The New Orleans VideoVoice Project

The New Orleans VideoVoice Project was a partnered health initiative between REACH NOLA and the California-based VideoVoice Collective. The VideoVoice Collective brought academic researchers, filmmakers, technology mavens, social justice champions, and community leaders together to improve the health conditions of underserved communities. REACH NOLA joined forces with the VideoVoice Collective in August of 2007. In February of 2008, REACH NOLA and VideoVoice Collective partners worked together to train ten New Orleans residents in the use of video cameras. After completing this 2-day training, these novice filmmakers were encouraged and supported to shoot footage in and around the Central City neighborhood, while continuing to meet on a weekly basis to share and discuss their footage and emerging themes. During May and June of 2008, community filmmakers and expert editors on our team collaboratively edited the footage to create a documentary, “In Harmony: Reflections, Thoughts, and Hopes of Central City,” which has screened within the Central City community. At this community screening, filmmakers as well as other residents of Central City where invited to come, eat, mingle, view and collectively discuss the images shown.

The process (videos)
In Harmony: Reflections, Thoughts, and Hopes of Central City (video)

From this process we hoped to learn if the process of training and engaging marginalized community members in the use of film to communicate their ideas and hopes will encourage community social action and if so, what kind of social action. Guided by Community-Based Participatory Research principles, our project goals included investigating the use of videovoice methodology to

1. strengthen our existing community-academic partnership,
2. enhance the social capital of Central City residents to include networks of filmmakers and media professionals,
3. build community capacity to produce and distribute their own media,
4. improve the understanding of community health in New Orleans, and
5. advocate for public health policy change.

A strong message expressed at the Central City screening was that youth voices needed to be heard. As a result, the next Video Voice project undertaken in New Orleans in the Spring of 2009 through REACH NOLA’s support, was led by participants from the Central City video project, and trained a group of teenage girls in the Treme neighborhood from The Awesome Girls Mentoring Program. The documentary produced, “From Our Point of View: Joining Hands to Save Our Community,” explores the history and struggles of the Treme and 7th Ward area exposing issues such as education, economy and neighborhoods. In May 2009, the film went on to win 1st place in the Elisabeth Irwin Human Rights Film Festival in New York, New York.

From Our Point of View: Joining Hands to Save Our Community (video)

REACH NOLA had the honor of supporting the group that participated in the Central City video and led the Treme video go on the establish an independent non-profit organization called New Orleans Video Voices (www.neworleansvideovoices.org). New Orleans Video Voices continues to work in the New Orleans area creating community videos.