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Paper short abstract

Fatigue is so central to the visceral experience of caring for others. And yet, tiredness is seen as a barrier to thinking. How might we create space for fatigued thinking, which may not follow a plot or argument, but has its own momentum and rawness?

Paper long abstract

In this paper, I reflect on the relationship between fatigue and fieldwork. In the early months of my fieldwork in Delhi, India, sleep did not come easily. During this time, I spent many languid summer afternoons with Rasheeda, a young mother who often complained of feeling lethargic and tired. I reflect on the ways in which she spoke about her fatigue, both in an immediate (interrupted nights) and a more existential sense (feeling lethargic, overwhelmed by familial obligations). As we tried to lift each other out of each other’s lethargy, despite the vastly different circumstances of our lives, fatigue became a language through which we alluded to – without explicitly naming – the things in our lives that caused us to lose sleep. As I reflect on these moments and follow my trailing thoughts, I think about the ways in which fatigue is so central to the visceral experience of caring for others. And yet, like caregiving, tiredness is seen as a barrier to creativity and intellectual life. How might we create space for fatigued thinking, which may not follow a plot or argument, but has its own momentum and rawness?