Photo-Elicitation Method Gives Voice and Reactions of Subjects

Abstract

Visual anthropologist John Collier Jr. 1and visual sociologists Douglas Harper,2 Jon Wagner,3 and Dona Schwartz4 have known for years the value of photo-elicitation as a research tool. More recently, some graduate students studying visual communication at the University of Missouri-Columbia have used this fieldwork technique to help them better understand their own photography and the work of others.5 Photo-elicitation is of particular interest here because of a research assignment given in a graduate course that examines the role of photography in society. Because this research tool can help students become more connected with their work, photo-elicitation can be put to use in a variety courses where photography is studied, including media ethics or mass communication and society. Method Rather than strictly relying on what the creator or critics say about a body of work, students can go straight to the source, in a manner of speaking. Photojournalists rarely take their images back to their subjects to learn what the subject thinks of the work, primarily because of the press of deadlines. However, for those interested in feedback from their subjects, the photo-elicitation method can reverse the roles of researcher (photographer) and subject, according to research.er Douglas Harper. As the informant studies images of his or her world and then talks about what elements mean, the interview produces information that is more deeply grounded in the phenomenology of the subject. A photograph, a literal rendering of an element of the subject's world, calls forth associations, definitions, or ideas that otherwise go unnoticed, he adds.6 In the photo-elicitation method, photographic techniques rarely are at issue; instead, what often brings forth a wealth of information from the subjects are images ... that the photographer might have considered, from his or her own cultural perspective, too 'boring' or 'commonplace' even to consider using.7 For this class assignment, the actual subjects from a book are not shown the photographs (obvious logistical problems prevent this), but a person who is intimately familiar with the subject is interviewed instead. Students who elect to do this particular assignment (see Exhibit 1) are encouraged to pick a book that focuses on such delicate and sometimes explosive subjects as domestic abuse, AIDS, civil rights, homosexuality, or drug addiction.8 This assignment requires students to find people to interview who are - or were - representatives of that group (for example, finding women or men who were directly involved in domestic abuse and then showing them Donna Ferrato's Living with the Enemy). In our case, Anne-Marie Woodward, a graduate student in photojournalism, wanted to do an independent study project in which she would share Larry Clark's controversial Tulsa with three recovering drug addicts living in Atlanta, where she formerly resided. Woodward conducted separate photo elicitation sessions in late November 1997 with three individuals she met through friends and acquaintances in Atlanta. Whitney N., 34, used heroin for three years; Catherine M., 28, used IV drugs for nine months; and Adam P., 27, used IV drugs for four years. All agreed to have their interviews tape recorded.9 Students like Woodward who study the work of award-winning photojournalist Eugene Richards, author of Cocaine True, Cocaine Blue, often admire Richards' gritty realism and incredible access to the world of illegal drugs. However, few of today's students are aware that more than two decades earlier photographer Larry Clark published a raw, unflinching look at the drug use he and his friends engaged in during the 1960s. Like The Americans by reclusive EXHIBIT 1 RESEARCH ASSIGNMENT FOR PHOTOGRAPHY IN SOCIETY (EDITED FOR SPACE) During the second half of the semester, we are studying a variety of work that could be interpreted either as furthering our understanding of people outside the mainstream or as exploiting them. …