Photovoice in Mexico: U.S. Graduate students immerse in researching/learning through photography
Location
3031
Format Type
Paper
Format Type
Panel
Start Date
13-1-2017 4:10 PM
End Date
13-1-2017 5:10 PM
Abstract
The recent tendency to communicate through photography in the emergence of internet-based social media makes the adoption of photovoice (Wang & Burris, 1997) a culturally appropriate qualitative research methodology for data gathering and analysis. Presenters will share their participatory action research (PAR) experiences when adopting photovoice as a means for graduate psychology and family therapy students to engage actively and critically in understanding themselves from the vantage point of cultural difference as therapists in training during a faculty-led study abroad program to Mexico. Photography was used as a tool to capture with intention students’ discernment of cultural differences as experienced when exposed to the local communities’ worldviews in Mexico, and as it is relevant to their therapy skills and knowledge development. Students turned the camera lens toward events that provided them with an opportunity to record and reflect critically about occurrences that confronted them with their social and cultural locations attached to personal biases, privileged or underprivileged conditions by living and practicing in the U.S., particularly working with to those who identify a Mexican or Mexican American heritage. Research inquiries emerged from students at the beginning of the course. Data collection took place by them, interviewing one another on the stories of their pictures upon our return and the researcher’s content analysis of their journals.
Photovoice in Mexico: U.S. Graduate students immerse in researching/learning through photography
3031
The recent tendency to communicate through photography in the emergence of internet-based social media makes the adoption of photovoice (Wang & Burris, 1997) a culturally appropriate qualitative research methodology for data gathering and analysis. Presenters will share their participatory action research (PAR) experiences when adopting photovoice as a means for graduate psychology and family therapy students to engage actively and critically in understanding themselves from the vantage point of cultural difference as therapists in training during a faculty-led study abroad program to Mexico. Photography was used as a tool to capture with intention students’ discernment of cultural differences as experienced when exposed to the local communities’ worldviews in Mexico, and as it is relevant to their therapy skills and knowledge development. Students turned the camera lens toward events that provided them with an opportunity to record and reflect critically about occurrences that confronted them with their social and cultural locations attached to personal biases, privileged or underprivileged conditions by living and practicing in the U.S., particularly working with to those who identify a Mexican or Mexican American heritage. Research inquiries emerged from students at the beginning of the course. Data collection took place by them, interviewing one another on the stories of their pictures upon our return and the researcher’s content analysis of their journals.
Comments
Breakout Session F