Positionality and Ethics
I am a professor in the art department at Midwestern Community College. As the participants’ art professor and as a professional photographer myself, power differentials must be tended to. The courses I teach fulfill general education requirements and are open to all students. They come from a variety of interest areas and intended majors – some consider themselves artists or photographers – many do not. I have been photographing most of my life and I use photography as a way to understand myself and the world around me.
However, just because I have been photographing most of my life, that does not make me an expert on my participants’ photographs, on their intended meanings and how they experience college space (Luttrell, 2019). The job of the researcher is to let go of one’s ego and remember who the experts are – the participants themselves (Tracy, 2013). In order to understand how students use college space, an ungraded class activity was assigned to my Photo 1 and Intro to Art classes. Students used their cell phones to take photographs around campus, in response to the specific photo elicitation questions about how they use and feel about campus space. All attending and participating students received credit for the ungraded engagement activity. At the end of the activity, they completed their daily engagement index card, reflecting on their experience of thinking about and photographing various college spaces. Not part of the research project, the student reflections were insightful and, on a personal note, encouraging to me for the rich data I was hoping for.