Critical review of a social policy journal (article is available on Essay

Critical review of a social policy journal (article is available on sagepub) - Essay Example Janet attained all these academic qualifications in the University of Essex (The Open University, 2012). The article explains visual research, a form of research that uses photography to study a certain community. The article explains how photography can help in the collection of visual data, which helps in studying the aspects of a given community. The article is a guide on how visual data can help policy makers in obtaining information about the resources and the values that the community values. Janet’s article explains how the data collected using photographs to explain the differences among various communities in the contemporary England. In any society, there are clear issues that affect different communities that interact. There is that group of the society that does not enjoy benefits that other groups enjoy. For example, in Britain some communities are disadvantaged and marginalized in all aspects of life. A study of the experiences of community members and the areas that the communities views as problematic shows the actual gap between different communities in Britain. Visual research using photographs reveals the areas that account for the practices and problems that face the community. In addition, the research also shows the areas that the community members deem as good. ... Visual research is probably the best approach for decision-making about the welfare of a certain disadvantaged community. Critique of the article The article raises a number of issues concerning understanding the society. For instance, many marginalized communities face the problem of vandalism and destruction of property. This is due to the crash of ideas between different members of the society. Therefore, the communities are responsible for their problems in many instances. For instance, young people wanted the field for their own personal issues while other members of the community concerned themselves with protecting the field. The community divided itself along age and gender basis, but it is clear that the community has strong moral and social standards. The article brings to light how photography reveals some aspects that other people assume to be normal. For instance, the photographs on infrastructure indicate the local council's negligence in maintaining infrastructural fac ilities. Understanding the problems of disadvantaged members of the society needs complete masterly of all factors within their environment. Most of these factors, however, appear normal to many individuals, which hinders policy makers from making sense as well as interpreting the factors. The article stresses on the importance of visual data in analysing such information that may appear as irrelevant in the given communities (Fink, 2011). I agree with certain propositions of the article. The article stresses on the contributions of photography in studying various practices and experiences that influence the actions of marginalized communities. Visual research identifies aspects that affect the community and that appear normal in the eyes of many individuals. Policy makers need