Slowing Down and Taking Time: A Proposal for Integrating Care Ethics into Visual Storytelling Research and Practice

This forum contribution discusses an arts-based research project that reconfigures survivor testimony within a relational ethics framework. Highlighting the creative partnership between Utrecht-based comics artist Tobi Dahmen and his research collaborator Akram, a young man who survived the Syrian prison system, the author proposes to employ comic drawing as an inquiry-based tool and caring practice during collaborative life writing sessions. A commitment to relational storytelling—honouring relationships that are based on mutual trust and shared authority—also fosters a practice of mindful, reflective slow scholarship. Taking time is thus a critical pillar of collaborative storytelling work for the survivors and the artists, as well as all members on the research team, as they mutually negotiate the flow, pace, and rhythm of co-narration.