Short Abstract:

This lab seeks to bring together scholars, artists and researchers interested in experimenting with drawing as a form of anthropology-making. We welcome the opportunity to share experiences and develop a collaborative network with those interested in exploring the different applications of drawing.

Long Abstract:

Following on from a renewed interest in graphic anthropology (Ingold, 2011) and in drawing as ethnographic method (Causey, 2017), illustrations, cartoons and comics have emerged within Anthropology in a so-called 'graphic narrative turn' (Dix & Kaur, 2019). This lab explores the potential of drawing not only as a perceptive tool for fieldwork to enhance new modes of reflexivity but to also challenge traditional modes of ethnographic representation and provide new forms of anthropological knowledge production through storytelling. Drawing allows to recapture the very intersubjective nature of any ethnographic encounter and grants the opportunity to foster collaborations and decolonise representations; to move beyond text as well as the barriers of verbal language and its temporal limitations. It does so in ways that privilege subjectivities and emotions over textual linearity and theoretical coherence in order to provide real visibility and voice(s) to participants. Drawing an ethnographic scene means to engage with the multitude of encounters and the sensorial over-exposition that is experienced in the field. In the very moment we draw, we position ourselves, in the field and toward others: drawing enhances the process of self-reflexivity which is crucial to the production of anthropological knowledge.The production of drawings offers an alternative collaborative method to encourage more reflexive and recursive styles for impactful projects; a new and different way to disseminating anthropology beyond academia and into civil society. We invite Lab participants to bring an ethnographic encounter in mind and pens, pencils and papers so as to start drawing together our ethnographic stories.