Online Submission 2 - Amrita Ahluwalia

Plush, T. (2009) Amplifying children’s voices on climate change: the role of participatory video. Participation Learning and Action [online] 60 Dec 119-128. Available from: < http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14573IIED.pdf> [Accessed on 30 April 2014].

In the above, Plush (2009) outlines a community education and action-research project using participatory video with children in Nepal to explore climate change and their adaptation needs. Within the project, workshops were held both to train local adults as ‘participatory video facilitators’ and provide children with information. Children then worked with adult facilitators to co-create questions for filmed interviews with children and adults in their community. The children were also supported to develop a film storyboard highlighting a chosen aspect of climate change and its impact on their lives. The final product was a report (available here) and a video.

Plush (2009) advocates this use of participatory video from a rights-based perspective as a child-led process able to empower children and give them a means ‘to speak for themselves’ (Plush, 2009: 126) on issues important to them. The product can also be a powerful catalyst for change – In the case study presented, the video contributed to a successful application for funds to build a bridge over a river that regularly flooded. Plush (2009) also feels that participatory video gave the children a ‘sense of ownership’ (125) which improved the quality of the findings, and in turn improved awareness of climate change and encouraged community action to protect against its negative effects.

Beazley et al. (2009) also advocate participatory and rights-based research. They argue that working from this framework gives voice to the perspectives of the ’90.8% muted majority of children’ (366) living out-with industrialised areas. Participatory video tools seem to give the Nepalese children in Plush’s (2009) project the tools to reflect their local and situated perspectives, hence offering them ‘the right to be properly researched’ (Beazley, 2009: 370). It does feel like this methodology is on the right track!

However, in contrast Buckingham (2009) argues that the use of creative methods such as participatory video can be naïve, and that claims that these are ‘inherently ‘empowering’ tends to obfuscate pressing ethical issues’ (648). Arguments that visual methods enable children ‘to speak for themselves’ can neglect the implications of children’s understanding of the aims of the research and of the context inherent in the media itself (Buckingham, 2009). They can also ignore the steering role that research aims and researchers – however remote – will inevitably have, by misrepresenting visual methods as necessarily able to faithfully capture viewpoints.

Plush (2009) does acknowledge the importance of considering the context of using video equipment where this might be ‘novel’, and the power imbalances within communities that participatory video methods are not able to address. However, Plush (2009) does not attend to the impact that the perceived purpose of the end product might have, or the steering effect of preparatory work with adult facilitators and children. Nor does Plush (2009) consider any perceptions the children might have about the ultimate audience or ideas about what makes a ‘good video’.

All of these aspects come with the territory and need to be more closely considered in all research applying creative methods.

REFERENCES

Beazley, H., Bessell S., Ennew, J., & Waterson, R. (2009) The right to be properly researched: research with children in a messy, real world. Children’s Georaphies 7 (4) Nov 365-378.

Buckingham, D. (2009) ‘Creative’ visual methods in media research: possibilities, problems and proposals. Media Culture Society 31 (4) July 633-652.

Plush, T. (2009) Amplifying children’s voices on climate change: the role of participatory video. Participation Learning and Action [online] 60 Dec 119-128. Available from: < http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/14573IIED.pdf> [Accessed on 30 April 2014].

Online Submission 1 - Amrita Ahluwalia

The following resource raises interesting questions about assumptions around representation in the use of creative methods:

Coad, J., Plumridge, G., & Metcalfe, A. (2009) Involving children and young people in the development of art-based research tools. Nurse Researcher 16 (1) 56-64.

In the above article, the authors describe the process of working with children and young people to develop art-based activities for use in a study exploring how children and young people communicate with their families about genetic conditions – a research area not previously explored using creative methods. Within the article, Coad et al. (2009) briefly highlight methodological issues about children and young people’s participation and some challenges for their research.

Coad et al. (2009) advocate art-based methods based on the idea that they are more relevant to children and young people than ‘traditional’ research methods, and avoid adult-dominated perspectives that see children as ‘objects’ of research rather than active participants. Coad et al. (2009: 59) therefore argue that the next logical step in promoting a participatory approach was to co-create research tools with children and young people: ‘if the research was to be meaningful to the group, it was important that the tools were developed with the users from the outset’.

In development of the art-based research tools required for the study, the authors consulted with youth advisors who were briefed on the study and participated in workshops to develop two toolkits for ages 8 to 11 and ages 11 to 18. The toolkits produced are focused on encouraging discussion and comprise of a sticky bag/board for the younger age group, and a graffiti board for ages 11+.

It is interesting to note that Coad et al. (2009) acknowledge two pitfalls of this exercise: (1) Many of the children and young people participating to develop the toolkits ‘were very articulate and therefore may not have been representative’ (Coad et al., 2009: 62); and (2) The majority of participants did not have genetic conditions and therefore did not form part of the target group who would use the toolkits within the study.

Coad et al. (2009) report managing these pitfalls by seeking ongoing feedback from the target research group throughout the study. However, is this satisfactory?

Lomax (2012) argues that ‘child-led’ visual research methods can overprivilege the perspective of ‘the all-knowing and all-seeing child’ (106) and can therefore be homogenised by researchers who are supposedly trying to better appreciate the viewpoints of children and young people by using ‘child-centred’ creative methods.

It seems that Coad et al. (2009) fall into this trap – In their study, youth advisors are in a position to develop research tools for use with other children and young people, by virtue of being children and young people themselves, rather than by virtue of sharing an experience in common with the target research group.

REFERENCES

Coad, J., Plumridge, G., & Metcalfe, A. (2009) Involving children and young people in the development of art-based research tools. Nurse Researcher 16 (1) 56-64.

Lomax, H. (2012) Contested voices? Methodological tensions in creative visual research with children. International Journal of Social Research Methodology 15 (2) 105-117.