ABSTRACT
This chapter emerges out of our ongoing community research into homelessness using photo-production techniques. However, in this chapter the authors have chosen to focus on the core of visual work based in community research and engagement, using photo-voice and photo-elicitation. In many respects, the authors have come to understand research, including the use of visual methods, from a perspective similar to that of early impressionist painters and early impressionist social scientists, such as Georg Simmel. This understanding is also central to our work, where we seek to offer visual impressions of everyday poverty that convey participant experiences and encourage empathetic reactions. Like impressionist painters, we aim to offer readers an overall impression of the dynamics of everyday poverty. The field of visual research has developed substantially over recent years, becoming increasingly complex and interdisciplinary, and more advanced theoretically, influenced by the recent ‘turns’ in social science to practice, place, emotion and mobility, as well by the development of technologies.
