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AFFILIATE SPOTLIGHT
YOUTH MAKING MEDIA
PhotoVoice
What is the mission of your organization?
We provide on-site training in photography and documentary skills for those around the world whose views are marginalized by society. Our projects to date have included work with refugee youth (Nepal), street children (Vietnam) and women living with HIV (Congo). PhotoVoice aims to help these groups raise awareness of their lives through promoting their work locally and internationally though mainstream media, Internet and exhibitions. We also help these groups to generate income through their photography.
What age, class, racial, religious, and ethnic groups do your organization work with?
We have 3 main projects — to work with groups of mixed gender teenagers (age 15 - 20), street children from Vietnam and Bhutanese refugee youth from Nepal. 1 has worked with HIV positive adult women in the Congo.
What are the main facilities, resources and services you make available to young people interested in working in media?
We provide them with training in photography and documentary skills. In the case of Nepal we also provided them with a basic training in print media. For young people not involved directly in our projects our website allows them to learn about and view our work and ideas and contact us directly if they are interested.
How would children and young people make contact with your organization?
E-mail and Internet, or within the U.K. by phone.
What made you originally want to start working with young people?
Working with young people will hopefully affect the most change in the long-term - youth is a time to be inspired and learn. Marginalized youth need to be encouraged to believe in their own worth and need to learn skills to be able to compete in a global society. Hopefully by adulthood they will have the confidence and knowledge to be able to make their own media independently of charitable organizations and be able to pass on their skills to contemporaries and younger people in their communities.
How are young people using new technologies to help them gain access to public forums and be more effective media makers?
Not all young people have access or training to use new technologies.
What do you see as the obstacles young producers of media face in gaining access to television, film, video, and print?
Having their views taken seriously.
Do you believe there is bias in the dominant media toward young people and their interests and issues? What is it?
Yes — much of the dominant media views work generated by young people in a patronizing and sentimental way.
How do you think the Internet and other technologies are influencing young media makers?
Yes — encouraging them because they can gain more control.
What are your organizations success stories working with young media producers?
Enabling some of the young people we work with not only to have their work taken seriously by both local and international audiences but also to earn an income for their work, which in turn allows them to become independent. We have seen some of the young people we work with grow in confidence as photography creates something new for them, alleviating some of the hardships in their lives.
What will be the most serious challenges facing young media journalists in the future?
As before — being taken seriously.
What do you think can be done to make young people more media literate?
Providing training in journalism skills, media practice and strategies and training in how to get their work seen and heard.
— Tiffany Fairey, PhotoVoice
YOUTH MAKING MEDIA: MAIN PAGE
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