Rivers, Rice Fields and Rural Identity: A Photovoice Documentation Project with Junior High School Students in Kecamatan Gading, Probolinggo

This article examines the visual documentation of rural landscapes produced by junior high school students in Kecamatan Gading, Probolinggo, Indonesia, as part of a community-based pengabdian masyarakat (community service) program. Drawing on 117 field photographs, the study analyzes how students visually frame three key elements of their environment: rivers, rice fields, and tobacco plots. Using Pandalungan cultural hybridity and Eco-Cultural Language Learning (ECLL) as theoretical lenses, the analysis reveals that students position themselves as observers at the edge of the landscape, document the environment as a layered space of nature and infrastructure, and visually normalize agricultural labor. These findings indicate that photovoice serves as a pedagogical tool that supports SDG 4 (Quality Education) by linking environmental observation with language learning. This article contributes to the literature on visual methods and place-based education by demonstrating how rural youth act as active interpreters of their own agrarian environments.