Robyne Hayes, a ‘Research Photographer’ on child marriage & photovoice around the world, as she called herself, came to give us a short introduction on herself and answer our questions on Writer’s Fortnight.
Empathy & Understanding Through Photography?
When I first heard this, I was confused, how could you be making any difference through photography? However, as the session progressed I saw the entire matter in a completely different light. Since younger, she always loved working with kids. In fact, her first job was a teacher. Recognizing her passion for the issue of child marriage 
and combining it with her talent for photography, she sought out to build a career out of them both. This taught me that is possible to combine your passions and talents and make a living out it as well. This way what you did would matter to you. The question that remained however was how? How did she make any difference to this issue with photography? For starters, this created awareness of the issue, letting those inside their own bubbles, have a view into the lives of these kids. Although however hard we try, we cannot possibly put ourselves completely in the shoes of someone else. She came up with the idea of letting these girls have a camera for a week, and helping her capture their lives through there own perspectives. This lets us have a small glimpse into what they believe can represent their lives every day.
This post was a very good repository for information about Robyne Hayes. There is a lot of information about her and her life, you also weaved your personal reflection very well into the piece so the reader can see not only Robyn Hayes but also what your opinion to the speech was. I think the best line to sum up this experience and the reflection given is “Although however hard we try, we cannot possibly put ourselves completely in the shoes of someone else”. It perfectly represents the challenges Ms Hayes and her team faced as well as gives very good advice, that no matter how hard you try you cannot be someone else but yourself. This made me think of how precious I am since I can’t just hop into someone else’s life so I have to make the most out of mine. All in all, it was a brilliant source of information of her visions to change the world as well as good advice for the future.
Thank you for your comment. I completely agree, it most definitely is a challenge for an organization such as her’s that have to try to imagine themselves in other people’s shoes.
Your post is an interesting one, I like how you reflect and this quote of yours “This taught me that is possible to combine your passions and talents and make a living out it as well.” is very impressive. I think this sentence summarize this presentation nicely and I can also read your opinions additionally. It was a good post! I like it 🙂
Thank you for your comment. Yes, I think that knowledge could be truly inspiring for many young people who are struggling with their career options, to know that there are ways to tie together their passions and talents.