Portraiture methodology for environmental justice pedagogy and activist praxis

Abstract

The purpose of this theoretical paper is to provide a praxis oriented example of a qualitative methodology called portraiture for environmental justice and critical environmental education. The five essential elements for a portraiture study are context, voice, relationship, emergent themes, and aesthetic whole. Context is the frame, thus environmental exclusion and the field’s exclusionary past is first examined. Portraiture gives back power and voice to people with marginalized identities in the environmental space, which includes the researcher’s voice as a fourth-generation Japanese American woman, and the voices of other diverse environmental educators and activists. The aesthetic whole demonstrates the importance of attending to voice in environmental education and shows portraiture is fundamental to understanding diverse educators’ perceptions of their environmental science agency, which is defined as “learning science while doing science, which can foster environmental stewardship, civic participation, and meaningful science learning” (Ballard et al., 2018, p. 6).

Keywords:

• Portraiture
• environmental justice
• environmental science agency
• pedagogy

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my grandfather for teaching me how to be an environmentalist, and the two anonymous peer reviewers for their suggestions and feedback, which helped to strengthen the manuscript. Lastly, thank you to my committee members for their support and insights: Drs. Emily Alicia Affolter, C. Centáe Richards, Dianna Gielstra, Rose Brusaferro, and Richard Lewis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 According to the Human Rights Campaign (n.d.), LGBTQ + is an acronym for “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer with a + sign to recognize the limitless sexual orientations and gender identities used by members of our community.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kimi Waite

Kimi Waite is an Assistant Professor of Child and Family Studies at California State University, Los Angeles. An Asian American educator-activist-scholar and former elementary school teacher, she has received both national and state recognition for her leadership in environmental education, social studies, and climate change education.