Mel Grewell, an M. A. Candidate in the Department of Geography and Urban Studies and Graduate Research Fellow of ITSRG is interested in youth perceptions of community. Her paper examines inner-city adolescents' perceptions of community and other geographic concepts, such as maps and place. Her study was conducted in North Philadelphia drawing on perspectives of students involved in the BITS Program. She has noticed that there are many interesting connections between what participants drew on their sketch maps of their communities and how they chose to photograph their communities. For example, most participants portrayed their homes on the community maps the created and also through photography. But, some of the participants' drawings tended to focus on the area immediately around their homes, whereas their photographs had a broader geographic range showing where the participants spend their time.
Michele Masucci
Temple University