The process and product: crafting community portraits with young people in flexible learning settings

† The preparation of this paper is supported through the Australian Government's Collaborative Research Networks (CRN) programme.

Abstract

Community-based alternative education is situated on the margins in relation to mainstream education. Young people attending these learning sites are often characterised as ‘disengaged learners', who have fallen through the cracks of the traditional schooling system. The aim of this project was to use participatory visual methods with students at flexible learning sites to develop a community portrait of these settings and the young people who attend them. This paper explores how photography in particular, within a frame of liberation arts, can work to democratise the knowledge production process by involving young people as ‘co-portraitists’. Students across three separate sites worked to create a visual narrative that displayed both individual and collective experiences, culminating in a piece for a local exhibition. Finally, this paper explores how community portrait making may open up spaces for dialogue and project the voices of young people in flexi learning schools.

Keywords:

• community portraits
• alternative education
• youth
• photography

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank A/Prof Chris Sonn, Amy Quayle and the two anonymous reviewers for feedback they provided. I am also grateful for the support received from A/Prof Kitty te Riele and to the young people who shared their stories with me.

Notes on contributor

Alison M. Baker is currently a postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Victoria Institute for Education, Diversity & Lifelong Learning at Victoria University in Melbourne. Her research explores youth citizenship through community-based arts and sports with young people in Melbourne. Alison is interested in blending creative, participatory research methodologies with documentary arts techniques to develop young people's sense of social justice and capacity for action.

Notes

† The preparation of this paper is supported through the Australian Government's Collaborative Research Networks (CRN) programme.