"How Did We Meet?": Experiments with Ethnographic Comics in Nepal

Abstract

This comic-format article details a 2024 workshop that the authors held in Nepal, in which Nepali, US, and Chinese writers and artists teamed up to create collaboralife" in the Nepali city of Patan and was grounded in open- ended ethnographic interviews that each pair conducted with locals. This article draws on the events and output of the workshop to consider the role of comics in ethnographic studies. We focus on how one pair's comic helped the partners reflect critically on how they might go about forming the relationships that ground ethnographic research, while also pointing to the topic of relationship formation as a potential area of ethnographic inquiry. We conclude by discussing how the comic- making endeavor highlighted the importance of reflexivity in ethnographic work.

Publisher

American Folklore Society

Publication Date

Fall 2025

Publication Title

Journal of American Folklore

Department

Anthropology

Document Type

Article

DOI

https://doi.org/10.5406/15351882.138.550.06

Notes

Special Issue: Folklore, Comics, and Graphic Storytelling

Keywords

Ethnography, Interviews, Workshops, Comic books, Strips

Language

English

Format

text

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