Critical Visual Methods to Advance Racial Justice in Educational Research: The Seen and the Unseen

Critical Visual Methods to Advance Racial Justice in Educational Research advances critical research methodologies for analyzing visual and multimodal data, with particular attention to racial justice for minoritized communities. It presents innovative theoretical frameworks and analytical approaches for examining how visual representations impact, perpetuate, and potentially transform systemic inequities in educational research.

Organized into three sections, this book explores analytic frameworks, methods for critical visual analysis, and visual praxis in schools and communities. Contributors weave together transformative theories while demonstrating innovative approaches to visual analysis that center participant perspectives, including photovoice, collage, slow looking, and radical curation. The book showcases rigorous approaches to analyzing visual data while maintaining methodological depth. Key findings illustrate how visual methodologies can reveal hidden power structures, document lived experiences, and generate new knowledge about how minoritized communities engage with and create visual meaning. The work advances the understanding of perspectives across the lifespan―from children to youth to adults―through critical visual and multimodal research methods.

This book is designed for emerging and established educational scholars interested in critical visual and multimodal methodologies and serves as an ideal text for undergraduate and graduate research courses. It offers valuable insights for researchers studying representation, identity, and equity while advancing innovative approaches for analyzing visual and multimodal data in educational research.

Angela M. Wiseman is an associate professor of Literacy Education at North Carolina State University, USA, has an appointment as a scholar of multiliteracies research at the University of Tampere, Finland, and is affiliated faculty of the Center for Visual Literacies at San Diego State University.

Marva Cappello is a professor of Literacy Education at San Diego State University, USA, where she is the founder and director of the Center for Visual Literacies. She teaches master's courses in literacy as well as doctoral courses in qualitative research methods.

Jennifer D. Turner is a professor of Literacy Education and the College of Education ADVANCE Professor at the University of Maryland, USA, and is affiliated faculty of the Center for Visual Literacies at San Diego State University.