Doing Visual Research
- Claudia Mitchell - McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Doing Visual Research offers an innovative introduction to the use of photography, collaborative video, drawing, objects, multi-media production and installation in research. Claudia Mitchell explains how visual methods can be used as modes of inquiry as well as modes of representation for social research.
The book looks at a range of conceptual and practical approaches to a range of tools and methods, while also highlighting the interpretive and ethical issues that arise when engaging in visual research. She draws on her own work in the field of visual research throughout to offer extensive examples from a variety of settings and with a variety of populations. Topics covered include:
- Photographs and memory work studies
- Drawing as a participatory visual methodology
- Working with images/Writing about images
- Can visual methods make a difference? From practice to policy
Doing Visual Research takes an interdisciplinary approach to the subject of visual research, producing a practical introduction to the subject that will be of great use to students and researchers across the social sciences, and in particular in education, communication, sociology, gender, development, social work and public health.
A very useful textbook for students who elect to follow a creative route for their final year dissertation.
A good starting point for researchers and photographers who seriously want to explore the potential of the visual as a research tool.
A good introduction for practice based research.
this is a good text if you are considering visual methods, it is a supplementary text as the module is multiprofessional therefore the students follow many different research paths
This is an exceptionally useful book and I would I would consider it core for a research methods course. For my particular course, I intend to recommend it to those students who adopt a visual research approach to their data generation.
The book is highly accessible and the inclusion of visual methods in research is demystified. As well as being a 'how to' publication, the author offers rich examples from her own practice which help to vivify the text.
This is an interesting text but it is too specific for BA project students. I would however recommend it to any student planning to use visual research methods.
The book is a very well prepared methodological tool to develop skills necessary to analyze visual culture using different perspectives and methods of visual analysis. Using this textbook allows to provide basic knowledge about working with and writing about images: photographs, video, drawings. It also provides knowledge how to “read” the messages of the popular culture.
Very useful book for students interested in the methodology
Claudia Mitchel provided a very good training in making photography as well as making other imagery (as with extra computer software) become a major endeavour for journalism students.
We have used her text to enhance responses from several fields of regional journalism, namely newspapers and weekly reviews and we can only hope this will become a fully adopted text book in the next courses.
This is an excellent guide to the topic
