Extract from a successful funding application to the Canadian Institutes for Health Research 2012
Images of a Globalized World:
Collaborative Visual Ethnography, Intersectionality, & Health
Spitzer, D. ( University of Ottawa) O’Brien, V. (University of Cumbria) and Prentice, T. (University of Ottawa)
Collaborative Visual Ethnography
Anthropologists and sociologists have used photography and film as tools to gather data on social
environments and events for many years. Initially utilised as a tool for collecting objective data, a few
sociologists in the 1920’s used photographs to document everyday lives of the communities they
studied 1 . Visual records provided documentary evidence of social rituals, social and physical
environments, providing researchers with opportunities for theoretical analysis of recorded events.
Bateson and Mead 2 first used photographic sequences to illustrate cultural practices and by the 1960’s
ethnographers had begun to use photography as means of documenting everyday life and drawing out
the social and cultural conventions that informed everyday life in the groups and communities they
studied. More recently, visual sociology has moved away from a purely documentary approach towards
interpretive and creative use of visual images. Howard Becker, an early advocate for visual sociology,
argues for critical analysis of the underlying meanings, motives and messages contained within and
around visual images. For Becker 3 documentary images are socially constructed in the same way as all
other forms of social reporting on social constructions. They are interpretations, representations and
statements of what we know, or think we know, about the world. As socially constructed framings of the
social world there is a need to subject visual records to explicit and coherent analytical interpretation.
The context of image as well as its content is important in visual sociology. This move towards a more
analytical and interpretive stance continues to be influential in visual sociology and reflects a wider
trend within the social sciences to view research as interpretive rather than documentary.
Conceptualisations and articulations of everyday experiences are integrated components of personal
identity. They arise, are expressed, reframed and reformulated continuously. A product of our lived
experiences, they represent general interpretations of the significance of everyday and special events.
The relationship between perceived identities of project participants, their expectations and everyday
experiences, requires an approach to research that is reflexive 4, and collaborative. The motivation for
collaborative visual ethnography emerges from within a more general ethnographic research paradigm
that emphasises a high level of engagement between researchers and participants combined with a
collaborative approach to investigation and analysis. 5 As part of this collaborative visual ethnography
Visible Voice projects use participatory video and photography to enable participants to explore, express
and share ideas and insights into everyday life. Working through a powerful and familiar visual medium
language and cultural boundaries are more easily demonstrated, explained and transcended. Visual
narrative construction engages participants in a process, which allows people to speak for themselves 6
whilst providing opportunities for collaborative reflection, which, in turn, prompt new understandings
and mutual refinement of existing viewpoints. The public exhibition of the completed visual materials
provides enables individuals and groups to communicate their ideas using an accessible and powerful
medium. This in itself, can have a powerful transformative influence on the self esteem of the
participants and their communities. Using participatory video and photography not only provides a way
to engage the participants in active reflection on their lived experiences but it also allows them to
challenge the normalized representations provided through corporate media. Broadcasts in which
‘experts’ and journalists are empowered to disseminate ‘outsider’ interpretations of social events, issues
and relationships whilst retaining full editorial control of the content, narrative themes and messages.
Collaborative Visual Ethnography seeks to improve the authenticity of ethnographic narratives through a
process of deep engagement and collaborative between researchers and participants throughout all stages
of research and dissemination. The collaborative construction of visual narratives provides unique
opportunities for us to understand the way in which individuals and communities experience and give
meaning to their lives. In line with Becker’s 7 reading of the differences between journalism,
documentary and narrative visual sociology, using narrative, particularly visual narrative, as a form of
inquiry, provides opportunities for multi level analysis of content and context 8 . Video narratives
combine complex audio, textual and visual messages in conscious and unconscious attempts to explore
and communicate meanings and messages to audiences. Participants are both the object and the subject
of narrative production 9. The narratives they produce, whether they appear in them or not, are public
performances of identity. The completed exhibits can be viewed as ‘cultural products’ that represent the
performed identities of the authors 10 . Working through the initial narrative development, recording,
editing and dissemination phases of the projects participants become self aware. They ‘capture’ subtle
yet powerful aspects of their lives that sometimes only emerge when the work is complete. Researchers
are privileged to observe narrative construction in action with all of its explicit and implicit debates,
nuances of negotiation, reflection and compromise that are component parts of the narrative process.
Collaborative Visual Ethnography is more than simply a means of gaining knowledge about a given
social phenomenon, it is also about emancipatory change, a way in which research can help make the
world a ‘better place’ 11 .In opposition to the ‘objectivist’ goals of traditional ‘positivist’ influenced
research collaborative ethnography seeks to engage and develop a rapport with the participants. It seeks
to embed research activities, knowledge and skills as sustainable, developmental actions, as indicators of
personal and community potential which the participants and their communities can utilise in pursuit of
a better life. Collaborative Visual Ethnography arises within a declared and explicitly political- with a
small p- perspective. Collaboration and engagement, reducing barriers between researchers and
participants are seen as essential to the process where the research seeks to enable the participants to
make use of their own research experiences as an aid to personal and community development. As a
consequence research plans, activities and day to day interactions need to be carefully and critically
considered to ensure that the work and findings represent a valid and authentic interpretation of the
communities and phenomena studied. In contrast to traditional objectivist approaches the researcher’s
voice needs to be explicitly revealed within the methodology, analysis and interpretation 12.
As they work through their ideas and the production plans participants have to think about how and
which topics to include in their exhibits, how to represent complex and abstract issues visually, who the
audience might be and how the exhibits might be received. Narrative styles and techniques used in the
exhibits draw on what the participants already know and often mimic the styles and formats of film and
television 13. As with everything else, narrative style and format is negotiated within the group and the
finished product represents the outcome of the struggle between the dominant or most articulate
members of the group or, in some cases, the conventions and expectations of the wider community. The
production process is always socially and culturally contingent reflecting the perceived norms of the
participants and their relationship with the wider community. The production of films and photo
galleries is a dialogic process that enables participants to critically analyse their own lived experiences 14
to consider and interrogate personal and shared perceptions, attitudes and values and to explore the
contingencies and contexts of lived experiences. It is not simply the display of videos and films that is of
value, the production process itself generates the key data that enables researchers and participants to
examine, reflect and reconstruct ‘realities’. The completed films and photo exhibits should not be
viewed as a ‘snapshot’ of the participants’ lives. To misread them in this way can perpetuate unequal
power relations and misplaced assumptions about objectivity within the research process The exhibits
are constructed representations of perceived realities; performances of self and social identity produced
in a dynamic social context 15.
With some similarity to Freire’s use of drawing and storytelling in community education projects (cited
in 16 Visible Voice workshops use participatory video and photography to engage participants in
collaborative exploration of lived experiences. Using participatory video and photography helps to
minimise the importance of language skills and places strong emphasis on maximising participant
involvement, enabling and encouraging reflection, dialogue between the participants and the explicit
framing of the style and structure of a public exhibit. During recording and editing participants are able
to tell their story in their own language with translation and subtitling added when the group have
finished the initial edit. The process of production and dissemination provides multiple opportunities for
participants and researchers to engage in reflection and critical thinking. This includes deciding what to
film or photograph, developing a narrative style, making editing decisions (determining what is
important) sharing viewpoints, participating in collaborative dialogue, public exhibition of completed
work and engagement with audiences at exhibitions and screenings. Dissemination, screening of rough
edits, community screenings and public exhibition of materials by the participants, is an important part
of the narrative process, facilitating and encouraging reflection, reframing, refining and retelling of the
original narratives. For some participants, the experience is transformative and may prompt an emergent,
self initiated, form of visual activism.
Introduction to the project
“Images contribute to how we see ourselves, how we define and relate to the world, and what we
perceive as significant or different” (186). 17 The use of imagery also allows for engagement with
research and for opportunities to “speak out” in ways that transcend varying forms of literacies. 18
Interest in new visual methods—situated at the crossroads of social sciences, health sciences,
technology, and the humanities—is burgeoning and it is this interest we will draw upon for this planning
meeting initiative.
One of the most popular visual techniques currently in use in health and social sciences research is
photo-voice—a method that has become virtually synonymous with participatory visual ethnography.
Indeed, photo-voice was developed as a community-based participatory research tool for health
promotion that could highlight the worldview of the subaltern to demonstrate not only their needs, but
their strengths as well. Over the past decade, photo-voice has been used to open portals into lived
realities that may be unfamiliar to target audiences thereby making community concerns explicit with
the intent of influencing policy change.1,19 Furthermore, the process itself helps strengthen intra-group
bonds and promotes social action.20
The relatively widespread diffusion of digital technologies such as photography, video, PowerPoint, and
other capture and dissemination media has resulted in their uptake by a wider, non-expert public. These
technological changes have enabled a host of formal and informal groups ranging from Franco-African
migrants in northern England, and villagers in rural Kyrgyzstan to Latin American immigrant women in
Ottawa and HIV+ Aboriginal women in Toronto and Montréal, among others, to come together to
communicate their stories visually through Visible Voices (VV), a virtual network, initiated in 2006 by
Vincent O’Brien, Professor of International Health and Visual Ethnography at the University of
Cumbria (UK). Through the Visible Voices network, experiences from diverse settings are shared with
community, practice, and policy audiences in various locales, and via the Internet. Canadian participants
were introduced to VV by the nominated PA (Spitzer) through the auspices of two SSHRC-funded
Ottawa-based projects. The first project, Picture This! Migrant Lives, Healthy Lives, included the Latin
American Women’s Organization (LAZO) and the City for All Women Initiative (CAWI), while the
second, Transnational Families in Transition, brought together Filipino youth reunited with their
mothers who had been migrant workers in Canada. Thereafter as part of her CIHR-funded project,
Visioning Health: HIV-Positive Aboriginal Women’s Perceptions of Health, Culture and Gender, the coapplicant (Prentice) partnered with the Canadian Aboriginal AIDS Network (CAAN), the Ontario
Aboriginal HIV/AIDS Strategy (OAHAS), and Pauktuutit Inuit Women of Canada to engage HIVpositive First Nations and Inuit women in visual research that investigates their health and well-being.
Participants in these projects have the opportunities to share their stories and learn from the experiences
of others including members of Viramundo, a NGO working in Rocinha, a favela in Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil, as well as those of the Cumbria Multicultural Women’s Network and the Salford Refugee Link,
in addition to partners from Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, and the UK who have been engaged with Visible
Voices through its originator, Professor Vincent O’Brien.
Objectives of Planning Meeting
To date, different sub-sets of the Visible Voices membership have met virtually as part of meetings,
conference workshops, and visual art installations to communicate about their experiences and to inspire
each other in their work. This planning meeting, however, will allow us to assemble and to plan future
research endeavours that would attend to common interests pertaining to health and well-being that may
be disparately experienced depending on, amongst other factors, geographical and social location. We
intend to launch an inquiry that would deploy an intersectional lens to explore the use of collaborative
visual ethnography as a means of illuminating the perceived impact of globalization on health and wellbeing. Specifically, our primary objectives are to:
1. Plan research activities that would enable members to examine the impact of glocalization—the
interpenetration amongst global trends and local cultures and conditions—on their health and wellbeing by: (a) Engaging in collaborative ethnography—the collective creation of a visual product that
reflects participants’ perspectives and analyses; (b) Working with network members to articulate and
share their responses to this query using visual language; (c) Ensuring that attention is paid to intragroup variation in terms of gender, socioeconomic class, ethnicity, and other social indicators as
appropriate; (d) Employing an intersectional analysis that tries to uncover how axes of difference
operate together to situate individuals and groups in the dominant social hierarchy to collectively
analyze member contributions to identify both common and disparate experiences; (e) Identifying
appropriate policy, program, and community responses; and (f) Sharing the results of projects with
policymakers and program planners.
2. Share knowledge, transfer skills and expand a community of practice engaged in participatory visual
methods by: (a) Using our gathering to engage in co-learning about collaborative visual ethnography;
(b) Documenting our group processes through text and visual means for educational and training
purposes; and (c) Offering a public display of Visible Voices works at the site of our meeting.
3. Advance on-going multi-site collaboration by: (a) Developing a communication strategy for
information sharing amongst Visible Voices members; (b) Tracking our on-going efforts for
information and training purposes; (c) Fostering the development of a theoretical framework for
understanding local/global contexts, hierarchies of power, and the gendered, classed and racialized
impacts on health and well-being; and (d) Preparing a proposal for a collaborative research project.
Context
In this project, we will make visible myriad manifestations of globalization that serves as the context for
our lives. Contemporary globalization is characterized by, among other factors, the disembedding of
social life from local contexts, the heightened turbulence, frequency, density, and content of global
flows, and the interconnectedness of labour, products, and consumption that are reliant on flexible
accumulation and a flexible labour force.21,22,23,24 In addition, supra-national corporations and financial
institutions have promoted financial de-regulation and trade liberalization, often requiring such measures
under structural adjustment programs (SAPs) in exchange for financial interventions from organizations
such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the World Trade Organization
(WTO).25 Overall, the impact of SAPs and other neo-liberal prescriptions—including reduced social
spending, and the implementation of user fees, among other measures—on the health and well-being of
the most marginalized members of the populace has been deleterious. Studies have found that health
outcomes for women, children and those living in poverty (by no means mutually exclusive categories)
worsened.9 The burgeoning of part-time, precarious labour, also contributes to conditions such as heart
disease as much of this work is characterized by high demand and low control generating stress
particularly for those whose education exceeds their job’s demands. The trend is echoed in observations
of deteriorating health status found amongst racialized immigrant and refugee women in Canada that
may also be attributed to the chronic stress borne of the gap between their dreams and expectations for
which they have toiled, and the reality in which they live, the disparity of which often begins with
education/job mismatch.26 As historical and political specificities inform global disparities both within
and between nations, globalization does not impact everyone in the same manner. 27 Gender, a social
construct that shapes expectations, interpersonal relations, identities and behaviour, reflected in and
reinforced by social institutions such as the family, education, and the state. Although gender is also
used to reinforce and naturalize social disparities, its intersections with other social indicators are most
salient. 28 Intersectionality refers to the way in which markers of social difference are mutually
constituted and experienced as a whole, refuting attempts to segregate social life into discrete axes of
difference and to unquestioningly privilege one identifier such as gender over others such as
socioeconomic class or racialized status.29 Intersectional analysis, therefore, provides us with a more
nuanced and informative understanding as it avoids homogenization of social categories and attends to
the dynamics of power and oppression that are crucial elements in determining health and well-being.30
Narratives have been identified as the most effective manner with which to uncover policy-relevant
linkages between globalization and social determinants of health.9 To this end, we plan to use
Collaborative Visual Ethnography (CVE) to enhance ethnographic narratives through a process of deep
engagement and collaboration between researchers and participants throughout all stages of research and
dissemination. The collaborative construction of visual narratives, in which participants are both the
object and the subject of narrative production,31 provides unique opportunities to understand the way in
which individuals and communities experience, and give meaning to, their lives while also providing for
multi-level analysis of content and context. 32 Using participatory video and photography helps to
minimize the importance of language skills and places strong emphasis on maximizing participant
involvement, enabling and encouraging reflection, dialogue between the participants and the explicit
framing of the style and structure of a public exhibit. Researchers are privileged to observe narrative
construction in action with all of its explicit and implicit debates, nuances of negotiation, reflection and
compromise that are component parts of the narrative process.
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