What Really Matters: Reflections on the Experience of Displacement from the Earthquake in Central Nepal

One minute you’re walking down the street, carrying with you a feeling of stability and security. In the next, you’re being swept away by a current of chaos and panic, with nothing but a profound feeling of being completely trapped by the uncertainty of what’s to come next.

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The Language of Compassion in Fieldwork

While conducting my PhD fieldwork in west-central Nepal I found that showing respect, compassion and care for the non-human members of the communities in which I was doing research went a long way to build trust and points of connection between myself as an outside researcher and the people and social worlds that I was trying to get to know.

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Everyday Acts: Blurring the Individual and the Institution

“Organic Jim” is how he’s known as in Marchmont. Jim doesn’t have a home, as most people would define it, and he spends much of his time roaming around the streets of this area of Edinburgh. I first got to know Jim when I was walking home from a friend’s place. He was sitting next to a dumpster bundled up in blankets, and I asked him what his name was.

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