Lead: Gill Black
Co-Author: Mary Chambers (Oxford University Clinical Research Unit, Saigon)
Contributing Authors: Alun Davies and Sonia Lewycka
Funders: Wellcome
Partners: The Global Health Network

About the course

This course was developed in response to growing global interest in research engagement and excitement about possibilities of visual methods. It was compiled by Gill Black and Mary Chambers, as an additional dimension of our Bucket Loads of Health project.

It provides guidelines on the practice and ethics of participatory visual methods (PVM) with emphasis on their use in low and middle-income countries for community and public engagement in health and health science. It was produced as part of the Mesh Community Engagement Network learning and training resources.

The course has been developed for use by engagement practitioners who are relatively new to the field of PVM and want to learn more about what they are and how to work with them. It is most fitting for those who already have some experience in facilitating participatory processes or in using qualitative research methods. The course also aims to support health science researchers who wish to include visual methods when engaging local communities and wider publics in their work.

In addition to providing general guidelines on planning and facilitating PVM processes, and product dissemination, the course covers a range of methods:

• art to stimulate engagement
• picture card games
• body mapping
• performing arts
• participatory photography
• personal digital storytelling
• participatory and collective film-making
• participatory photo postcard sets

A voluntary quiz for each of the 8 modules has been created to test your knowledge of the course material and to gain certification to demonstrate that you have successfully completed the entire course.

Acknowledgements:

Sian Aggett, Caroline Jones and Salla Sariola were members, along with the authors, of a working group on the ethics of PVM in health science research that was established in 2015 (Cambodia: Supplementary workshop to Oxford Tropical Network meeting). The concepts that were discussed among the working group at that time have contributed to shaping the themes that are described in this course.

Many of the examples of PVM projects from Vietnam were conducted in partnership with Nick Fernandez and Linh Phan of Fact & Fictions Films.

We are grateful to Pam Sykes for undertaking an expert peer review of the written content for this course and Jess Drewett for her tireless support with formatting and referencing.