Human-Nonhuman Encounters in Psychiatric Care: Crossroads Between Sensory and Institutional Ethnography

In this ethnographic study, I examine the intersections between human and nonhuman dimensions of care within psychiatric clinics in Switzerland. The research question was how institutional ethnography can help us understand the "hospital multiple"—a site where human and nonhuman elements converge in experiences of illness, care, and violence. Through a non-idealizing approach to caring encounters, I foreground the largely invisible experiences and marginalized perspectives within institutionalized care. Drawing on vignettes from the field, I explore insights and methodological approaches to tracing the ambivalences of care through sensory and nonhuman dimensions. I argue that sensory ethnography—specifically a focus on experiential atmospheres and collaboratively documented moving interviews—provides valuable tools for this endeavor. Institutional ethnographies of the hospital multiple open creative pathways to analyze both interlocutors' embodied knowledge and the broader power structures underpinning institutions.