Participatory Video

Participatory Video is an interactive group process, mediated by video-recording and playback activities, which can be used to drive Participatory Action Research (PAR). Generally facilitated by practitioner researchers, the early stages  involve participants in structured exercises to video themselves and the world around them, watching these recordings together (playback), and then reflecting on what was said or shown. Later, group members create their own ‘films’ (e.g. video stories, messages or vignettes) for different audiences depending on the context and specific project purpose.

Like other qualitative methods, one purpose of participatory video is to generate subjective knowledge from within a particular situation – so we can understand how people experience, interpret and respond to their realities. Video enables participants to show as well as tell, and can reveal the contextual, emotional and dynamic aspects easily missed by other methods. Facilitated participatory video processes are also well-evidenced for building communication confidence, and generating the inclusive dynamics and trust needed for honest reflections.

However, participatory video is not only the means for people to create their own stories or communicate perspectives. Because it focuses on the concerns of group participants, it can foster collective purpose/agency, and the means for community-driven action on an issue. It is used to generate enabling communication contexts, and prompt discussions within the groups and across communities, in order to deepen research insight; but it also opens a pathway to external influence because it re-positions marginalised participants more powerfully in external dialogue.

This video introduces how the process has been used as part of the “Seeing Conflict at the Margins” research project:

Participatory Video has diverse roots including:

• Fals Borda’s participatory epistemologies and Freire’s transformative pedagogies
• underlying bottom-up development communications in the global South
• the community arts movement in the global North, where community video tackled disadvantaged groups’ concerns
• and as feminist epistemology with Indigenous groups exploring grounded ways of seeing

These diverse origins mean there is considerable debate on what constitutes participatory video, reflecting practitioners’ different motivations and positions. It is appropriate to contextualise and adapt responsively as a project plays out, rather than using formulaic series of activities.

In reality, participatory video also involves navigating some fundamental tensions between the opportunities created and the challenges (Shaw 2012): for example, between increasing public awareness and risking negative reactions, and, not least, between the aims of the process and what is expected of the final product. The most acute ethical issues occur when participatory video is used on short-term projects focused predominately on group video-production over a week or so. Limited timescales also amplify ethical risks such as inappropriate exposure for vulnerable groups.

Participatory Video is therefore best used in longer projects, where there is time to navigate the key tensions ethically and effectively, and for the benefits to participants to unfold progressively. Over several months to years, these benefits include building capacities, inclusive dynamics, deeper insight, collective agency, group-led action, community mobilisation and external dialogue.

Design and principles

This introductory page is a summary of “Extended participatory video processes” in The SAGE Handbook of Participatory Research and Inquiry.

There are five main stages of the extended participatory video processes:

• Group forming and building
• Group-level (internal) exploration and reflection
• Peer-level videoing and sense-making
• Community-level video-mediated dialogue and mobilisation
• Influencing external audiences through video mediated engagement.

Leading a Participatory Video project not only requires confidence in practical video-making skills. More importantly, facilitators need to be able to manage complex relationships between participants, and structure activities inclusively. This is to ensure the value of the process itself to the participants and the wider project PAR outcomes are maximised.

Where the initial stages of the process are skipped or rushed and intentions behind each stage are muddled, the process ceases to be meaningfully participatory and evolves into solely a group film-making activity.

When designing a Participatory Video process, it’s important to consider that:

• Topics and messages will emerge through the process which may differ from researchers’ assumptions. This is a valuable contribution that  should be anticipated and researchers need to be flexible in their outlook, and be led by participants’ priorities.
• Reflections on risks should be ongoing, as the process may evoke unexpected or upsetting conversations for participants.  Communication the clear separation of videoing for internal and external reflection to participants can help to mitigate this risk.
• It can be difficult to anticipate the response of audiences to films, which can critically challenge their perspective and assumptions. Therefore, there may be some nervousness to focus on, or clearly articulate, some messages which may cause confrontation. Decisions about how to use the films should be led by the participants. Facilitators have a responsibility to make sure that decisions are informed and participants can picture what it will mean to show the films in practice. This can be done by practising showing the video in safe spaces and progressively diversifying the spaces within which it is shown.
• Although several groups can run in parallel, fundamentally participatory video involves limited numbers, which inevitably excludes some.
• Copies of the finished films and footage needs to remain with the participants. Filming equipment should also be left with participants so they can continue to use the skills they have developed throughout the process. However, time and care should be taken to make sure that equipment isn’t commandeered by powerful community members and used in unethical or unintended ways. Ideally there would be time to set up access and usage systems.

These are just some of the complex risks and mitigation strategies that can emerge during the Participatory Video process. You can find more reflections on this in this article.

For an example of combining and sequencing Participatory within a research project, please see our case study on Seeing Conflict at the Margins. Participatory video was used in the first instance as a way to establish inclusive group relationships and build communication confidence – then later it was used to synthesis key insights from other exercises.