Health, Zines & Graphic Medicine

Welcome! This guide is focused on the intersection of self-representation and health through the wonderful mediums of zines and graphic medicine.  Library guides are created to help learners of all levels access library resources that will help them conduct effective research in their disciplines. You will find research tips, contextual information, and resources of various kinds depending on the type of guide you are looking at. To see a full list of Baylor's Library Guides organized by subject, click here. To return to the Baylor Library's homepage, click here. 

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From word-of-mouth, to graphic art, to literary narratives, the ways that people share health-related knowledge are diverse, personal, and highly creative. Zines and graphic medicine are examples of mediums that can help us explore the patient's perspective in the medical encounter. Additionally, many graphic medicine sources help to illustrate the practitioner's perspective in an artistic and emotionally vulnerable way. 

Zines and graphic medicine can also help us to think about authorial authority. Certain voices are privileged over others in the information that we seek as authoritative. Of course, it is vitally important to read studies conducted by clinical experts when seeking reputable information for our research. However, it is always important to consider whose perspectives are being obscured when we do research. Different resources hold different types of information, and that information can be incredibly valuable. The knowledge ecosystem holds many voices. 

For example, what might you learn from: 

• A cancer patient who created a zine about her experience undergoing chemotherapy? 
• An individual with Type-1 Diabetes who created a graphic novel about his lived experiences? 
• A pregnant mother who wrote a zine about her experiences on public transportation in a busy city? 

As a result of working through this guide, you should be able to: 

• Identify digital and physical zine and graphic medicine resources
• Explain what zines and graphic medicine have to do with health 
• Create your own zine with Baylor resources 

This guide is geared towards faculty and students in the health sciences. Anyone interested in learning about patient and practitioner perspectives within creative literary mediums will benefit from this guide.

In this guide, you will find information about:      

• What zines are and how they connect to health
• What graphic medicine is
• How to make your own zine 
• Where to find these types of texts both online and in physical locations