“Being There”: The Enduring Value of In-Person Photovoice Health Research With Equity-Owed Populations

The pragmatics of photovoice in health research have shifted since the inception of the methodology. Early photovoice centered ethnographic-like participatory and place-based methods where researchers were ever-present physically interacting with the participants, environments, and systems and structures that they studied. Photovoice has seen several modifications, however, including as researchers have moved to virtual and otherwise less immersive methods. At this juncture, there are wide-ranging perspectives on the optimal way(s) of using photovoice for health research, alongside wider debates about whether the methodology is being applied in line with its initial roots and aims, and indeed whether it needs to be. Amid these tensions and transitions, the current article contributes a discussion of in-person photovoice and its enduring value for meaningful and impactful health research with equity-owed populations. This discussion is framed within a photovoice study examining how trajectories of homelessness and substance use intersect for 2S/LGBTQ+ youth in Vancouver, Canada. Findings are shared across three themes. The first theme, Feeling place and presence, underscores the benefits of in-person and place-based photovoice methods for engaging with equity-owed communities and mitigating barriers to research participation. Old-school photography building process and product, reviews the asset-building capacity, practicality, and impact of photovoice research with disposable cameras, through facilitating community engagement and attention to social and material contexts. Powering pictures for community choice, consent, and control, chronicles how photovoice methods can be structured to promote reflexivities for community buy-in and purposefully active knowledge mobilization. Together, these findings underscore the potential of in-person photovoice methods for garnering deeper insight into the meaning, context, and affective dimensions of people’s lived experiences in community-based research. The insights shared in this article serve as a springboard for discussion about the pragmatics of actioning and modifying photovoice, whilst making a case for ‘being there’ with on-the-ground photovoice methods.