Spaces to Speak: Photovoice and the Reimagination of Girls’ Education in India

Delving into the “black box” of schooling can help us better understand the paradoxical reality that schooling for girls can be simultaneously empowering and disempowering. Despite recent interest in developing innovative research methodologies within the field of comparative education, there has been less attention to and reflexivity about the use of critical and participatory research methodologies as a way to gain insight into school processes that lead to dis/empowerment. This article details the use of photovoice methodology with rural, marginalized, adolescent-aged girls in Western India, with particular attention to collaboration, power sharing, and the production of “voice.” Through a case study of a group of girls in Gujarat, this article illustrates how photovoice methodology can act as an important analytical heuristic to illuminate the relationship between schooling and girls’ empowerment and how photovoice as a method might itself contribute to the empowerment process of girls.