Young People, Digital Cameras, and Art Gallery Spaces
Young people can take meaningful photographs and are thus capable users of handheld digital technology such as digital cameras. When their digital photographs are paired with their narratives (creating visual narratives) an intertexuality becomes evident whereby the child's voice is honored. By positioning children as capable photographers who generate images to share their lived experiences, this chapter describes a project (called Ways of Seeing) that was interested in how visual narratives could support participatory learning in an art gallery setting. Johnson, Adams & Witchey (2011) trends for 2011 – 2016 identify six emerging technology topics that resonate well with the projects aims and offer several concrete examples of how technology is used in museums and galleries. They believe that digital technology embedded with a contemporary context reflects the reality of education needs, learning and teaching. It is from this perspective that this chapter shares a project that builds on these notions and shares how a digital camera can be used in the gallery space with young people. A visual narrative of the method and a content analysis of the digital images generated by the young people is presented. This chapter demonstrates how it is possible to take digital technology such as digital cameras and embed them into gallery education programs with young people.