This is a workshop that I have taught in universities [University Of Toronto | Spring 2024] to unlock the writing block through visual thinking.

• It works marvels in teams’ settings whether the kind of writing you do is academic or not, geared toward social development, or corporate analysis.

• Here is a teaser for the workshop, ask me how to bring it to your workplace!

• Stuck in yet another writing project with no-one to turn to except your very own procrastination demons? Join us as we try to step aside from the writing process for a hot minute only to get back into it by way of visual thinking. Visual thinking enables a playful reconnection between mind and body inscribed in a low pressure process of ideation.

• By putting into pictures your thoughts and ideas, you can envision alternative research designs and writing orientations that would otherwise be left out of the blank page.

• The workshop will bring us to try some potential techniques such as sketchnotes, blackout poetry and daily diaries.

• You need absolutely zero skills in drawing / design to join!

• [Feeling extra? You can volunteer to bring one printed out paragraph of your own writing (essay, publication, proposal…)]

For the past couple of years, I have integrated sketchnoting as a method of visual thinking in my undergraduate courses.

• The practice of sketchnoting emphasizes ideas rather than art, and thinking rather than eloquence (through words).

• I find it to be a compelling method to reconnect mind and body and to break down complex concepts in a collaborative, fun and hands-on manner in the age of AI.

• Here is how I integrate sketchnotes in my syllabi, feel free to borrow for yours!

• Every Thursday we will go around the classroom to do a show and tell of your individual“sketchnotes”. Sketchnotes are notes that are visually grounded rather than word driven. They foreground thinking through ideas rather than language mastery. They require zero drawing/art skills, so anyone can be good at them. Every Thursday you will bring to class a 1 page sketchnote summarizing the week’s readings: feel free to experiment and get creative. We will discuss your notes in class, so make sure to bring them every time. You need 10 sketchnotes throughout the semester in total. Sketchnotes represent 20% of the final grade.

• I was an early blogger and have missed long form, personal and engaged online writing making publicly available complex ideas and thorny concepts!

• Still in its infancy, The Sketchy Anthropologist is a Substack newsletter about all things anthropology, all things sketchnotes, and the nerdy corner that connects them both!

• In this playful endeavor of public learning I forefront my passion for anthropology as… the science of wonder!

• The newsletter aims an inclusive learning experience for a wide audience to engage the essential qualities common to both anthropology and sketchnoting:

  • bounciness: the ability to get creative on the spot and,

  • curiosity: an endless openness to wonder about everything and everyone.

    
    

Come check it out!

The American University In Cairo | Spring 2024
[Upper Undergraduate Level + Graduate Students]

This course introduces students to a one-person film crew, raw and impromptu take on documentary production. Our approach will be grounded in the works of filmmakers and thinkers identifying their orientations as somehow ethnographic, somehow feminist, somehow experimental. Rather than attempting to define those genres and therefore risking to narrow them down from a distance, you will be engaging theory and practice through the making of your own short film, with a somehow ethnographic, somehow feminist, somehow experimental twist. While no previous ethnographic or filming experience or knowledge is required, a total devotion to cinema and an absolute dedication to anthropology are required.

Hamilton College | Spring 2020
[Upper Undergraduate Level]

Introduction to audio-visual digital documentary production. Students work on individual short documentaries based on an Asian community in Utica using filmmakers from Asia and beyond as inspiration. Readings, screenings, and discussions bring together experimental cinema and ethnographic theory and methods. Our ultimate goal is to consider how images can push the limits of the distinction between “fact and fiction” by fusing the real and the surreal.

The American University In Cairo | Spring 2022 [Upper Undergraduate Level]

This course introduces students to the theorization and practice of an anthropology embedded in a careful listening referred to as audio or sonic ethnography. We will notably wonder: How does anthropology work if we remove the “observation” at its core? How have anthropologists been documenting soundscapes to decenter the omni-reliance on the visual to describe the world? What kind of estrangement can be found in the familiar, and what kind of familiarity can be found in the strange when we open our ears? Through a fine-tuning of our senses, we will attempt to bring ourselves toward more intentionality, more attention to self and others, and a more attuned presence in the daily. You will be able to link theory and practice by building your own Cairo ethnographic soundscape, which you will be sharing with your interlocutors and a broad audience through a digital platform and a worldwide conference. Open to all students driven by curiosity across all levels of ethnographic and technical know-how.

The American University In Cairo | Fall 2023 | Fall 2021
[Upper Undergraduate Level]

This course introduces students to the anthropology of creation with a particular interest in filmmaking. What would the encounter between anthropology and film look like if we were to look at filmmaking from an anthropological point of view and at anthropology from the creator’s perspective? As we watch documentaries and read ethnographic studies of filmmaking, we will consider how the anthropology of creation could help us understand how movies (or TV commercials, or streaming series, or YouTube channels…) are thought, made, and lived. Rather than focusing on the outcome (the film itself), we will be paying attention to the process and the people involved. You will be able to link theory and practice in your own ethnographic study, which you will share with your interlocutors and a broad audience through a public website. This course welcomes all movie buffs and anthropology nerds across all levels of ethnographic and filmmaking experience.

For an overview of Fall 2021 students’ projects: click here

Hamilton College | Fall 2019
[All levels, Undergraduate]

Can your smartphone become a partner to picture your world differently? What do technologies of seeing in cinema and anthropology have in common? How do alternative modes of filmmaking inform how we view others? The course uses readings in anthropology to think about viewing films, primarily by filmmakers from Asia and its neighbors. Students will design ethnographic projects and use smartphone apps to produce their own short documentaries. No previous expertise in Asian studies, award winning cinematics, or advanced geeky tech required. Ideas, energy, and an open mind are mandatory.

For an overview of students projects: click here

Hamilton College | Fall 2020
[Canceled due to pandemic related immigration issues]

Introduction to the theory and methods of mobile ethnography. Students develop individual projects using smartphones to document a local community of their choosing. The ethnographic outcome uses the digital methods such as short creative writing, photographic postcards, and video snippets. Successful projects will demonstrate a commitment to collaboration, creativity, and mobility. No previous expertise in Asian studies, award-winning aesthetics, or advanced geeky tech required. Pre-requisites: ideas, energy, and an open mind.

The American University In Cairo | Fall 2022
[Graduate Level]

When do stories become history? Who gets to tell the facts (and are all sources born equal)? When is silence an erasure scarred by oppression, and when is it a screaming-out-loud only heard by a few? Can anthropologists get up close and personal in a telling of history that works not only through but also against the archive? Can poetry, images, and nonacademic mediums get us closer to historical truth? In this course, we will approach history not for what she has to say but for what she refuses to give up all too easily. We will wonder not so much what history is but imagine what she could be. We will venture into ethnographies of history that think the human less as a science and more as a method. 

The American University In Cairo | Fall 2021 [Mid-Undergraduate Level]

This course introduces students to digital anthropology and its potential to rethink how we inhabit virtual worlds. We will wonder: if ethnography is the study of how people live, what happens when it all goes online? What can thorough documentation of online worlds and cultures tell us about what we consider “real”? How are human relations maintained and altered by screens and data collections? As we read ethnographic studies of virtual worlds, we will consider how digital anthropology can construct, revise or unsettle oppositions such as real/virtual, face-to-face/disconnected, and the exotica of anthropological fieldwork. You will be able to link theory and practice in your own digital ethnographic study, which you will share with your interlocutors and a broad audience through a public website. This course welcomes all students curious about the world across all levels of ethnographic and digital experience.

For an overview of students’ projects: click here

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Hamilton College | Spring 2020
[Mid-Undergraduate Level]

Introduction to the theory and methods of digital ethnography. Students develop projects taking the digital as both object and outcome. Students choose an Asian virtual community for study and present final projects on a digital platform. The course interrogates the anthropological separation of “fieldwork” and “homework” in the digital era and raises questions such as: Are social relations erased, transformed, or newly created when the web becomes our world? Are we putting distance between ourselves and others or getting a little too close? Are we now, also, Others among Others?

For an overview of students projects: click here

The American University In Cairo | Fall 2023
[Upper Undergraduate Level]

This course introduces students to the development, practice, and ethics of research in community settings. We will notably look at how anthropology as a discipline and Participatory Action Research (PAR) intersect in the design of projects that aim to study social issues and contribute to social change. As we define the various methods used to understand communities close and afar from us, you will put into practice what you learn, by conducting your ethnographic project in a community of your choice. At the end of the semester, you will have learned to build, run, and adapt research to the realities of the world we inhabit. Your final assignment will crystallize this experience through a creative project of your own choosing.

The American University In Cairo | Spring 2024
[Anthro Majors Final Projects Guidance]

The mechanics and theme of this course “signature work” follow the model implemented by Dr Ramy Aly since 2020. Any course resemblance is entirely not coincidental.

This course follows a workshop format and aims to equip anthropology and sociology seniors with a final project of their own before they graduate and leave university. The project, a signature work, should be ethnographic in content, approach and output, and is entirely yours to direct. It should foster a sense of closure with your four years of study, and give you a feeling of achievement. Throughout the semester you will not only take charge of this project and its progress, but also of the class intellectual, methodological and content orientations.

The American University in Cairo | Fall 2022
[Anthro majors/minors + Upper Undergraduate Level]

Are you embarking on a social science-y project, the backpack full of not knowing what you're doing? Are you an ethnographer in the making, trying to expand your methodological toolkit but not sure where to start? Have you always wanted to go deeper than just that one storyline, but you would have to get in touch with people, and… that's just too much? Or maybe (just maybe) you are an eternal curious at heart willing to turn your daily hunt for gossip into a serious study of them humans? In this course you will learn more about the tools that anthropologists develop to look deep into the eyes' sockets of the world. We'll travel from participant observation to interviews, from the writing of field notes to the publishing of ethnographic poetry, from taking pictures to making ethnographic films, and from questioning positionality to embedding ethics of reciprocity. A journey through the many colors that fieldwork methods take, and which will start and end with your own mini ethnographic project. Not ready for this? Sounds like the perfect place to start. 

The American University In Cairo | Fall 2022 | Spring 2022
[Anthro majors/minors]

This course introduces students to cultural anthropology along with its potentials to reveal the familiar in the strange and the strange in the familiar. Some of the questions that will guide our conversations include: Can ethnography help us understand how we live with each other? How do culture, nation, gender, religion, class, race, and kinship shape our being in the world? What are the ethics of studying others and writing about them? As we read ethnographic studies and discuss the anthropological key concepts they engage with, we will consider how the discipline can construct, revise or unsettle social and cultural categories. You will be able to link theory and practice by building your own Cairo ethnographic study, which you will be sharing with your interlocutors and a broad audience through a public website. Open to all students curious about the world across all levels of ethnographic know-how.

Cornell University | Spring 2017
[Awarded a First-Year Writing Seminar Teaching Fellowship]

First-year writing seminar aiming to expose students to writing in the disciplines. The course explores the theories and puts into practice first-hand ethnographic experience as well as a wide genre of experimental ethnographic writing.

The American University In Cairo | Spring 2024 | Spring 2023 [Core Requirement]

Do processes of Orientalism and Otherization affect how we see “Arab Societies”? How can media representations engender Islamophobia? How can we change the way we view “others”—and therefore ourselves—starting with how we picture them? Putting theories of representation into practice, this class considers the ideas and methods of visual anthropology and film studies to question how Arabs have historically been represented on and off screen. The films and readings explored in this class raise an awareness for stereotypes surrounding us when it comes to the depictions of “Muslims” and “Arabs”. Throughout the course of the semester, you will historicize, contextualize and deconstruct those tropes in both form and content.

Fall 2023 | Spring 2023 [x2]
[Core Requirement]

This course will examine the nature of family, kin, and friends in a comparative perspective, with special attention to Egypt. Is romantic love universal? What makes a family? How are friends made and unmade? We will look at the intersections that marriage, genealogies and other practices and institutions maintain and renew to push the limits of what qualifies as kinship. Course materials will blend sociological, anthropological and historical perspectives and include films and podcasts, academic and news articles, as well as guest speakers.

The American University In Cairo | Fall 2021 [Fist Year Elective]
&
Cornell University | Fall 2018
[Awarded a First-Year Writing Seminar Teaching Fellowship]

How can media representations engender Islamophobia? Could the depiction of "Arabs" be a way to reassure a certain togetherness in face of strangeness? How do the descriptions of "being Muslim", reflect (on) social relations with and without actual Muslims? Can we change the way we view “others”—and therefore ourselves—starting with how we picture them? Putting theories of representation into practice, this class considers the ideas and methods of visual anthropology and film studies to conduct both written and visual assignments. Thinking cinematically and anthropologically, students will craft essays with words (E.g: analysis of the trope of the White Cheikh and the series Homeland), and images (a final photo essay on films’ potentials to turn clichés around)

2018 (Winter) | Chinese Empire and the Cambodian Experience | TA & Cambodia coordinator | Cornell in Cambodia & Tompkins Cortland Community College

2016 (Winter) | Chinese Empire and the Cambodian Experience | as above

Trouble in The Cage: Gender, Race and Class at The Fights | TA (sole instructor) | Recipient Fall 2017 Award from the Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies Department, Cornell University (declined in favor of the Charlotte Newcombe Doctoral Fellowship)

Thinging The World: An Anthropology with Objects | TA (sole instructor) | Selected for a First Year Writing Fellowship as a course Spring 2018, Department of Anthropology, Cornell University (declined in favor of the Charlotte Newcombe Doctoral Fellowship)

Women Writing Culture: Feminists & Anthropologists at Work | Lecturer | Seminar prepared upon an invitation from a women’s religious college in Qom, Iran | Postponed (schedule conflict).

2019 (Spring) | Documentary Production | TA (co-instructor) | Department of Anthropology, Cornell University

2016 (Fall) | The Comparison of Cultures | TA | Department of Anthropology, Cornell University

2015 (Spring) | Cultural Diversity & Contemporary Issues | TA | Department of Anthropology, Cornell University

2014 (Fall) |The Comparison of Cultures| TA | Department of Anthropology, Cornell University