On the Use of Encapsulation, Parity, and Visual Storytelling in Graphic Medicine

Abstract

Graphic medicine represents a juncture between the humanities and health communication which has received sparse exploration over the past few years. The subfield is characterized as “the intersection of the medium of comics and the discourse of healthcare” (Czerwiec et al. 2015: 1) and it leverages the relationships between different forms of discourse to engage in visual storytelling. Graphic medicine combines the features of pathography, the autobiographical documentation of one’s experiences dealing with an illness, and narrative medicine, the practice of efficient doctor-patient engagement during clinical encounters where the doctor attempts to gain insight into a patient’s experiences by listening to “the narratives of the patient, [and] grasp[ing] and honor[ing] their meanings” (Charon 2001: 1897). Within many contexts graphic medicine has been used to communicate stories about the imperatives and outcomes associated with health-related events but there have been few attempts to explore how graphic medicine can implement effective visual storytelling. This chapter examines how decisions about encapsulation (i.e. the mechanism through which information is transformed into a specific form of discourse) are informed and how visual and text-based forms of discourse interact and achieve parity within narratives (i.e. the equivalent and meaningful contribution that multiple discourse units jointly make towards the advancement of a story). The chapter also discusses how visual storytelling can enhance one’s comprehension of small stories produced on social media platforms.KeywordsCognitive loadEncapsulationMental modelNarrative structureParitySmall storiesVisual storytellingWeb story