Book Review: Mitchell, C., De Lange, N., & Moletsane, R. (2017). Participatory Visual Methodologies: Social change, community and policy.

Abstract

Mitchell, De Lange and Moletsane (2017) discuss the use of participatory visual research (PVR) to give voice to those involved in research and particularly to create opportunities for social change. Social change is characterized in different ways “new conversations and dialogues, altered perspectives of participants to take action, policy debates, and actual policy development” (p.16). The book intends to shift the conversation on PVR “towards outcomes and the ever-present question “What difference does it make?” (p.3). Both the ways social change is portrayed in the book, and the positioning that researchers, research participants, the community and policy makers take as audiences reflecting on the visual productions, are crucial to understand how PVR can stimulate social transformations.