Creative Ethnography: Documenting Everyday Life Through Notes, Sketches, Photography, and Sound
A course by Emiko Stock , Multimodal Anthropologist and Creative Ethnographer
Joined July 2025
Explore creative ethnography by blending writing, drawing, photography, and sound to document everyday life in engaging ways
Joined July 2025
Embark on a journey through creative ethnography, where everyday moments transform into engaging narratives. Dive into anthropology's art of curiosity, blending writing, drawing, photography, and sound to capture life's nuances. Learn to observe with intention, turning overlooked details into stories that connect and inspire. This course invites you to create a unique multimodal journal, weaving together text, images, and audio to document your world with imagination and care.
Uncover the power of co-creation, embracing the voices and stories of those around you. Explore ethical sharing and community-driven storytelling, ensuring your work resonates with respect and authenticity. Whether you're exploring your neighborhood or venturing abroad, this course offers a fresh lens to see and document the world. By the end, you'll have a personal artifact that captures presence and human connection, enriching your understanding of the stories waiting to be told.
What will you learn in this online course?
24 lessons & 18 downloads
- 23 students
- 24 lessons (5h 27m)
- 18 additional resources (4 files)
- Online and at your own pace
- Available on the app
- Audio: English, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese
- Romanian · Indonesian · English · Portuguese · German · Spanish · Italian
- Level: Beginner
- Unlimited access forever
What is this course's project?
Create a personal ethnographic notebook by weaving together sketches, photos, texts, and sounds. Transform everyday observations into a multimodal journal that captures human connection, presence, and imagination, documenting small stories and interactions with care and creativity.
Who is this online course for?
This course is ideal for curious individuals passionate about documenting everyday life creatively. Whether exploring familiar surroundings or far-off places, it's perfect for travelers, community observers, amateur historians, urban sketchers, and street photographers seeking deeper human connections and fresh storytelling methods.
Requirements and materials
No extensive prior knowledge is required. Basic necessities include a notebook, writing materials, and a device to capture photos and sound. A curious mindset and willingness to engage with your surroundings creatively will enhance your experience.
Emiko Stock
A course by Emiko Stock
Emiko Stock is a multimodal anthropologist and creative ethnographer based between Cairo and Phnom Penh. Her work blends feminist documentary, analog photography, soundscaping, writing, and drawing to explore how art and anthropology can inspire wonder, dialogue, and new ways of connecting with everyday life.
Working across disciplines and cultures, Emiko develops playful and collaborative methods that combine observation, storytelling, and experimentation. Through layering images, sounds, sketches, and personal reflections, she invites communities into processes of shared curiosity and creative exchange.
She has taught at Cornell University, Hamilton College, and The American University in Cairo, and co-founded CoMMPCT. Her short films have screened internationally, and she regularly collaborates as a curator, juror, writer, and sound artist on projects focused on multimodal storytelling and sensory experiences.
Through her newsletter The Sketchy Anthropologist, Emiko shares her creative process at the intersection of anthropology and sketchnoting, encouraging others to embrace imperfect drawing, attentive listening, and artistic exploration as tools for research, reflection, and connection.
Content
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U1
Introduction
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About Me
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Influences
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U2
Anthropological Attitude: Learning and Being With
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Multimodal Anthropology and Creative Ethnography
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Getting Started: Being Human
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Joining a Community With Vulnerability and Reciprocity
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Choosing Your Modalities Intuitively
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U3
From Field to Page: Visual and Poetic Practices
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Photographs as Story Fragments
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Drawing the Unrepresentable
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Writing the Unspeakable
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Soundscapes and Deep Listening
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U4
Constructing Your Journal
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Selecting What You Want to Document
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Writing: From Research Notes to Poetry 1
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Writing: From Research Notes to Poetry 2
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Writing: From Research Notes to Poetry 3
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Photography: Still Images As Evocative Moments
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Drawing: Sketchnotes for Those Who Cannot Draw 1
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Drawing: Sketchnotes for Those Who Cannot Draw 2
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Deep Listening Through Soundwork
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Assembling Your Journal With Intentionality 1
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Assembling Your Journal With Intentionality 2
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U5
Sharing Outcomes: Ethics, Audiences, and Community
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Who is the Journal For?
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Community-Driven Sharing & Participating
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Opening Yourself Up to Be Taught a Lesson
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Platforms and Possibilities
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FP
Final project
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How to Become a Creative Ethnographer: Documenting the World Through Fieldnotes, Sketches, and Sound
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What to expect from a Domestika course
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Learn at your own pace
Enjoy learning from home without a set schedule and with an easy-to-follow method. You set your own pace.
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Learn from the best professionals
Learn valuable methods and techniques explained by top experts in the creative sector.
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Meet expert teachers
Each expert teaches what they do best, with clear guidelines, true passion, and professional insight in every lesson.
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Certificates
PlusIf you're a Plus member, get a custom certificate signed by your teacher for every course. Share it on your portfolio, social media, or wherever you like.
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Get front-row seats
Videos of the highest quality, so you don't miss a single detail. With unlimited access, you can watch them as many times as you need to perfect your technique.
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Share knowledge and ideas
Ask questions, request feedback, or offer solutions. Share your learning experience with other students in the community who are as passionate about creativity as you are.
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Connect with a global creative community
The community is home to millions of people from around the world who are curious and passionate about exploring and expressing their creativity.
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Watch professionally produced courses
Domestika curates its teacher roster and produces every course in-house to ensure a high-quality online learning experience.
FAQs
Domestika courses are online classes that allow you to learn new skills and create incredible projects. All our courses include the opportunity to share your work with other students and/or teachers, creating an active learning community. We offer different formats:
Original Courses: Complete classes that combine videos, texts, and educational materials to complete a specific project from start to finish.
Basics Courses: Specialized training where you master specific software tools step by step.
Specialization Courses: Learning paths with various expert teachers on the same topic, perfect for becoming a specialist by learning from different approaches.
Guided Courses: Practical experiences ideal for directly acquiring specific skills.
Intensive Courses (Deep Dives): New creative processes based on artificial intelligence tools in an accessible format for in-depth and dynamic understanding.
All courses are 100% online, so once they're published, courses start and finish whenever you want. You set the pace of the class. You can go back to review what interests you most and skip what you already know, ask questions, answer questions, share your projects, and more.
The courses are divided into different units. Each one includes lessons, informational text, tasks, and practice exercises to help you carry out your project step by step, with additional complementary resources and downloads. You'll also have access to an exclusive forum where you can interact with the teacher and with other students, as well as share your work and your course project, creating a community around the course.
You can redeem the course you received by accessing the redeeming page and entering your gift code.
