PHOTOVOICE AS A TOOL FOR
PARTICIPATORY EVALUATION: THE
COMMUNITY’S VIEW OF PROCESS AND
IMPACT
Caroline Wang
Yuan Yan Ling
Feng Ming Ling
About the Authors
• (From university of Michigan.com)
• Caroline Wang, PhD is Assistant Professor of Health Behavior
and Health Education,
• currently provides consultation to non-governmental
organizations, health agencies, and other institutions around
the world in using the photo-voice concept
• Her professional interests include: participatory and
community-based health education, mass media, and stigma.
• Dr. Wang has 10 years of collaborative experience working on
health promotion and reproductive health in urban and rural
China. She is also the co-developer of Photovoice
Big 5
• Topic: Photovoice as a tool for evaluation
• Focus: Photovoice in Yunnan
• Methods: Content Analysis
• Goals: Promote change and usage of photovoice
• Target: Organizations, communities, cultures
Basics of Essay
• “Photovoice is a process by which people identify,
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represent, and enhance their community though a specific
photographic technique”(Wang 1996,47)
Focus on chinese village
-focus on womens health
-cultural practices
-stoves
-health education
Relationship between organizations and culture,
community and culture and policy and culture.
Promote Change
Benefits of photovoice
• Focus on positivites that photovoice can bring to the
community changes
• Getting a true inside view of the problems and ways of life
• Difficult for a outsider to document how they feel
• Bring change through photography so outsiders don’t
guess what is happening they can visually see it first hand
through local photographers.
• “A picture is worth a thousand words”
Photovoice
• We can’t read or write but these photographs can
speak for us.”
• ~A Tibetan Villager in
• China’s Yunnan Province
• “Photovoices is a way to get community participation
in conservation and for people to have a voice
through their photographs and stories to help
conservation planners do a better job.
• ~Lida Pet, PhD Marine Biologist
• WWF-Indonesia
Photovoice process
• 1. Training local photographers
• 2. Taking pictures of village life, culture, agriculutre etc
• 3. reviewing stories behind the photographs
• 4. Providing local information to Decision makers
• 5. Meeting between local photographers and experts to
collaborate
• 6. Village exhibitions to give credit to the local
photographers
Key Quotes
• “Linking the intrapersonal and interpersonal and culture,
photovoice can contribute to participatory evaluation by
providing a meaningful discussion context by which to enhance
peoples assesment of their own psychological assets, and by
which increase peoples knowledge about community
organizing and community problem solving. Photovoice
provides the opportonity for people to photograph strenths,
bonds, social networks. This process in turn serves to provide
information, stimulate ideas, and stir conversations about the
communities resources and capabilities”(Wang 1996,48)
• What is your first impression of photovoice, and do you think
that it is more powerful than essays, and other forms used to
pass on information?
Key Quotes
• “Participants also noted other advantages of photo voice
not mentioned earlier. They were able to save time that
they would have otherwise been spend on written reports.
They were able to expose problems in implementation
quickly. Finally they were able to help decision-makers
avoid similar mistakes in future programs and
projects”(Wang 1996, 49)
• If the turnaround time between photos being taken if
much shorter than that of essays etc, why is it not more
popular today? Or Is it popular today?
Key Quotes
• “Photovoice is an attempt to enable people to represent
themselves in a planned process that enhances their
community well being. It does not attempt to ‘give a voice’
to the voiceless, but assumes that peoples voices are
infused with an expertise and insite that outsiders
lack…photovoice enables people to furnish evidense and
to put forth their view of how programes and policies have
or have not benefited their community”(Wang 1996,49)
• What does photovoice provide to outside community
members that promotes change?
PHOTOVOICE EXAMPLES
website
• http://www.photovoicesinternational.org/index.html
Gardening Photovoice
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aavKIwaQ3i8
Homeless Teens
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_RaIW_PSlUk