'The Voice of Kandisosi' Activating community through comics
Environmental comic lays foundation for community engagement
Dinah Awino is an environmental sustainability and green-growth researcher. She founded AkadiEco and Mentorship Ventures, writes children’s books about nature, and wrote “The Voice of Kandisosi and B.Ficho: Accountability and Transparency for Community Development,” a book based on her Master’s research.
After I read her book, we hopped on a call so I could ask questions about the book and its format. Dinah’s book isn’t a monograph or a typical research-project book complete with case studies, data, and a bibliography.
It’s a comic.
While Dinah’s book looks and reads like a comic, her informed research process is present throughout the story. One example of this is a two-page spread representing her effort to reach out to individuals and groups. Dinah shared interesting insight into the outreach activities that added depth to her research.
If you read Dinah’s book, you will soon notice words in Swahili you might be tempted to look up. I asked her about them. Here is what I learned.
Yes, science can be dry, and environmental topics may not be for everyone. Stories, though, are something people can relate to. Teachers, storytellers, writers, neuroscientists, and others know this, which is why we can find examples of TV shows and movies with sustainability themes in industry publications and read about climate storytelling in academic books. Comic books and graphic novels like Dinah’s “Voice of Kandisosi” are creative and accessible additions to a growing body of work about the natural world and our relationship with it.
Learn more about Dinah’s books and ongoing projects on AkadiEco’s Substack page.
You Might Also Like
A conversation I had with Dinah when she was on the podcast. We talked about Pendo Mazingira, her environmental education program for children. You can listen to our conversation and click on links of Dinah's published research here.
