PROJECTS
ETHNOMAD is built on long-term, place-based ethnographic fieldwork. Before writing, filming, or publishing, we spend time in the field listening, observing, and working alongside communities whose lives are shaped by land, environment, displacement, and tradition. Our work is grounded in presence. We do not extract stories. We build relationships, return when possible, and document only what has been earned through trust.
How we work
ETHNOMAD fieldwork follows a consistent approach, adapted to local context:
-
Long-term engagement rather than rapid assessment
-
Listening before interpretation
-
Community consent and collaboration at every stage
-
Respect for cultural authority, knowledge systems, and limits
-
Careful documentation that avoids harm, simplification, or spectacle
Fieldwork may involve living within communities, working through local partners, or returning repeatedly over years to understand change as it unfolds.
Where we work
ETHNOMAD’s fieldwork spans Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe, and the Pacific, with long-term engagements in regions affected by conflict, environmental stress, and cultural transition. Our work is shaped by decades of experience in humanitarian response, conservation contexts, and ethnographic research.
Each project is grounded in its own geography, history, and constraints. There is no template.
Field-based ethnographic work to understand, document, and support living cultures.
Traditional Knowledge Systems:
Learn From Tribal, Traditional and Indigenous Communities
This is a long-term ethnographic project working across tribal regions of South and South East Asia to document how traditional knowledge systems shape relationships with land, resources, education, and community life. Through sustained fieldwork, ETHNOMAD records not only the pressures these communities face from conservation policy, development, and displacement, but also the losses incurred when their knowledge is ignored. These systems hold practical insight into sustainability, restraint, social cohesion, and the human relationship with nature. As they erode, so too does a body of knowledge that modern systems have failed to replace.
Origins of Oil Painting:
From the Cave to the Canvas
This project traces the overlooked history of oil-based painting from its earliest known uses in Central and South Asia through its movement along ancient trade routes into the Islamic world and eventually Europe. Grounded in field research, material analysis, and interviews with the last remaining practitioners of endangered oil-based painting traditions, the project challenges the dominant Eurocentric art history narrative. It documents techniques, materials, and cultural contexts that reveal oil painting not as a single invention, but as a cumulative body of knowledge shaped by migration, exchange, and continuity. As these practices disappear, so too does evidence of a shared artistic heritage that reshapes how global art history is understood.
The River Transect:
People, Culture, and Climate from the Himalayas to the Bay of Bengal
This long-term field expedition follows major river systems from the foothills of the Himalayas through Assam and into Bangladesh, ending at the Bay of Bengal. Moving with the rivers, ETHNOMAD documents the lives of river-dependent communities, including tribes, fishing peoples, boat dwellers, and floodplain farmers whose cultures are shaped by seasonal movement, water, and uncertainty. The project examines how climate change, upstream interventions, borders, and development policies alter livelihoods, settlement patterns, and cultural continuity. By treating rivers as living systems rather than physical features, the expedition reveals how environmental change is experienced at a human scale over time.
Mokhtarzadeh Caravanserai:
Rebuilding women's heritage and trade in Herat, Afghanistan
This project centres on the restoration and rehabilitation of the Mokhtarzadeh Caravanserai in Herat, reclaiming a historic space of exchange as a contemporary centre for women’s economic and cultural life. Grounded in local partnership, the work supports women artisans and traders seeking to re-enter networks of trade that once sustained the city. The caravanserai is envisioned not as a museum, but as a working place where craft, commerce, and knowledge circulate again. By restoring both structure and purpose, the project links heritage conservation to livelihoods, dignity, and continuity in a context where women’s access to public and economic space has been sharply constrained.
Informal Settlements:
Documenting Life on the periphery Society
This project documents everyday life inside informal settlements in Dhaka and Karachi, focusing on communities that exist outside formal recognition yet underpin urban economies. Through sustained ethnographic presence, ETHNOMAD examines how households navigate insecurity, undocumented status, climate pressure, and displacement, while maintaining social networks, livelihoods, and systems of mutual support. The project addresses issues including child and forced marriage, labour precarity, environmental risk, and access to education and services. Rather than portraying these settlements as failures, the work shows how they function, contribute, and endure, arguing for recognition grounded in evidence rather than neglect or erasure.
