collective action as elements of inquiry. Art Research International: A Transdisciplinary Journal, 5(1), 47–70. Solorzano, D. G., & Yosso, T. J. (2002). Critical race methodology: Counter-storytelling as an analytic framework for education research. Qualitative Inquiry, 8(23), 114–124. Villaverdi, L. (2008). Feminist theories and education. Peter Lang.

CHAPTER 9

Visual Research Ethics: Dilemmas, Judgment, and Ethics of Care

Visual research ethics is a rapidly changing field of study and thus, there is a need for researchers to consider this field as dynamic, contextual (Becker, 1998), and, at times, contested (Wiles et al., 2011). Ethical responsibility in visual research should be situated within the specific research context, the researcher’s moral framework (Banks, 2001; Becker, 1998; Clark et al., 2010; Dingwall, 2008; Pouwels, 2008; Prosser, 2000, 2001), and the community rights and benefits for research participants (Mitchell & de Lange, 2011). The aims of the chapter are threefold: First, the chapter lays out key principles or guidelines for visual research ethics (Delgado, 2015; ESRC, 2015; Locke, 2019; Papademas & IVSA, 2009; Rose, 2016). Second, the chapter considers some challenges regarding ethical practices associated with visual research, particularly around issues of informed consent, anonymity, confidentiality, and dissemination of findings. The last section suggests that a situated approach to visual research ethics (Clark, 2012) might help researchers seek a delicate balance between a solid understanding of visual ethics principles and guidelines on the one hand and a careful consideration of context (Becker, 1998) and the benefits to the participants on the other. Researchers’ implementation of a situated approach to visual research ethics might help them consider the unique challenges of visual research with thoughtfulness, ethics of care, and integrity (Banks, 2001; Becker, 1998; Clark et  al., 2010; Dingwall, 2008; Pouwels, 2008; Prosser, 2000, 2001), careful judgment, prudence, and reflexivity (Rose, 2016).

Visual Ethics: Key Principles and Guidelines Research involving human participants must be formally approved through a process of institutional ethics review. All researchers are obliged to comply with the ethical regulations that their own institutions establish. For instance, Cox

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_9

153

154 

L. AZZARITO

(2019) explained that “in Canada, the body charged with this task is a research ethics board (REB); in the United States, it is an institutional review board (IRB); and in Australia and the United Kingdom, it is a research ethics committee (REC)” (p. 252). In the context of the US, like in many other countries around the world, all research must be submitted to an IRB and gain formal approval from the university ethics review board. Specific to the US, the IRB is governed by the Research Act of 1974 (Code of Federal Regulations) and is responsible for reviewing research proposals. All researchers at their universities and colleges are required to receive an IRB’s formal approval of their studies before they can undertake the proposed research. In general, the university’s IRB committee consists of faculty—in some cases, faculty and community members—and is responsible for scrutinizing research proposals to ensure that the proposed research methods and procedures will not harm participants. About this matter, Locke (2019, p. 111) explained: IRBs are particularly concerned about “risk” and particularly for members of the previously mentioned groups, that is, what are the risks to the human subject related to participating in a study. Importantly, there is no such thing as a study with no risk. Risk is determined by the potential harms that may be experienced by a participant as a result of partaking in a research study. Factors associated with risk might include the procedures involved in a study, the setting or context in which the study takes place, the equipment associated with the study, the researcher’s level of training and/or experiences, and the health and age of the participants.

Common principles inform ethical codes of practice, and for all types of research, including visual research, researchers need to consider ethical implications carefully (Clark, 2012; Rose, 2016; Wiles et  al., 2011). The following section lays out examples of key principles or guidelines for visual ethics (AAA, 2009; AAS, 2003; ASA, 1999, 2018; Delgado, 2015; ESRC, 2015; Papademas & IVSA, 2009; Wiles et al., 2008). For instance, Wiles et al. (2008, p. 8) outlined the following main principles: • Researchers should strive to protect the rights, privacy, dignity, and well-­ being of those that they study; • Research should (as far as possible) be based on voluntary informed consent; • Personal information should be treated confidentially and participants anonymized unless they choose to be identified; and • Research participants should be informed of the extent to which anonymity and confidentiality can be assured in the publication and dissemination of the potential reuse of data. Elsewhere, drawing from the Economic and Social Research Council’s (ESRC) Framework of Research Ethics, Rose (2016, p.  358) referred to key principles, as explained below:

9  VISUAL RESEARCH ETHICS: DILEMMAS, JUDGMENT, AND ETHICS OF CARE 

155

• Research participants should take part voluntarily, free from any coercion or undue influence, and their rights, dignity, and (when possible) autonomy should be respected and appropriately protected. • Research should be worthwhile and provide values that outweigh any risk or harm. Researchers should aim to maximize the benefit of the research and minimize potential risk of harm to participants and researchers. All potential risk and harm should be mitigated by robust precautions. • Research staff and participants should be given appropriate information about the purpose, methods and intended uses of the research, what their participation in the research entails, and what risks and benefits, if any, are involved. • Individual research participant and group preferences regarding anonymity should be respected, and participant requirements concerning the confidential nature of information and personal data should be respected. • Research should be designed, reviewed, and undertaken to ensure that recognized standards of integrity are met, and quality and transparency are assured. • The independence of research should be clear, and any conflicts of interest or partiality should be explicit. Expanding on the above ethical guidelines and frameworks, when research participants are positioned as co-researchers and/or partners of a community-­ based research project, Delgado (2015) addressed nine functions of ethical conduct of Community-Engaged Research (CEnR): “(1) minimize psychological, safety, and harm risks; (2) reasonable benefit-risk ratio; (3) fair subject selection; (4) adequate monitoring; (5) informed consent; (6) privacy and confidentiality; (7) conflicts of interest; (8) address vulnerabilities; (9) HSP [human subject protection] training” (p. 148). However, as Delgado (2015) advised, because these nine functions of ethical research of CEnR might manifest in a wide range of ways, researchers need to consider the different types of research projects and specific circumstances regarding issues of ethics carefully and thoughtfully. For education researchers, those frameworks, principles, and codes of ethical practices outlined above provide key resources regarding ethical issues. In the US, while IRB applications and processes vary across universities and colleges, IRB approval is required before the research project takes place. While all researchers are expected to meet the requirements and expectations mandated by the IRB, as Wiles et al. (2011) pointed out, visual research ethics is a complicated terrain, and these regulatory frameworks as well as IRB approval should not be the only determinants of thinking about ethical practices. In line with their viewpoint, Bridges and McGee (2011, p.  214) underscored that while “ethics is central to all research,” the IRB is traditionally shaped by post-­ positivist research paradigms. This means that the IRB might not always be familiar with the wide range of innovative qualitative visual and arts-based methodologies, including participatory visual inquiries or arts-based research.

156 

L. AZZARITO

In this case, the visual researcher or arts-based inquirer might need to explain to the IRB how their research design is unique or different from other forms of conventional qualitative and/or quantitative research methods. While for arts-based or innovative visual inquiries the IRB might require additional explanations around visual ethics and those justifications might intensify the work of visual or arts-based researchers, the IRB might learn about the aims and the unique approaches to visual and arts-based research methodologies. As a result of this process, the IRB might enhance its institutional ethical practices. In general, the IRB scrutinizes the researcher’s ethical practices, which must receive formal IRB approval. However, after the IRB’s formal approval, Clark (2012) suggested that the visual researcher should consider how to use the visual material ethically over the course of the research—in all stages of the study, including the selection of research participants, data collection, data analysis, and dissemination of findings. Clark’s suggestion is justified for a number of reasons. First, the ethical regulatory framework and code of practice stated by the institutional ethics review board are conventionally associated with numbers and/or words-based forms of qualitative research. Second, because the institutional ethical review procedures and regulatory frameworks are post-positivist oriented, members of the IRB might not always have the appropriate research training to understand how the visual material and methodologies apply to visual research practices. Third, because the ethical framework posed by the IRB often represents a “one-size-fits-all” approach to ethical research practices, such a framework might not always cover or deal with the wide range of visual and arts-based research methodologies (Clark, 2012, p. 25). As Warr et al. (2019, p. 8) pointed out, different from conventional forms of research, “visual research projects are more likely to involve discrete, but interlinked, creative and research components.” While all researchers must meet the ethical guidelines, rules, regulations, and expectations of the institutional ethics review board and legal framework, how to use visual material in ethical ways is not always straightforward but needs to be situated within the specific research context and the visual researcher’s moral framework (Rose, 2016). According to Perry and Marion (2010, p. 99), visual research ethics is a complicated and rapidly growing field of study and thus demands that visual researchers build upon the conventional IRB framework with “careful strategies for mediating [visual] ethical concerns.” In this regard, Clark (2012, p. 25) argued that there is a need to re-situate the ethics-related debate beyond the requirements of regulatory frameworks and code of ethics (important as they are) in an emergent landscape of alternative practices. Some, though certainly not all, of the ethical dilemmas visual researchers face arise from a legacy of biomedical, or at least positivist-­ oriented, ethical principles that fail to fit with their predominantly post-positivist methodological frameworks…such situated ethics recognize that it is unlikely that a “one-size-fits-all” ethical framework will be appropriate for all visual research and demonstrate how ethical decisions can be made (and appraised) in

9  VISUAL RESEARCH ETHICS: DILEMMAS, JUDGMENT, AND ETHICS OF CARE 

157

the context of particular cases rather than according to a set of prescriptive regulations that are rigidly adhered to or adopted whole.

In other words, while the conventional IRB frameworks, guidelines, and procedures are required and valuable for researchers, there are cases in which the ethics around the visual data and visual research methods might be different from the ethics around numbers and/or words-based approaches to research. Whether visual research ethics should be regarded as a specialist area within visual methodologies, in contrast to ethical practices and regulations used for number- and/or words-centric research—especially when people from marginalized or vulnerable populations are involved (Wiles et al., 2011)—is an ongoing debate. Clearly, the “one-size-fits-all” ethical framework might not be appropriate for all forms of research, and visual research in particular might present complicated ethical challenges that cannot be overlooked. However, to assist visual researchers with ethical dilemmas and to expand on the ongoing complicated debate around visual ethics, several professional research-driven bodies have recently developed useful guidelines for considering ethical visual research. In the context of North America and Europe, these professional bodies include the ESRC’s Framework for Research Ethics (2015); the American Sociological Code of Ethics; the British Sociology Association (2006); and the International Visual Sociology Association in 2008 (Papademous & International Visual Sociology, 2009). For both novice and more experienced visual researchers, all of these frameworks provide helpful guidance around the topic of visual research ethics. The following section considers ethical practices associated with visual research, particularly around issues of informed consent, anonymity, confidentiality, and sites for the dissemination of findings.

Key Issues in Visual Ethics While laying out key principles, regulations, or guidelines for ethical research practices outlined by the institutional ethics review board is useful, researchers might face particular challenges in navigating ethical practices associated with visual research. Because many complex factors might inform researchers’ ethical decision-making in visual research, critically considering how to best tackle challenging ethical dilemmas is key (Rose, 2016). Regarding the complexity of the ethical decision-making process, according to Delgado (2015), researchers should also maintain transparency and openness with the research participants, creating a trusting and collaborative partnership with them throughout the research process. While researchers should discuss ethical matters with the research participants in all phases of the research, their ethical decision-making in visual research must consider the following key issues: (1) consent, (2) anonymity and confidentiality, (3) copyright ownership, and (4) dissemination of findings. Consent. Gaining consent from the research participants to take part in the research is an ethical research requirement. Researchers must obtain informed

158 

L. AZZARITO

consent from the individuals involved in the research. When visual researchers undertake research projects, they must obtain consent from research participants or legally authorized representatives (Papademas & IVSA, 2009). It is unethical for the researcher to deceive and/or coerce research participants into taking part in research. Researchers must inform research participants about the purpose of the research, the methodological procedures, and the nature of participants’ involvement. When fully informed, research participants can voluntarily consent to participate in the research project. To gain informed consent from research participants, researchers commonly use consent forms. Usually, consent forms include relevant information about the research goals, the nature of the research participants’ involvement, a short description of the task-oriented approach (e.g., photo diary, photovoice, drawing), how the participants will be involved in the research, and how the research findings will be disseminated (e.g., books, manuscripts, arts-based exhibitions, community events). In visual research, there are many cases in which the researcher might need to obtain more than one consent form from the research participants. For example, it is a common practice for visual researchers to obtain a first informed consent from research participants to be involved in the research, a second informed consent to gain research participants’ permission to use visual materials for publications, and a third informed consent to gain participants’ permission to use their photos or images in public spaces, such as arts galleries, museums, and community events. There are also cases in which the visual researcher might decide to develop a longer version of the consent form, gaining and securing consent from participants to be involved in all stages of the research project (e.g., nature of involvement, data collection, publications, public display). The length, writing style, and language(s) of the consent form also vary and depend on the age of the research participants, level of education, culture, language(s), and context. In any case, the researcher has the responsibility to explain the consent form to the research participants and to address any questions participants might have. In general, the researcher gives a copy of the consent in written form to each research participant to sign, but there are situations in which verbal consent might be considered acceptable as well. For example, a researcher (and/or a research participant) might ask someone for verbal consent to be pictured in a public setting. It is always a good practice to gain verbal (or written) consent from anyone pictured in photos. In addition, the researcher might seek verbal permission to take photos of specific places or spaces (Wiles et al., 2011). While in the UK and US, the researcher or participants can take photos of places or spaces considered public, there are areas where it is not always clear what legally constitutes “public” or “private” space. While the IRB requires the researcher to obtain signed written consent forms for all research participants before the researcher can start employing the proposed methodology, gaining consent from the participants is also an important initial step in developing and committing to relationships of trust and

9  VISUAL RESEARCH ETHICS: DILEMMAS, JUDGMENT, AND ETHICS OF CARE 

159

respect between the researcher and the participants in the research setting. In other words, securing research participants’ consent is not simply an IRB requirement. As Delgado (2015) noted, even after research participants sign the consent forms, ethical issues and dilemmas that might arise throughout all phases of the research demand careful attention and ethics of care. Similar to Delgado’s argument, Waters and Waite (2019) suggested that building “ethical relationships” with research participants in the field is crucial. Likewise, Pink (2007) contended that consent is a “process” through which research participants become aware of and informed about their involvement throughout the research process. To this end, maintaining openness and transparency throughout the entire research process can nurture a trusting collaborative partnership between the researcher and the participants, establishing a transparent and respectful ethical process. In summary, the researcher first must obtain formal IRB approval for the proposed research project. Second, research participants must give voluntary informed consent to be involved in the research, and researchers must obtain participants’ consent to anonymize (or not to anonymize) individuals in participants-produced images. Third, research participants must give consent for their images to be used in the dissemination of findings, including publications, books, and/or public exhibitions, such as photo- or art-based exhibitions. Anonymity and confidentiality. Guaranteeing the anonymity and confidentiality of the research participants involved in the research project is an ethical practice imposed by the institutional ethical review board. Maintaining anonymity and confidentiality is crucial to conducting ethical research (Wiles et al., 2011). In general, to protect the anonymity of the research participants, conventional ethical practices require researchers to fully anonymize the identities of the research participants and to maintain confidentiality regarding all the information that the research participants provide. To ensure that no research participants are identifiable in photos, it is a common practice among visual researchers to use pixilation techniques and/or to blur the faces of the research participants digitally. However, while maintaining research participants’ anonymity and confidentiality is considered a “good ethical practice for text-based data” (Clark, 2012, p. 21), anonymizing the identity of research participants might present some challenges in some forms of participatory research. For example, preserving anonymity and confidentiality might be ethical for some research projects but questionable for research participants invested in visual participatory research projects or social-justice-oriented arts-based inquiries. For instance, an arts-based researcher who also positions herself or himself as an artist in an arts-based inquiry might not want to maintain anonymity but rather freely express her or his identity with the artwork created. In this regard, Klassen (2019) contended that “research ethics review processes uncover unique challenges in situating artists’ research in academic worlds” (p. 238). In this matter, Clark (2012) too contended, “to put it bluntly, it is often impossible, impractical or even illogical to maintain the anonymity and confidentiality of individuals in artwork, photographs and film” (p.  21). For instance,

160 

L. AZZARITO

de-identifying research participants might diminish the richness of the data, and changing or manipulating images might unintentionally construct deceptive and/or misleading messages, negatively impacting the identities and/or expectations of research participants, and causing harm to the research participants’ sense of self. In addition, as Jordan (2014) clarified, “if image makers crop or adjust their photos to purposefully alter the reception of the image by the reader, or to misrepresent the situation where the image was taken, then their techniques degrade into image manipulation” (p. 445). Similar to arts-based inquiries, in visual participatory research projects participants are positioned as co-researchers or producers of knowledge, and they get involved in action research projects for making social inequalities public, so there might be cases in which research participants do not wish to maintain anonymity. Given that amplifying and respecting the voices of research participants are at the heart of visual participatory research, researchers should involve research participants in the ethical decision-making process over the course of the research project. To this point, Papademas and The International Visual Sociology Association (IVSA) (2009, p. 254) contended that there are “community/participatory research, and individual case studies involving individuals who consent to using identifying information (e.g., their own names and visual representation).” While blurring faces in visual research is a common practice, there might be cases in visual participatory research in which the research participants wish to use and/or display images they produced as unchanged. For instance, the research participants might wish to retain the original images and/or consider blurring their faces in the image to be dehumanizing and disrespectful. In those situations, as Rose (2016, p. 361) suggested, “anonymity then, is not necessarily obligatory when using visual research methods; but its absence requires careful consideration.” In this regard, the visual researcher might consider revising the initial consent form to explain the wish of the research participants not to maintain anonymity and resubmitting the revised consent form to the IRB for approval. It is always possible to make changes to an IRB application after the original approval. After IRB approval, the visual researcher might then seek to obtain a consent form from the research participants not to anonymize the images and to display the images as unchanged. In general, visual researchers recommend involving research participants in the ethical decision-making throughout the research process. However, there are also situations in which the researcher decides to maintain the anonymity of the participants in the photos against the wishes of the research participants. For instance, when researching vulnerable populations, the researchers might decide that protecting the identity of those participants is particularly important and necessary to avoid possible distortions, misinterpretations, and/or negative perceptions of the participant-produced images. In particular, Barrett (2004) suggested that to protect marginalized research participants from possible negative stereotypes, it might be necessary to maintain the anonymity of

9  VISUAL RESEARCH ETHICS: DILEMMAS, JUDGMENT, AND ETHICS OF CARE 

161

the participants in the images against the research participants’ wishes. Likewise, Warr et al. (2019, p. 12) pointed out that socially disempowered and marginalized participants are highly vulnerable to being subjected to symbolic violence through research. These concerns are inevitably heightened when participants are portrayed using words and images. These kinds of risks point to the obligations of visual researchers to protect the dignity of participants.

Copyright ownership. While some key issues framed by ethical principles are common among all researchers (e.g., minimize potential harms, maintain participants’ anonymity and confidentiality, gather informed consent), other ethical issues are particularly relevant to visual research (Warr et al., 2019). These key ethical issues are associated with issues of authorship and ownership of visual data. Rose (2016, p. 367) defined copyright as “a legal term that refers to the ownership of a specific visual image.” While the ethical issues around copyright ownership are complex and not always straightforward (Waycott et  al. 2015), issues of copyright ownership raise questions of judgment and prudence when researchers use research participants’ images for research purposes, including publications, photos, or arts exhibitions. In this regard, Clark (2012, p.  23) suggested that researchers consider the following questions: “Who has created the image? Who owns the image? Who has the right to use the images in the research?” Thinking about those questions, in general, the individual who produces the image owns the image and its copyright and thus retains copyright ownership. In this regard, Wiles et al. (2011, p. 688) clearly stated that “usually, the person who creates an image is the copyright holder.” While the person who creates the image maintains copyright ownership of the image, it is a common practice in visual research for the researcher to seek consent from the research participants to use their images for publication outputs as well as public display of the research findings (e.g., galleries, exhibitions, community events). Dissemination of findings. Visual researchers might also use research participants’ images to display research findings at arts or gallery exhibitions to reach out to the community or policymakers. At these exhibitions, the public views, interprets, and consumes the images. In this case, it is important for the researcher to consider how the audience might receive, interpret, and respond to the images displayed at those exhibitions. Notably, to minimize potential misrepresentations, negative stereotypes, or distortions of the images by the public, the researcher needs to be knowledgeable about the political, cultural, and social context and thus use the visual data thoughtfully. According to Delgado (2015), visual researchers who use photos for critical sites of public pedagogy should be careful “not to reinforce negative views of youth while still advocating for their cause” (p. 167). It is therefore key for the researcher to use public exhibitions to reach out to the public, delivering a central message that reflects, represents, and captures the voices of the research participants in

162 

L. AZZARITO

creative ways with a focus on social justice. To avoid research participants’ disappointment, though, it might also be helpful for the visual researcher and participants to work together to create and deliver the messages and opinions in a positive light from the viewpoint of the research participants.

A Situated Approach to Visual Research Ethics Whether visual research ethics should be regarded as a specialist area in contrast to the ethical practices and regulations used for number- or words-centric research, especially when involving people from marginalized or vulnerable populations, is an ongoing debate (Clark, 2012). In the context of the US, while the IRB at universities or colleges offers a useful ethical code of practice, many visual methodologists have concurred that visual research ethics call for researchers to implement a situated visual ethics approach (Clark, 2012; Rose, 2016; Wiles et al., 2011). While researchers need to seek approval from the university ethics review board, a situated approach to visual research ethics demands that researchers consider ethical dilemmas in relation to the specific circumstances, the benefits of research participants, and the researcher’s own moral framework (Clark, 2012; Rose, 2016; Wiles et al., 2011). In this regard, Wiles et al. (2011, p. 703) maintained, to act ethically is to value integrity, inclusiveness, personal security, privacy, and dignity. For visual researchers, ethics guidelines and code of practice cover important principles, but being “visual” in orientation brings its own set of methodological practices and its own distinct set of ethical conundrums that require solving.

Similar to Wiles et al.’s standpoint, other visual scholars have recognized the IRB’s ethical research guidelines as useful but emphasized that because visual research ethics present unique challenges, there is a need for researchers to move beyond the IRB’s traditional framework. To deal with those challenges thoughtfully, the visual researcher’s ethical responsibility should be situated within the specific research context, the visual researcher’s moral framework (Banks, 2001; Becker, 1998; Clark et  al., 2010; Dingwall, 2008; Pouwels, 2008; Prosser, 2000, 2001), and the community rights and benefits for research participants (Mitchell & de Lange, 2011). As Wiles et  al. (2011, p.  698) pointed out, “researchers make their own ethical decisions within the context of their research,” and their personal moral frameworks inform the research practice with the participants in the specific research context. Obviously, the researcher’s own moral framework is subjective, varies, and is a matter of context. What’s “right” or “wrong” ethically for a researcher is informed by her or his moral and ethical orientation but, notably, also shaped by the culture, wishes, and expectations of the research participants, their modes of expression, and the specific research context. The implementation of a situated collaborative approach also demands that visual researchers involve participants

9  VISUAL RESEARCH ETHICS: DILEMMAS, JUDGMENT, AND ETHICS OF CARE 

163

throughout the research process with ethics of care, aiming to establish integrity and truthfulness in the research context while validating the rights of research participants. As Clark (2012) contended, a situated approach to ethics does not mean going with whatever participants request, but rather enables researchers to make informed decisions in collaboration with participants and in consideration of the contexts in which those images will subsequently be viewed and interpreted. (pp. 28–29)

While visual ethical responsibility is a complex and rapidly changing field of study, the researcher’s use of a situated approach to ethics seeks a delicate balance (Figs. 9.1, 9.2) between a solid understanding of visual ethics principles and guidelines on the one hand and a careful consideration of context (Becker, 1998), the researcher’s moral framework (Clark, 2012), and the benefits to and rights of the research participants on the other (Delgado, 2015; Rose, 2016; Wiles et al., 2011). As Wiles et al. (2011) stated, a situated approach to visual ethics calls for researchers’ engagement with an ethical decision-making process that uses “compassion, and a desire to act in ways that benefit the individual and group who are the focus of the research” (p.  699). While ethics guidelines and frameworks offer valuable principles, a situated approach to

Fig. 9.1  A DELICATE BALANCE, 2021. Author’s birthplace, Canelli, Italy. Author’s photo

164 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 9.2  A DELICATE BALANCE, 2021. Author’s photo

visual research ethics might help researchers consider the unique challenges of visual research with thoughtfulness, ethics of care, and integrity (Banks, 2001; Becker, 1998; Clark et  al., 2010; Dingwall, 2008; Pouwels, 2008; Prosser, 2000, 2001), careful judgment, prudence, and reflexivity (Rose, 2016).

References American Anthropological Association (AAA). (2009). Code of Ethics of the American Anthropological Association. Retrieved January 28, 2010, from http://www.aaanet. org/issues/policy-­advocacy/Code-­of-­Ethics.cfm. American Sociological Association (2018). (n.d.). Code of Ethics. Retrieved April 25, 2023, from https://www.asanet.org/wp-content/uploads/asa_code_of_ethicsjune2018.pdf. Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK and the Commonwealth (ASA). (1999). Ethical Guidelines for Good Research Practice. Retrieved January 11, 2010, from http://www.theasa.org/ethics/guidelines.htm. Australian Anthropological Society (AAS). (2003). Code of Ethics. Retrieved August 26, 2010, from http://www.aas.asn.au/docs/AAS_Code_of_Ethics.pdf. Bridges, D., & McGee, S. (2011). Collaborative inquiry: Reciprocity and authenticity. In J. Higgs, A. Titchen, D. Horsfall, & D. Bridges (Eds.), Creative spaces for qualitative research: Living research (pp. 213–222). Sense Publishers.

9  VISUAL RESEARCH ETHICS: DILEMMAS, JUDGMENT, AND ETHICS OF CARE 

165

Clark, A. (2012). Visual ethics in a contemporary landscape. In S. Pink (Ed.), Advances in visual methodology (pp. 17–37). Sage Publications. Cox. (2019). Ethical considerations when using visual methods in digital storytelling with aboriginal young people in Southeast Australia. In K. K. Strunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for social justice and equity in education (pp.  171–184). Palgrave Macmillan by Springer Nature. Delgado, M. (2015). Urban youth and photovoice. Visual ethnography in action. Oxford University Press. Economic and Social Research Council. (2015). ESRC framework for research ethics. Economic and Social Research Council. Retrieved June 20, 2022, from http:// www.escr.ac.uk/_images/framework-­for-­research-­ethics_tcm8-­33470.pdf Jordan, S. R. (2014). Research integrity, image manipulation, and anonymizing photographs in visual social science research. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 17(4), 441–454. Klassen. (2019). Research by artists: Critically integrating ethical frameworks. In K. K. Strunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for social justice and equity in education (pp. 237–250). Palgrave Macmillan by Springer Nature. Locke, L. A. (2019). Institutional review board: Purposes and applications for students. In K. K. Strunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for social justice and equity in education (pp. 109–113). Palgrave Macmillan by Springer Nature. Papademas, D., & The International Visual Sociology Association. (2009). IVSA code of research ethics and guidelines. Visual Studies, 24(3), 250–257. Perry, S., & Marion, J.  S. (2010). State of the ethics in visual anthropology. Visual Anthropology Review, 26(2), 93–104. Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies. An introduction to researching with visual methods. Sage Publications. Warr, D., Waycott, J., Guillemin, M., & Cox, S. (2019). Ethical issues in visual research and the value of stories from the field. In K. K. Strunk & L. A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for social justice and equity in education (pp. 1–16). Palgrave Macmillan by Springer Nature. Waters, P., & Waite, S. (2019). Toward an ecological approach to ethics in visual research methods with children. In K.  K. Strunk & L.  A. Locke (Eds.), Research methods for social justice and equity in education (pp. 117–127). Palgrave Macmillan by Springer Nature. Wiles, R., Bagnoli, A., Clark, A., Davies, K., Holland, S., & Reynold, E. (2008). Visual ethics: Ethical issues in visual research. ESRC National Centre for Research Methods. Wiles, R., Clark, A., & Prosser, J. (2011). Visual research ethics at the crossroads. In E.  Margolis & L.  Pauwels (Eds.), The sage handbook of visual research methods (pp. 685–706). Sage Publications.

CHAPTER 10

Conclusion

Reimagining education in the current landscape of schooling calls for decolonizing and humanizing visual research methodologies that re-center, valorize, and make visible voicelessness (Fig.  10.1). In today’s neoliberal era, reimaging education calls for creative, alternative, and situated methodologies that use images as primary sources of data combined with multisensory approaches to covey documentations, tell stories, bring hidden identities to surface, display counter-visualities, and stage critical arts-based inquiries to reach out to the public, beyond the academic boundaries. While the increased commercial discourse driven by neoliberal globalization invites research methods that are marketable, implicitly providing a fertile neoliberal academic context for researchers to adopt simplistic and mechanistic research methods that promote scientific reductionism and uniformed scholarship, images release imagination while evoking thoughtful reflection to provoke action for social justice. Visual Methods for Social Justice Education makes an argument for moving beyond words, and turning to creative, decolonizing, arts-based, visual methodologies. The book hopes to provide education to researchers with the methodological tools to problematize, explore, and shed light on the experiences of individuals from marginalized groups, offer indepth cultural insights into community dynamics, support community-based activism, reinvigorate community-led environmental activism, position children as active agents, “artists” and producers of knowledge in research, offer child-centered approaches, and enable silenced voices to “speak up,” bringing to light complexities, nuances, and multiplicities of knowledge for social change.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2_10

167

168 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 10.1  Social justice and education, 2021. (Source: Author’s photo)

Central themes explored in this book range from neoliberal governmentality in education to the social justice research paradigm, intersectionality, decolonizing and humanizing research, community empowerment, counter-­ visualities, collaborative seeing, asset-focused approaches, ethics of care, and the need for transgressing academic boundaries by reaching out to the public sphere for social change, engaging with policymakers, activists, educators, families, practitioners, and journalists. Rather than simply collecting data in urban schools as “data plantations” and/or incorporating the data from “Others” in research in ways that implicitly colonize and reproduce patterns of oppression, to challenge existing modes of scholarship beyond a monovocal story or one single-sided story, the wide range of visual approaches discussed in this book offer methodological tools of resistance to a majoritarian story sustained by Whiteness, espousing and challenging its deficit theorizing. While conventional methodological simplification might not engage with Otherness from a decolonized standpoint, the different visual approaches included in this book provide researchers, educators, graduate students, and artists with decolonizing, humanizing, and creative methodologies for resisting, interrupting, and transgressing the normative “gaze,” generating powerful counter-­ visualities for

10 CONCLUSION 

169

social change. Through visually driven storytelling, Whiteness can be identified, revealed, and marked, highlighting its normativity, homogeneity, and privilege. The incorporation of the theory-methods entanglement in visual research, however, is crucial, as this entanglement offers critical interpretative lens through which the visual researcher (with the research participants) sees, makes sense of, analyzes the data collected, and stages the research findings. In the struggle against the oppression of minoritized communities—including racism, classism, sexism, xenophobia, ableism, transphobia, and the intersectionality of these social issues—visual methods for social justice envision researchers build empowering, humanizing, caring, and decolonizing research contexts in which individuals from minoritized groups can create “images” of themselves on their own cultural terms through storytelling, offering counter-­ stories and counter-visualities that question and expose majoritarian stories for reimagining a social justice–oriented education. Today’s increasingly homogenized neoliberal society has a huge impact on ways of seeing communities of risk and individuals from historically oppressed groups, maintaining Whiteness as dominant, invisible, and normative while overlooking the intersection of gender/sex, religion, social class, race, and (dis) ability, however, framed within the social justice research paradigm, visual research methods for social justice in education have the potential to trouble homogenization driven by neoliberal globalization. Visual methods for social justice aim to offer education to researchers with the methodological tools to generate persuasive counter-narratives as a means of disturbing and resisting the current neoliberal education context with a focus on generating decolonizing knowledge. Framed by social justice theories, visual research methods can also provide education researchers, graduate students, artists, and activists with the methodological approaches to bring to light the viewpoint of the “Other” in affirmative ways from a position of strength; to expose deficit-informed research that distorts the epistemologies of people from historically oppressed groups; to represent the complexity of the embodied nature of the human experience of everyday lives to advance decolonizing theories; to subvert majoritarian narratives; and thus, to advance an anti-racist, anti-ableist, and postfeminist imagery to counter-narrate today’s neoliberal vision. Moreover, to generate anticolonial work in the current neoliberal landscape of education, visual methods of decolonization might enable researchers to explore and shed light on the sociocultural, political, and economic dimensions of hard-to-reach communities for social change, reimagining Otherness in education within a framework of cultural diversity in creative ways. The book encourages visual researchers, activists, artists, educators, and graduate students to avoid “easy thinking” about visual methods and to think about visual methods not in fixed or rigid ways but with flexibility, malleability, creativity, empathy, collaborative attitudes, and visual ethics of care. Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education makes a case for the usefulness of visual

170 

L. AZZARITO

Fig. 10.2  Social change, 2021. (Source: Author’s photo)

research methods for advancing a social justice agenda in education and for developing new knowledge through interdisciplinary scholarly engagement with creativity for social change (Figs. 10.2 and 10.3). Carefully considering and weighing alternatives, options, and possibilities allow a rigorous, thoughtful, malleable, yet creative visual research design to be the heart of robust scholarship and essential to decolonizing and humanizing knowledge-building efforts for reimagining more social justice–oriented school communities and society.

10 CONCLUSION 

Fig. 10.3  Social change, 2021. (Source: Author’s photo)

171

Index

NUMBERS AND SYMBOLS #BlackLivesMatter, 1 A Ableism, 34, 39, 46, 47, 51, 61, 65, 88, 89, 169 Aborigines people, 39, 80 Adult-centric research methodology, 119 Agency, 4, 10, 12, 20, 43, 50, 56, 59, 61, 63, 65, 67, 68, 76, 77, 88, 107, 111, 120, 121, 123, 124, 138 Anonymity, 13, 131, 132, 153–155, 157, 159–161 Anti-immigrant narrative, 136, 139 Anti-Mexican racism, 135, 139, 149 Anti-Semitism, 46, 47, 144 Appropriateness of visual methods, 9, 32, 41 Arts-based exhibitions, 12, 13, 138, 139, 142, 158 Arts-based inquiry, 7, 13, 20, 33, 78–80, 136–140, 142, 148, 159, 160, 167 Arts-based research (ARB), 27, 80, 136–138, 155, 156 Arts-relationality, 148 Asylum seekers, 1, 135, 136, 149 At-risk communities, 1, 106 Authoritative voice, 98, 122 Auto-driven photo-elicitation, 59–62

B Body, 31, 33, 48, 61, 66, 80, 84–86, 88, 89, 98, 99, 102, 103, 107, 109, 114, 139, 154, 157 C Child-appropriate mode of communication, 123 Child-centered methodology, 124–132 Child empowerment, 119–132 Child-friendly methodology, 124–132 Child-friendly research setting, 129 Childlike activity, 123, 128 Classic photo-elicitation, 59–62, 65 Classism, 34, 46, 47, 169 Collaborative methodology, 104, 107 Collaborative seeing, 12, 99, 104–113, 115, 168 Collective consciousness, 148 Colonial governmentality, 98 Community-Engaged Research (CEnR), 155 Community-led environmental activism, 111, 167 Confidentiality, 13, 131, 132, 153–155, 157, 159, 161 Consumer voice, 122, 123 Copyright ownership, 157, 161

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 L. Azzarito, Visual Methods for Social Justice in Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-25745-2

173

174 

INDEX

Co-researchers, 10, 11, 76–78, 81, 83, 86, 92, 155, 160 Corporate pedagogy, 20, 21, 35 Counter-narratives, 89 Counter-stories, 4, 13, 49, 50, 135–149, 169 Counter-visualities, 9, 20, 40, 44–51, 167, 168 Creative visual methods, 19–35 Creativity, 14, 21–23, 32, 33, 35, 40, 42, 58, 79, 80, 86, 127, 129, 169, 170 Critical arts-based approach, 137 Critical arts-based inquiry, 7, 20, 136–139, 167 Critical theory research paradigm, 8, 20, 26, 30–33 Critical voice, 122 Cultural diversity, 22, 47, 100, 112–115, 169 Cultural probes, 12, 100, 113–115 D Decolonized knowledge, 42 Decolonized methodologies, 8 Decolonizing education, 1, 23 Decolonizing research, 6, 7, 9, 39, 42, 44, 50, 51, 91, 101, 103, 106, 113, 169 Decolonizing theories, 39, 41, 43, 46, 76, 90, 100, 169 Decolonizing visual research, 39, 40, 44 Difference, 1, 2, 7, 19, 29, 31, 33, 47, 48, 66–68, 85, 98, 112, 113 Different visuality, 56, 67–69, 85 Deficit stories, 49 Discrimination, 1, 42, 63, 66, 67, 135, 136, 138, 139, 149 Dissemination of findings, 13, 26, 79, 153, 156, 157, 159, 161 Dominant visuality, 51 Drawing, 7–10, 12, 19, 24, 33, 42, 43, 56–58, 84, 86, 88, 90, 97, 101, 107, 108, 119–132, 154, 158

E Embodied knowledge, 43, 47, 48 Embodied methodology, 11, 99 Embodiment, 5, 12, 44, 61, 82, 84, 85, 88, 102–104, 107–110, 120, 138, 141, 144 Empathy, 21, 80, 169 Empowerment, 11, 35, 43, 75–92, 119–132, 168 Enabling methodology, 20, 57 Entanglement of theory and methodology, 9, 39–51 Ethnography, 7, 11, 12, 20, 97–115 Ethnography turn, 11, 97–115 Exclusion, 8, 19, 42, 87, 88, 102, 122 F Fotonovela, 7, 11, 75–92, 124 H Hard-to-reach-communities, 12, 99, 104–113, 115, 169 Heteronormativity, 85, 87 Homogenization, 3, 20, 23, 39, 47, 69, 75, 169 Homophobia, 39, 46, 47, 51, 66, 80 Humanizing research, 1, 6, 34, 43, 76, 90–92, 168 Hybrid photo-image-text method, 90 I Identity, 2, 4, 10, 12, 13, 19, 21, 24, 26, 28, 33, 39, 43, 45–49, 56, 57, 59, 60, 62, 64, 67–69, 79, 82, 83, 86, 88–91, 99, 101, 102, 107, 109–115, 119, 122, 123, 138–142, 145, 148, 149, 159, 160, 167 Imagination, 12, 20, 33, 41, 49, 64, 76–81, 85, 86, 91, 100, 103, 123, 124, 126, 128–130, 132, 138, 144, 167 Indigenous people, 49 Informed consent, 13, 153–155, 157–159, 161 Inquirer posture, 26

 INDEX 

Institutional Review Board (IRB), 154–160, 162 Intercultural communication, 89, 90 Interdisciplinary knowledge-building, 5, 7, 14 Interdisciplinary research, 2 Interpretative/constructivist research paradigm, 26, 28–30 Intersectionality, 5, 6, 9, 13, 34, 39–51, 61, 66, 90, 135–149, 168, 169 L Language-based methods, 20 Latinx, 3, 19, 34, 39, 49, 63, 80 LGBTQA+, 87, 88, 141 Logocentric methods, 57 M Marginalization, 41–43, 64, 66, 88, 92, 102, 109–111, 137, 138, 142, 148 Marginalized communities, 20, 21, 41, 76–79, 86, 88, 90–92, 110 Market-driven education, 21, 75 Marketization of education, 20 Methodology, 6–9, 11, 20, 21, 23, 33, 34, 39–51, 61–63, 82–88, 90, 99–105, 107–110, 115, 119, 121, 123–132, 137, 156, 158, 167, 168 Micro-ethnography, 108 Migration, 110, 111, 135–138, 142–149 Minoritized groups, 9, 10, 12, 51, 58, 62–67, 69, 70, 75, 137–139, 142, 148, 169 Misrepresentation, 8, 19, 84, 87, 161 Multisensory ethnography, 100–104 Multisensory methodology, 11, 99–104 Multisensory visual ethnography, 102, 103 Mutual humanization, 91 N Neoliberalism, 8, 19–21, 23, 75, 85 Newcomers, 90, 110–113, 115, 128, 129, 135–139, 148, 149 New paradigm of childhood, 120–123

175

Non-directive method, 60 O One-size-fits-all ethical framework, 156, 157 Othering, 3, 47, 48, 66, 67 Ownership, 10, 62, 65, 76–81, 157, 161 P Paradigm wars, 26 Participant-produced images, 60, 61 Participatory action research (PAR), 7, 10, 75, 76 Participatory arts-based Inquiry, 78–80 Participatory/cooperative research paradigm, 25–29, 32 Participatory methodologies, 75, 78, 84 Participatory visual methodology (PVM), 10, 11, 75–81, 90–92 Participatory visual research (PVR), 10, 75–92 Pedagogic voice, 122 People of color, 39, 80, 89 Photo activists, 65 Photo diary, 11, 76, 81–90, 108, 158 Photo documentary, 7 Photo-elicitation, 7, 9, 10, 55–70, 99 Photo-friend technique, 111 Photo interviewing, 56, 59, 60 Photojournalism, 7, 11, 75–92 Photovoice, 7, 11, 75–92, 158 Placed-based methodology, 111 Place-making research methodology, 101 Polyvocality, 90, 121 Poor people, 39, 80, 89 Positionality, 25, 28, 29, 39 Positivist/post-positivist research paradigm, 2, 28, 29, 99, 155 Postmodern turn, 26 Power relations, 11, 35, 45, 47, 67, 75, 76, 78, 81, 89, 90, 107, 115, 120, 121, 130, 131, 140 Process of subjectification, 67 Public pedagogy, 13, 77, 79, 87, 138, 139, 142, 161

176 

INDEX

R Racism, 1, 5, 6, 34, 39, 46, 47, 51, 65, 66, 135, 139, 141, 147, 149, 169 Reflexive photo-elicitation, 62 Reflexive photography, 59–62 Reflexivity, 13, 14, 28, 31, 39, 58, 62, 78, 80, 81, 99, 104, 109, 153, 164 Refugees, 1, 110, 111, 135, 136 Reimagining education, 19–35, 167 Research activists, 75, 77, 78 Researcher-created visual data, 33, 41 Researcher-found visual data, 33 Researcher-produced-images method, 60 Research paradigm, 2, 8, 9, 20, 21, 25–33, 40, 76, 77, 99, 120, 155, 168, 169 Research-participant-generated visual data, 33, 42 Right to look, 35, 50, 51 S Savage ethnography, 11 Self-expression, 12, 43, 62, 78, 80, 84, 88, 125 Sexism, 34, 39, 46, 47, 51, 65, 139, 169 Situated visual ethics, 162 Social justice arts-based research, 137 Social justice-oriented education research, 58 Social justice paradigm, 3, 8, 20, 25, 28 Sociology of the body, 84 Speak back, 51, 91 Storytelling, 9, 23, 28, 44–51, 63, 99, 124, 142, 143, 149, 169 Strength-based approach, 22, 24, 43, 91 Subaltern, 10, 50, 51, 56, 67–70 Subjectivity, 23, 24, 26, 31, 35, 39, 67, 79, 83, 99, 113, 123, 144 Subjugated knowledge, 3, 13, 31, 35, 40, 49, 51, 76, 120, 124, 136, 139, 140, 149

T Talk-based methods, 58 Therapeutic voice, 122 Third space, 69, 70 Transformation, 44, 77, 79, 100, 101, 109, 110, 137, 139, 140, 142 Transgenderism, 46, 47 V Visual competence, 25, 28 Visual-driven research paradigm, 31 Visual encounters, 48, 49, 67–70 Visual ethnography, 11, 20, 97–115 Visual ethnography of decolonization, 7, 11, 12, 97–115 Visuality, 33, 50, 51, 67–69, 85 Visual methodology, 12–14, 31, 39–51, 86, 120, 121, 123–125, 127, 157, 162, 167 Visual methods, 1–14, 19–35, 40–42, 57, 66, 90–92, 98, 124, 169 Visual research ethics, 13, 14, 153–164 Visual storytelling, 7, 43, 50 Visual turn, 3, 20, 21, 27–34 Visual voice, 48, 56, 65, 66, 68–70, 88, 89, 91, 111, 119–124 Voice, 1, 4, 5, 8–12, 19–22, 27, 39, 47, 55–70, 75, 79, 80, 83, 112, 115, 119, 120, 137, 138, 160, 161, 167 Voicelessness, 1, 6, 88, 121, 167 W Western gaze, 68–70 Whiteness, 3, 5, 6, 8, 19, 20, 22, 24, 35, 49, 69, 91, 98–100, 112–115, 168, 169 Women of color, 44, 45, 50 Words-centric paradigms, 26 X Xenophobia, 34, 135, 139, 169 Xenophobic culture, 136, 139