Organisation and participation in workshop, seminar, course: Ekphrastic Writing (Event)

The workshop asks us to consider the place of poetics within ethnography. What role do metaphor, juxtaposition, and imagery play in developing an ethnographic mode of attention, description, and analysis?

This workshop engages such a conversation through experimental creative practice. Ekphrastic modes of writing take a visual image or form as prompt – be it a fieldwork photograph or sketch, an artwork, a map, an advertisement, a street mural, or a medical image. Through a slow meditation and engagement, ekphrastic writing expands, supplements, or reconsiders the meaning of the visual image. The ekphrastic mode of attention harnesses visual images and visual media to see, write and understand in novel ways.

Participants will be encouraged to bring an image from fieldwork in order to engage in a series of guided ekphrastic exercises. No prior experience necessary in poetry writing or ekphrastic creative writing.