Abstract
Photography has a long history of being utilised in social science research for its capacity to capture and document material culture and human behaviour. More recent articulations of participatory photography draw on its value as a tool for self-exploration and reflection to shed light on personal histories and experiences. In this paper we explore the role of participatory photography in engaging young people in deep, reflexive explorations of life and professional aspirations and their embeddedness in the socio-cultural environments that they are inhabiting. We report on two creative research workshops with distinctive approaches, the first focused on enhancing visual and photography skills as means for enhanced reflexivity; and the second engaging young people in a creative workshop-based experience for creating their personal aspirations zines. The two workshops were offered as part of a mixed methods study that looked at the role of cultural engagements in shaping young people’s aspirations. 285 UK-based young people from all walks of life have been involved in the research, through methods ranging from interviews to surveys, focus groups and creative research workshops. The analysis of this rich data corpus enabled us to single out the distinctive role played by creative research approaches in studying complex constructs such as aspirations and the personal experiences shaping them. The paper offers insights from this empirical analysis focusing on the approach and techniques for engaging young people and how these served to enhance their expressive potential and reflexivity in ways not afforded by traditional data collection methods.
Presenters
Amalia SabiescuSenior Lecturer, Institute for Media and Creative Industries, Loughborough University London, London, City of, United Kingdom Noemi Zajzon
Researcher, Designer, Institute of Design Innovation, Institute of Media and Creative Industries, Loughborough University London, United Kingdom
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
The Arts in Social, Political, and Community Life
KEYWORDS
Community-based Research, Participatory Photography, Creative Research Methods, Young People, Aspirations
