Seeing Stories, Sentiments, and Emotions – Sentiment Analysis in Narrative/Graphic Medicine

This semester, I created a digital humanities project for Professor Phil Sandick’s Digital Humanities and Rhetoric: Theory, Method, Practice course, where I conducted sentiment analysis and created a website. My website shares my experience conducting sentiment analysis on cancer narratives using ATLAS.ti, with my bold wish to deepen understanding of narrative/graphic medicine and strengthen interpersonal communication on patients’ emotional states. I want to open up an inclusive dialogue, bringing together illness narratives in literary works and real-life experiences, offering a platform where patients, caregivers, and others can connect through understanding and empathy. I am especially proud of this project because I actively used the library resource ISIDORE for many weeks, received fruitful assistance from technician Abby Scheetz, gained insights from interviewing a physician and gathering feedback from peers, all of which motivated me to put my heart into this project. I learned that facilitating emotional dialogues between patients and caretakers is important to strengthen care relationships and support patients in moving forward by validating their emotions.