four note friday 2.26 | Writing a Second Edition of My Photovoice Book
Well, it is official. It's happening. Yesterday I signed a contract to write a second edition of my book on photovoice.
I am in the throes of wrapping up the production of another book and finalizing yet another (more on that in the next few weeks), so of course it is time to commit to yet another mammoth project. [smile] I kid. Moving toward the one-year anniversary of this email newsletter/blog posting adventure has rekindled my love of photovoice as a practice and a significant thread within my scholarship. One of the outcomes of this adventure is me deciding, finally, to pen a second edition.
That said, I imagine year two of four note friday being focused on crafting the new edition. And what better time to start than now? (Tentatively planning to deliver the book to the publisher at the end of 2027).
So in what follows, I will give an overview of the four main pieces of useful and very thoughtful feedback provided by the reviewers who have deemed a second edition is warranted. In addition, in some cases I will share a handful of pieces I plan to read throughout the process of addressing the feedback. A whole, whole lot has happened since 2017, and I have my work cut out for me.
Freshen up guidance related to the intersections of technology and ethics.
It will be critical to address contemporary issues related to technology and research ethics. It will be even more critical to address the intersections between the two. One reviewer stated that "[g]iven the central role that digital photography, social media, online dissemination, and data governance now play in visual research, a contemporary audience is likely to expect a more substantial discussion of the ethical and methodological challenges associated with digital environments." This is quite right.
In preparation for addressing this feedback, I have dipped into the literature and located a few pieces to read as a start. This second edition will be as much of a reading exercise as a writing one. They are as follows:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1077800418807239 (Torrance, 2019)
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00131857.2020.1805310 (McLoed & O'Connor, 2020)
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08164649.2021.2018991 (Moore et al., 2021)
Engage participant agency, ownership, and representation.
New debates abound in the current qualitative research literature related to participant agency, ownership, and representation. In keeping with the theoretical underpinnings and related aims of photovoice, the full agency of project participants must be recognized and honored. Critical questions must be asked related to photographic ownership and individual and collective representation. For example, one reviewer noted that "there is now greater recognition that participants may wish to be identified by name rather than automatically anonymised, as naming can be an important expression of voice, authorship, and recognition within participatory research." Again, quite right.
Some of my early inroads into the literature on these topics are as follows:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00220221231193146 (Itzik & Walsh, 2023)
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1743727X.2024.2432271 (Pretorius & Vijaykumar Patel, 2025)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/17470161231180829 (Aurini & Iafolla, 2023)
Foreground education as the disciplinary foundation of the book.
Since the publication of my book 2017, we've seen quite a few additional books on photovoice become available. Many of the books published since have had disciplinary grounding in fields other than education such as social work and criminal justice. One reviewer keenly noted that "the focus on education seems insufficiently developed to provide a distinctive disciplinary contribution." This feedback is excellent. When I was writing the first edition, I was not thinking much about making a disciplinary contribution. I was thinking about making a methodological contribution.
As I move forward, then, it will be important to situate photovoice within an educational context, broadly speaking. The reviewers quite enjoyed the blend of literature and stories of application within edition one, and I have plenty more application stories.
The most contemporary example I have is related to my consulting work with EASNIE, which I have written about here previously. [Bonus. The final dissemination webinar was just released. See here. Please watch; it is an excellent resource.]
Here are three recent publications featuring interesting photovoice projects situated in education. They're all on my reading list.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/14697874241245350 (Ciolan & Manasia, 2026)
https://www.emerald.com/he/article/doi/10.1108/HE-09-2025-0179/1341040/Health-in-our-school-a-photovoice-project (Burke et al., 2026)
https://www.cjhe-rces.ca/index.php/cjhe/article/view/190599/186829 (Toledo & Borak, 2025)
Address photovoice adaptations.
As I have written about here previously, tracking the many photovoice adaptations now present in the literature has been fascinating. Tracing these adaptations and how they converge with, diverge from, and extend canonical photovoice conceptions within edition two is key. According to one of the reviewers, I need to include "clearer guidance on what constitutes [p]hotovoice in its original form, what modifications are being proposed, and how these modifications affect the methodological and philosophical commitments of the approach." Completely agree.
I was encouraged to engage with Nicole Brown's Photovoice Reimagined as a strong example of how to do this. It's on my list.
If you have read my book and have ideas about shaping the next edition, please reach out. Would love to consider any and all suggestions.
🥹 Thanks for spending a moment with me this Friday.
💌 If you’re new here, welcome! I hope this space becomes one you look forward to each week.
📬 Have a question you want me to answer in a future issue? Reach me at photovoicefieldnotes@gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you.
Thanks for being here.
Warmly,
Mandy
photovoice field notes
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