ABSTRACT

Photovoice allows participants to speak freely about their life and roles by using the camera to capture their first-hand situations in photographs, and by later recalling the related stories. On the one hand, this methodology shifts the focus to involving participants in order to amplify their own voices and thus enhance their agency; but, on the other hand, for certain groups of people – in particular, the most deprived populations who have unequal power relations with scholars – this authorization still falls under the researcher’s dominance in the details of the operation. Therefore this chapter argues Photovoice should focus on empowering participants to establish stronger social networks and to improve their local communities, and it should always be operated with innovative measures that consider contextual influence.