Animals, Society and Culture - University of Warwick
Department of Sociology
2012-13
Animals, Society and Culture
SO334
Convenor: Nickie Charles
Room number: Ramphal 3.32
Email: nickie.charles@warwick.ac.uk
Office hours: Thursday 12.00-1.00
Lecture: Wednesdays at 11.00 in R1.03
Seminars: Thursdays at 10.00 in S2.84
Thursdays at 11.00 in H2.03
Animals, Society and Culture SO334
This module will:
(1) explore the significance of animals to society and culture - both historically and contemporaneously - and how changing relations between society and nature, human and animal have been conceptualised sociologically;
(2) explore the philosophical and moral underpinnings of social and cultural attitudes and practices towards animals and their implications for animal welfare and animal rights;
(3) investigate how social movements concerned with animals have affected both the way we 'see' animals and the way they are treated by humans;
(4) explore the ways in which society, social action, agency and notions of the self have been understood and ask whether they can be mobilised to analyse the place(s) of animals in society and culture;
(5) investigate the implications for sociology of post-humanist critiques of anthropocentric understandings of the world.
This module explores the place of animals in society and culture and how this varies cross-culturally and over time. It will address the importance of animals to the organisation and development of society, exploring notions of 'co-evolution', 'domestication' and 'human exceptionalism' and the philosophical and moral underpinnings of human-animal relations. Animal studies, as a newly-emerging interdisciplinary area of study, draws on different theoretical traditions to make sense of its subject matter. Sociology has been particularly slow to take up the challenge of studying animals and the module will investigate why this should be so and whether studying animals poses a particular problem for sociology as a discipline. It will consider different aspects of human-animal relations and how taking animals into consideration might challenge our understandings of society.
Learning outcomes
By the end of the module you should be able to:
• Explain how relations between humans and animals have changed over time
• Evaluate different ways of theorising human-animal relations
• Critically assess the material and cultural significance of animals in different types of society
• Review the portrayal of animals in art, literature and film
• Research, using a range of methods, the key social, political and ethical issues influencing the position of animals in contemporary societies
Method of Assessment: the module may be assessed by 100% essay, or 100% examination, or 50% assessed / 50% examined.
Key Readings
Key readings are identified for each week and need to be read before the relevant seminar.. You will not be expected to read all the key readings for every topic; advice on this will be provided in seminars. All the key readings are available electronically as well as in hard copy in the Library. There are three types of electronic resources that are accessed via the Library: scanned in extracts; e-journal articles and e-books. Other resources can be accessed directly from the internet using the link provided.
You will need Adobe Reader to access resources electronically, and you can download it free if you don’t already have it on your machine:
Scanned in Extracts
These are chapters of books available via the Library’s dedicated site for e-resources for this module:
You will need to ensure that you are registered for the module via eMR in order to have access, and you must also sign-in to the intranet site (see top menu bar, right-hand-side). Then you simply look for the reference you require (they are arranged alphabetically by author’s surname). It will open as a pdf and the chapter follows on from the Copyright Notice. You can read it on screen but you will also need to print a copy to bring to the class and you might also want to save a copy (for your own personal use only).
E-journal articles
The link provided will take you to the Library Catalogue site for that e-journal. You will then need to select a database to access it through, checking that it has the relevant year. You will need to be logged in and then the database archive will open and you need to select the Vol. and/or No. of the journal and page down for the article. You can click to open the pdf, which may take a few seconds, but the interface and reliability does vary. It is recommended instead to save the pdf to your hard drive or data-stick (right click, select ‘save target as’, then choose a directory and give the file a meaningful name). You can then open the saved document, print it, search it etc.
E-books
The link provided after the reference in the reading list will take you to the Library Catalogue site for that e-book. If you are on campus you click for access. If you are off-campus click ‘Log In’ (top left of the page), then ‘Athens Users, log in here’ (bottom of screen at the left) and you should be prompted for your normal Warwick login. Once you have opened the book you need to search for the relevant chapter. You can read this on-screen but if possible you must also print a copy to bring to the class. To print a Netbook make sure you have searched for the chapter using the box at the left-hand side, expanding sections as necessary to find it. Then select Print from the top banner and choose the option ‘Pages starting with the current page’, inserting the number of pages in the box and clicking OK (where possible, the number of pages is provided in square brackets as part of the reference in this reading list). This will prompt the creation of an Adobe document so click to Run and the chapter will then come up on your screen with an option to print. You can also save a copy using File, Save a Copy. You will notice that under the terms of University Access to Netbooks only a limited number of pages can be printed each hour, so you may need to access the e-book again later if other library users have used the quota. If you are unable to print the reference you must ensure that you have extra detailed notes to bring to the seminar.
Additional Readings
All the additional readings listed below for each topic are available in the library and should be used when you are doing more in-depth work, eg. for a seminar presentation, class essay, assessed essay or revision for exams.
Note: The nature of this course means that students will have different opinions, sometimes quite passionate, about the subject matter. While you are encouraged to speak your mind freely in class discussions, you will also be expected to express yourself courteously, showing respect for the opinions and sensibilities of others. In addition, some of the material that we will discuss and read about may be challenging or hard to hear and watch.
Animals, Society and Culture
SO334
TERM 1
Lecture outline
(1) Introduction to animal studies and to the module
(2) What is an animal?
(3) The philosopher's dog and Schrodinger's cat – philosophy, science and religion
Animals and social change
(4) Co-evolution and social change - domestication
(5) Animals in industrial society – from beasts of burden to fashion accessories
(6) Reading week
Animals and culture
(7) Kinship with animals
(8) Cultures of meat eating and farm animals
(9) Cultures of masculinity
(10) Animals and cultural identity
TERM 2
Representing animals
(11 The call of the wild - zoos and safaris
(12) Animals as spectacle – circuses, wildlife programmes
(13) Anthropomorphism and animal tales
(14) Representing animals - art, film and media
Challenging speciesism
(15) Social movements, animal welfare and animal rights
(16) Reading week
(17) Species, social construction and power – animal ethics
(18) Embodiment - the elephant and the ant – science studies – current research on animal intelligence and emotions
(19) Post-humanism and the animal challenge to sociology – animals and agency, selfhood, personhood
(20) Understanding the social and cultural positioning of animals - systems or networks? – drawing the course together
TERM 3
(21) Revision session
(22) Revision session
Indicative reading
The following will give you a good overview of the key topics covered on this course Berger, J (2009) Why look at animals? Penguin Books
Birke, L (1994) Feminism, animals and science, Open University Press
Carter, B and Charles, N (2011) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Palgrave
Cudworth, E (2011) Social Lives with Other Animals, Palgrave
Ellis, S (2010) Wolf within, London: Harper
Franklin, A (1999) Animals and Modern Cultures: A Sociology of Human-Animal Relations in Modernity, London: Sage Publications
Haraway, D (2008) When Species Meet, University of Minnesota
Peggs, K (2012) Animals and sociology, Palgrave Macmillan
Rowlands, M (2008) The Philosopher and the Wolf, London: Granta
There are two journals which contain useful articles:
Society and Animals
Anthrozoos
Course texts
Many of the key readings on this module come from the following readers and textbooks which you are strongly advised to purchase:
• Arluke, A and Sanders, C (eds) (2009) Between the species: a reader in Human-Animal relationships, Boston, Mass: Pearson Education
• Cudworth, E (2011) Social Lives with Other Animals, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan
• Flynn, C P (ed) (2008) Social creatures: a human and animal studies reader, New York Lantern Books
• Gross, A and Vallely (eds) (2012) Animals and the human imagination: a companion to animal studies, Colombia University Press
• Hurn, S (2012) Humans and other animals, London: Pluto Press
• Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) (2007) The animals reader: the essential classic and contemporary writings, Oxford: Berg
• Peggs, K (2012) Animals and sociology, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan
There is also a series of books which contains many pieces which are useful for the module and which you should familiarise yourself with. These books are available from the library:
Kalof, L and Resl, B (eds) (2007) A cultural history of animals: volumes 1-6, Oxford: Berg
Week 1
Introduction to animal studies and to the module
This lecture introduces the interdisciplinary field o animal studies and the module. It raises the question of why there is an increasing interest in exploring human-other animal relations within sociology..
Key reading
Ellis, S (2010) Wolf within, London: Harper
Rowlands, M (2008) The Philosopher and the Wolf, London: Granta
Week 2
What is an animal?
This lecture asks what is an animal? It begins to explore such questions as: How do we define animals, how do such definitions relate to defining what is human, and the way definitions of human and animal, society and nature differ cross culturally.
Key reading
Ingold, T (2012) ‘Hunting and gathering as ways of perceiving the environment’ in A Gross and A Vallely (eds) Animals and the human imagination, New York: Columbia University Press, pp.31-54
Midgley, M (1988) ‘Beasts, brutes and monsters’ in T Ingold (ed.) (1988). What is an Animal? London: Unwin Hyman, pp.35-46.
Berger, J (2009) Why look at animals, London: Penguin Books, pp. 12-37 and in L Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 5, 26
Seminar questions
1. What is an animal?
2. How does Ingold distinguish between hunter-gatherer and Western ontologies?
3. What does Midgley mean by the species barrier?
4. How do definitions of human and animal relate to each other? How can it be argued that animals make us human?
Additional reading
Arluke, A. and Sanders, C. R. (1996) Regarding Animals, Philadelphia: Temple University Press. (chapter 1)
Bekoff, M (2007) Encyclopedia of human-animal relationships: a global exploration of our connections with animals, London: Greenwood Press
Blake, C, Molloy, C and Shakespeare, S (eds) (2012) Beyond human: from animality to transhumanism, London: Continuum
Caras, R A (1996) A perfect harmony: the intertwining lives of animals and humans throughout history, New York: Simon and Schuster
Corbey, R (2005) The metaphysics of apes: negotiating the animal-human boundary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Creager, A N H and Jordan, W C (eds) (2002) The animal/human boundary: historical perspectives, Rochester: University of Rochester Press
Descola, P and Palsson, G (eds) (1996) Nature and Society: anthropological perspectives, London: Routledge
Ellis, S (2010) Wolf within, London: Harper
Fudge, E (2002) Animals, London: Reaktion
Freeman, C, Leane, E and Watt, Y (2011) Considering animals: contemporary studies in human-animal relations, London: Ashgate
Haraway, D (2003) The Companion Species Manifesto, Prickily Paradigm Press
Haraway, D (2008) When species meet, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
Hearne, V (2007) Adam’s task, New York: Skyhorse Publishing
Herzog, H (2010) Some we love, some we hate, some we eat, Harper-Collins
Hobson-West, P. (2007). Beasts and Boundaries: An introduction to animals in sociology, science and society. Qualitative Sociology Review, 3, 2-41.
Ingold, T (1986) The appropriation of nature: essays on human ecology and social relations, Manchester: Manchester University Press
Ingold, T (ed) (1988) What is an animal? London: Unwin Hyman
Ingold, T (1983) The Architect and the Bee: Reflections on the Work of Animals and Men Author(s): Man, New Series, Vol. 18, No. 1, pp. 1-20
Lynch, M. and Collins, H.M. (1998) ‘Introduction: humans, animals, machines’, Science, Technology and Human Values, 23, 371-383.
Midgley, M (1989) Beast and Man: The Roots of Human Nature London: Methuen
Midgley, M (1983) Animals and why they matter, Athens: University of Georgia Press
Mack, A (ed) (1999) Humans and other animals, Columbus: Ohio State University Press
Manning, A and Serpell, J. (1994) Animals and Human Society. London:Routledge.
Noske, B (1989) Humans and Other animals: beyond the boundaries of anthropology, London: Pluto Press
Pluskowski, A (ed) (2007) Breaking and shaping beastly bodies: animals as material culture in the middle ages, Oxford: Oxbow Books
Preece, R (2005) Brute Souls, Happy Beasts and Evolution: The Historical Status of Animals, UBC Press: Vancouver
Rowlands, M (2008) The Philosopher and the Wolf, London: Granta
Shapiro, K (2002) ‘Editor’s introduction: the state of human-animal studies: solid at the margin!’ Society and Animals, 10 (4): 331-337
Sheehan, J.J. and Sosna, M. (eds) (1991) The Boundaries of Humanity: Humans, Animals, Machines, Berkeley: University of California Press.
Shepard, P. (1997) The Others: how animals made us human, Island Press.
Sorenson, J (2006) Ape, Reaktion
Thomas, K. (1984). Man and the natural world, Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Williams, E and DeMello, M (2007) Why animals matter, Amherst, N Y: Prometheus Books
Week 3
The philosopher's dog and Schrodinger's cat
In this lecture we shall begin to explore how definitions of animals and the relation between humans and other animals have developed and changed in philosophy, science and religion. Questions such as whether animals have souls, language, intelligence, emotions and how human exceptionalism has been legitimated will be investigated. Moral questions of how animals should be treated, do they feel pain, do they suffer will be approached here but followed up in more detail later in the course.
Key reading
Herzog, H (2009) ‘Human morality and animal research’ in A Arluke and C Sanders (eds) Between the Species, Unit 2, Part 5, 15
Nussbaum, M (2007) ‘The moral status of animals’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 1, 6
Serpell, J (1986) In the company of animals, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, Chapter 9
OR
Thomas, K. (1984). Man and the Natural World, Harmondsworth: Penguin, Chapter 1.
Seminar questions
1. What are the problems with a Utilitarian approach to the treatment of animals? Should justice focus on the individual or the species?
2. What moral dilemmas does Herzog identify in the social treatment of animals?
3. What is human exceptionalism? Where does it originate? Is it a universal belief? What legitimates it? How does it relate to the way animals are treated in contemporary Western societies?
Additional Reading
Philosophy
Aaltola, E (2012) Animal suffering: philosophy and culture, Palgrave Macmillan
Adams, C J (1993) Neither man nor beast: feminism and the defense of animals, New York: Continuum
Baron, D (2004) The beast in the garden: a modern parable of man and nature, New York: W W Norton
Bat-Ami, B O and Ferguson, A (eds) (1998) Daring to be good: essays in feminist ethico-politics, New York: Routledge
Carruthers, P (1992) The animals issue: moral theory in practice, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Calarco, M and Atterton, P (eds) (2004) Animal philosophy: ethics and identity, London: Continuum
Calarco, M (2007) Zoogeographies: the question of the animal from Heidegger to Derrida, NYC: Columbia University Press
Coetzee, J M (2001) The Lives of Animals, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
Fudge, Erica, Brutal Reasoning: Animals, Rationality, and Humanity in Early Modern England (Cornell, 2006) (animal/human distinctions historically prior to Descartes, relevant to how humans/animals are distinguished)
Gaita, R (2002) The philosopher’s dog, London: Routledge
Hearne, V (2007) Adam’s task, New York: Skyhorse Publishing
Midgley, M (1983) Animals and why they matter, Athens: University of Georgia Press
Midgley, M. (1979) Man and Beast, Hassocks: Harvester
Noske, B. (1989) Humans and Other Animals, London: Pluto Press
Rowlands, M (2002) Animals like us, London: Verso
Rowlands, M (2008) The philosopher and the wolf, London: Granta
Sorabji, R (1993) Animal minds and human morals, London: Duckworth
Science
Birke, L (1994) Feminism, Animals, and Science the naming of the shrew,
Buckingham: Open University Press
Fox-Keller, E and and Longino, H (eds) (1996) Feminism and Science, New York: Oxford University Press
Franklin, S (2007) Dolly mixtures: the remaking of genealogy, Durham, NC: Duke University Press
Gowaty, P A (ed) (1997) Feminism and evolutionary biology: boundaries, intersections, and frontiers, New York: Chapman and Hall
Haraway, D (1989) Primate Visions: gender, race and nature in the world of modern science, New York: Routledge
Harré, R (2009) Pavlov’s Dog and Schrödinger’s Cat, OUP
Hicks, E.K. (ed.) (1992) Science and the human-animal relationship, Amsterdam: SISWO.
Langley, G (ed) (1989) Animal experimentation: the consensus changes, London: Macmillan
Regan, T (ed) (1986) Animal sacrifices: religious perspectives on the use of animals in science, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Waldau, P and Patton, K (2006) A communion of subjects: animals in religion, science and ethics, New York: Columbia University Press
Westcoat, J L Jnr (1998) ‘The “right of thirst” for animals in Islamic law: a comparative approach’ in J Wolch and J Emel (eds) Animal Geographies, London: Verso, pp. 259-279
Religion
Bataille, G (1992) Theory of religion, New York: Zone Books
Brown, J E (1997) Animals of the soul: sacred animals of the Oglala Sioux, Rockposrt, Mass: Element
Folz, R (2006) Animals in Islamic Tradition and Muslim Cultures, Oxford: Oneworld
Hobgood-Oster, L (2008) Holy dogs and asses: animals in the Christian tradition, Urbana: University of Illinois Press
Kalechofsky, R (ed) (1992) Judaism and Animal rights: classical and contemporary responses, Marblehead, Mass: Micah Publications
Linzey, A (1995) Animal theology, Urbana: University of Illinois Press
Morris, B (2000) Animals and ancestors: an ethnography, New York: Berg
Regan, T (ed) (1986) Animal sacrifices: religious perspectives on the use of animals in science, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Regenstein, L (1991) Replenish the earth: a history of organised religion’s treatment of animals, London SCM Press
Waldau, P (2002) Spectres of speciesism: Bhuddist and Christian views of animals, New York: Oxford Univeristy Press
Webb, S H (1997) On God and Dogs: a Christian theology of compassion for animals, New York: Oxford University Press
Animals in different types of society
Week 4
Co-evolution or domestication?
Here the focus is on processes of domestication, how they are understood, and how animals have co-shaped human societies. We begin to investigate how human-animal relations have changed along with changes in the social organisation of production. We also reflect on whether domestication is an ongoing process.
Key reading
Clutton-Brock, J (2007) ‘How domestic animals have shaped the development of human societies’ in L Kalof (ed) A cultural history of animals in antiquity, Oxford: Berg, Chapter 3, pp.71-96
Haraway, D (2007) ‘Cyborgs to companion species: reconfiguring kinship in technoscience’ (up to page 367 only) in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 6, 35.
Hurn, S (2012) Humans and other animals, Chapter 5
Ingold, T (1994) ‘From trust to domination’: an alternative history of human-animal relations’ in A Manning and J Serpell (eds) Animals and human society: changing perspective, London: Routledge, pp.1-22
Seminar questions
1. What is meant by domestication? What are the different ways in which ‘domestication’ is theorised? What evidence is used to support these different theories?
2. How have animals shaped the societies of which they are part?
3. What changes in forms of social organisation are associated with domestication?
4. How does Ingold theorise the shift from hunter-gatherer to pastoral societies?
Additional reading
Brown, K (2010) Healing the Herds: Disease, Livestock Economies, and the Globalization of Veterinary Medicine, Ohio University Press
Budiansky, S (2002) The truth about dogs, London: Phoenix
Budiansky, S (1992) The covenant of the wild: why animals chose domestication, New Haven: Yale University Press
Bulliet, R W (2005) Hunters, Herders, and Hamburgers: The Past and Future of Human-Animal Relationships, New York: Columbia University Press
Carlson, L W (2001) Cattle: an informal social history, Chicago: Ivan R Dee
Cassidy, R and Mullin, M (eds) (2007) Where the wild things are now: domestication reconsidered, New York: Berg
Clutton-Brocke, J (ed) (1989) The walking larder: patterns of domestication, pastoralism and predation, London: Unwin Hyman
Clutton-Brocke, J (2012) Animals as domesticates, Michigan State Press
Clutton-Brocke, J (1981) Domesticated animals from early times, Austin: University of Texas Press
Ellen, R and Fukui, K (eds) (1996) Redefining nature: ecology, culture and domestication, London: Berg
Ingold, T (1988) Hunters, pastoralists, and ranchers: reindeer economies and their transformations, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Kalof, L (2007) Looking at Animals in Human History, London: Reaktion Books, (chapters 1, 2 and 3).
Manning, A and Serpell, J (eds) (1994) Animals and human society: changing perpectives, London: Routledge
Rowley-Conwy, P (ed) (2000) Animal bones, human societies, Oxford: Oxbow Books
Russell, E (2011) Evolutionary History: Uniting History and Biology to Understand Life on Earth, Cambridge University Press (co-evolution, humans shaping evolution, domestication)
Schwartz, Marion, A History of Dogs in the Early Americas (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997
Serpell, J (ed) (1995) The domestic dog: its evolution, behaviour, and interactions with people, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Serpell, J (1986) In the company of animals, Oxford: Basil Blackwell
Tester, K. (1991) Animals and Society, London: Routledge
Vigne, J D et al (eds) (2005) New methods and the first steps of animal domestication, London: Oxbow Press
Willis, R (ed) (1994) Signifying animals: human meaning in the natural world, New York: Routledge (anthropology, totemism, symbolism of animals)
Week 5
Industrial society – from beasts of burden to fashion accessories
In this lecture we look at how human-animal relations have changed with the development of industrial societies. We look at the work done by animals prior to the industrial revolution and how animal power (particularly horse power) was rendered redundant by mechanisation. Urbanisation is associated with a reduction in human contact with domesticated animals and a rise in pet keeping. Is it helpful to conceptualise this as a shift from domestic to post-domestic societies?
Key reading
Benton, T (1993) Natural relations: ecology, animal rights and social justice, London: Verso, pp. 60-69
Franklin, A (1999) Animals and modern cultures: a sociology of human-animal relations in modernity, London: Sage, Chapter 3, pp. 34-61
Hurn, S (2012) Humans and other animals, Pluto Press, Chapter 8
Norton Greene, A (2008) Horses at Work: Harnessing Power in Industrial America, Harvard University Press, Chapter 5
Seminar questions
1. How does Franklin theorise changes in human-animal relations in post-modernity? What concepts are central to this theorisation and how does he use them?
2. Is Fordism a useful concept for understanding changes in human-animal relations?
2. Is Benton’s categorisation of the different relations between animals and humans useful? How do his categories relate to Franklin’s analysis?
3. What are the effects of consumerism on pet animals identified by Hurn? How does this square with the increasing emotional importance of animals identified by Franklin?
Additional reading
Allen, B (2004) Pigeon Reaktion
Boddice, R (2009) A History of Attitudes and Behaviours toward Animals in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Britain. Anthropocentrism and the Emergence of Animals, Edwin Mellen Press
Bough, J (2011) Donkey Reaktion
Bulliet, R W (2005) Hunters, Herders, and Hamburgers: The Past and Future of Human-Animal Relationships, New York: Columbia University Press
Brantz, D (ed) (2010) Beastly Natures: Animals, Humans, and the Study of History, Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press
Burt, J (2005) Rat Reaktion
Clutton-Brocke, J (1992) Horse Power: A history of the horse and the donkey in human societes, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press
Cooper, J, (2006) Animals in War, Rearsby
De Stefano, S (2010) Coyote at the Kitchen Door: Living with Wildlife in Suburbia (Harvard, 2010)
Franklin, A (1999) Animals and modern cultures: a sociology of human-animal relations in modernity, London: Sage
Franklin, A. and White, R. (2001). Animals and modernity: changing human–animal relations, 1949–98. Journal of Sociology, 37: 219-238.
Gardiner, J (2006) The Animals’ War: Animals in Wartime from the First World War to the Present Day, London
Manning, A and Serpell, J (eds) (1994) Animals and human society: changing perpectives, London: Routledge
McShane, C and Tarr, J A (2007) The Horse in the City: Living Machines in the Nineteenth Century, Baltimore
Norton Greene, A (2008) Horses at Work: Harnessing Power in Industrial America, Harvard University Press
O’Sullivan, S (2011) Animals, equality and democracy, Palgrave Macmillan
Philo, G and Wilbert, C (eds) (2000) Animal spaces, beastly places: geographies of human-animal relations, London Routledge
Ritvo, H (1987) The animal estate, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press
Sabloff, A (2001) Reordering the natural world: humans and animals in the city, Toronto: University of Toronto Press
Thomas, K. (1984). Man and the Natural World, Harmondsworth: Penguin
Twine, R (2010) Animals as Biotechnology – Ethics, Sustainability and Critical Animal Studies. Earthscan
Van Emden, R, (2010) Tommy’s Ark: Soldiers and their Animals in the Great War London
Walker, B (2005) The lost wolves of Japan, Seattle: University of Washington Press
Week 6: Reading week
Animals and culture
Week 7
Kinship with animals
It is often said that pets are part of the family. In this lecture we shall focus on the past and present of pet keeping, looking at the emotional bonds that exist between pets and people and the implications for animals of being family members. We shall also explore the effects of consumer capitalism on how pet animals are treated.
Key reading
Cudworth, E (2011) Social Lives with Other Animals, Palgrave, Chapter 6
Fox, R (2008) ‘Animal behaviours, post-human lives: everyday negotiations of the animal-human divide in pet-keeping’ in Social & Cultural Geography, 7 (4): 525-537
Ritvo, H (2008) ‘The emergence of modern pet keeping’ in Flynn, C P (ed) Social Creatures, New York: Lantern Books, pp. 96-106
Tuan, Y (2007) ‘Animal pets: cruelty and affection’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 3, 16
Seminar questions
1. What are the functional roles of pets identified by Hurn? How are they reflected in the pieces by Cudworth and Fox?
2. How does Cudworth use the notions of dominance and affection outlined by Tuan to understand human-dog relationships?
3. What are the class dimensions to pet keeping identified by Ritvo?
4. How are pets both and neither animal and human? What is it that makes a family post-human?
Additional reading
Alger, J and Alger, S (2003) Cat culture: the social world of a cat shelter, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Animal Studies Group (2006) Killing Animals, Urbana: University of Illinois Press
Arluke, A and Sanders, C R (1996) Regarding animals, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Arluke, A (2006) Just a dog: understanding animal cruelty and ourselves, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Ascione, F. R., Weber, C. W. And Wood, D. S. (1997) ‘The abuse of animals and domestic violence: A national survey of shelters for women who are battered’ Society and Animals 5(3): 205-218
Ascione, F and Arkow, P (eds) (1999) Child abuse, domestic violence and animal abuse: linking the circles of compassion for prevention and intervention, West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press
Beck, A and Katcher, A H (1996) Between pets and people, West Lafayette, Ind: Purdue University Press
Budiansky, S (2002) The truth about dogs, London: Phoenix
Charles N and Davies CA (2008) ‘My family and other animals: pets as kin’, Sociological Research Online, 13 (5), and in B. Carter and N. Charles (eds) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Palgrave Macmillan
Davis, S and DeMello, M (2003) Stories rabbits tell: a natural and cultural history of a misunderstood creature, New York: Lantern Books
Dekkers, M (1994) Dearest Pet: On bestiality, London: Virago
Francione, G L (1995) Animals, Property, and the Law, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Fudge, E (2008) Pets, Acumen
Grier, K C (2005) Pets in America, Harvest Books
Irvine, L (2004) If you tame me: understanding our connections with animals, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Kete, K (1995) The beast in the boudoir: petkeeping in nineteenth-century Paris, Berkeley: University of California Press
Lawrence, E (1985) Hoofbeats and society, Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press
Lockwood, R and Ascione, F (1998) Cruelty to animals and interpersonal violence, West Lafayette, Ind: Purdue University Press
MacGregor, A ( 2012) Animal Encounters: Human and Animal Interaction in Britain from the Norman Conquest to World War I (Reaktion)
Manning, A and Serpell, J. (1994) Animals and Human Society. London:Routledge
McHugh, S (2004) Dog Reaktion
Podberscek, A L et al (eds) (2005) Companion animals and us: exploring the relationships between people and pets, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Rogers, K M (2006) Cat Reaktion
Sanders, C R (1999) Understanding dogs: living and working with canine companions, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Shaffner, J E (2010) An introduction to animals and the law, Palgrave Macmillan
Serpell, J (1986) In the company of animals, Oxford: Basil Blackwell
Serpell, J (2005) People in disguise: Anthropomorphism and the human-pet relationship’ in L Daston and G Mitman (eds) Thinking with animals: new perspective on anthropomorphism, New York: Columbia University Press
Tipper, B (2011) ‘Pets and personal life’ in V May (ed) Sociology of personal life, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp 85-97
Tipper, B (2011) ‘“A dog who I know quite well”: everyday relationships between children and animals’ in Children’s Geographies, 9 (2): 145-165
Tuan, Yi-Fu (1984) Dominance and affection: the making of pets, New Haven: Yale University Press
Taylor, N. and Signal, T. (2008) ‘Throwing the Baby out with the Bathwater: Towards a Sociology of the Human-Animal Abuse 'Link'?’ in Sociological Research Online 13(1)2
Week 8
Cultures of meat eating and farm animals
In this lecture we look at cultures of meat eating, the variation in which animals are used for food cross culturally, and how cultures of meat eating are gendered. We also look at the ways in which the meat that most of us eat is produced and the implications of factory farming for animal welfare. Should we all become vegetarian in order to reduce the pressure on finite resources like water and land?
Key reading
Adams, C (2008) ‘The sexual politics of meat’ in Flynn, C P (ed) Social Creatures, New York: Lantern Books, pp.245-258 AND in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section, 3, 19
Hurn, S (2012) Humans and other animals, Pluto Press, Chapter 7
Novek, J (2012) Discipline and distancing: confining pigs in the factory farm Gulag’ in Gross, A and Vallely (eds) (2012) Animals and the human imagination, Colombia University Press, pp. 121-151
Mason, J and Finelli, M (2007) ‘Brave new farm?’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section, 3, 18
Nibert, D (2007) The promotion of “meat” and its consequences’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section, 3, 20
This is a useful website: The Vegetarian Society.
It would be worth looking for others.
Seminar questions
1. How are cultures of meat eating gendered?
2. How does Novek use Foucault’s notion of bio-power to throw light on factory farming? What parallels does he draw between the treatment of humans and animals in capitalist systems of production?
3. Why is personhood relevant to who or what we eat?
4. What are industrialized systems of meat production? What are the welfare issues they raise?
5. Is there a moral argument for vegetarianism? What, in Nibert’s view, are the social, political and environmental consequences of industrial scale production of meat?
Additional reading
Adams, C J (2003) The pornography of meat, London: Continuum
Adams, C J (2009) The sexual politics of meat: a feminist-vegetarian critical theory, New York: Continuum
Akhtar, A (2012) Animals and public health, Palgrave Macmillan
Animal Studies Group (2006) Killing Animals, Urbana: Universit of Illinois Press
Buller, H and Morris, C (2003) “Farm animal welfare: a new repertoire of nature-society relations or modernism re-embedded?” Sociologia Ruralis Vol.43, No.3, pp.216-237
Bulliet, R W (2005) Hunters, Herders, and Hamburgers: The Past and Future of Human-Animal Relationships, New York: Columbia University Press
Brown, K (2010) Healing the Herds: Disease, Livestock Economies, and the Globalization of Veterinary Medicine, Ohio University Press
Carlson, L W (2001) Cattle: an informal social history, Chicago: Ivan R Dee
Coe, S (1995) Dead meat, New York: Four Walls Eight Windows
Cudworth, E (2011) Social Lives with Other Animals, Palgrave,
Davis, K (1996) Prisoned chilckens, poisoned eggs: an inside look at the modern poultry industry, Summertown, Tenn: Book Publishing Company
Davis, S and DeMello, M (2003) Stories rabbits tell: a natural and cultural history of a misunderstood creature, New York: Lantern Books
Dawkins, M (1980) Animal suffering: the science of animal welfare, London: Chapman and Hall
Dolins, F L (ed) (1999) Attitudes to animals: views in animal welfare, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Douglas, M. (1966). Purity and Danger, London: Ark.
Eisnitz, G (2007) Slaughterhouse: the shocking story of greed, neglect, and inhumane treatment inside the US meat industry, Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books
Fiddes, N (1991) Meat: a natural symbol, London: Routledge
Grandin, T and Johnson, C (2006) Animals in translation, Bloomsbury
Harrison, R (1964) Animal machines: an expose of “factory farming” and its dangers to the public, London: Vincent Stuart, Ltd
Iacobbo, M. and Moussaieff Masson, J. (2006) Vegetarians and vegans in America today, Praeger Publishers.
Lee, P (ed) (2008) Meat, Modernity and the Rise of the Slaughterhouse, University of New Hampshire Press
Maurer, D. (2002) Vegetarianism: Movement or Moment? Temple University Press
McDonald, B. (2000) Once you know something you can’t not know it: An empirical look at becoming vegan. Society and Animals, 8(1): 1-23
Miele, M (2011) ‘A good kill’ in B. Carter and N. Charles (eds) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan
Mizelle, B (2011) Pig Reaktion
Pachirat, T (2012) Every twelve seconds: industrialized slaughter and the politics of sight, Yale University Press
Peggs, K (2012) Animals and Sociology, Palgrave, Chapter 6
Regan, Tom (1980) ‘Utilitarianism, Vegetarianism, and Animal Rights’ in Philosophy and Public Affairs, 9 (4): 305-324.
Sapontsis, S F (ed) (2004) Food for thougth: the debate over eating meat, New York: Prometheus Books
Sydney Watts, Meat Matters: Butchers, Politics, and Market Culture in Eighteenth-Century Paris. Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2006.
Vialles, Noelie (1994) Animal to edible, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Walters, K S and Portmess, L (eds) (1999) Ethical vegetarianism from Pythagoras to Peter Singer, Albany, NYY: State University of New York Press
Wilkie, R M (2010) Livestock/Deadstock: Food Animals, Ambiguous Relations, and Productive Contexts, Temple University Press
Wolch J and Emel J. (eds) (1999) Animal Geographies: Place, Politics and Identity in the Nature-Culture Borderlands, London and New York: Verso. Section 3
Week 9
Cultures of masculinity
This week we explore cultures of masculinity in relation to hunting and fighting with dogs. We contrast hunting in hunter-gatherer societies with hunting in industrial societies.
Key reading
Cartmill, M (2007) ‘Hunting and humanity in Western thought’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 4, 25
Evans, et al (2007) ‘Dogfighting: symbolic expression and validation of masculinity’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 4, 23
Kalof, L, Fitzgerald; A and Baralt, L (2004) ‘Animals, Women, and Weapons: Blurred Sexual Boundaries in the Discourse of Sport Hunting’ in Society and Animals, 12 (3): 237-251
Kheel, M (2008) Nature Ethics: An Ecofeminist Perspective, Lanham: Rowan and Littlefield Publishers, Chapter 4
Maher, J. et al. (2011). Friends, status symbols and weapons: the use of dogs by youth groups and youth gangs, Crime, Law and Social Change. 55 (5): 405-420.
Seminar questions
1. In what ways is hunting classed and gendered? Is this different for different forms of hunting? How do the different readings address this question?
2. What assumptions about human-animal relations underpin hunting? Does this differ cross-culturally?
3. Masculinity is associated with dog fighting – what type of masculinity? How does it differ from masculinities associated with hunting?
4. How can hunting be undersood in terms of gender and sexuality?
Additional reading
Animal Studies Group (2006) Killing Animals, Urbana: Universit of Illinois Press
Boglioli, M (2009) A Matter of Life and Death: Hunting in Contemporary Vermont, Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press ,
Brody, H (1987) Living Arctic: Hunters of the Canadian North, Seattle: University of Washington Press
Bulliet, R W (2005) Hunters, Herders, and Hamburgers: The Past and Future of Human-Animal Relationships, New York: Columbia University Press
Burridge, J. (2008) ‘Hunting is not just for blood-thirsty toffs’: The Countryside Alliance and the visual rhetoric of a poster campaign’, Text and Talk 28 (1): 31-53
Cartmill, M (1993) A view to a death in the morning: hunting and nature through history, Cambridge: Harvard University Press
Griffin, R (2007) Blood Sport: Hunting in Britain since 1066, Yale University Press
Harding, S (2012) Unleashed: the phenomenon of status dogs and weapon dogs, The Policy Press
Hurn, S (2012) Human and other animals, Pluto Press, Chapter14
Ingold, T (1988) Hunters, pastoralists, and ranchers: reindeer economies and their transformations, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Ingold, Tim (2000)The Perception of the Environment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill. London : Routledge.
Kheel, M. (2008) Nature Ethics: An Ecofeminist Perspective, Lanham: Rowan and Littlefield Publishers
MacDonald, H (2006) Falcon Reaktion
MacGregor, A (2012) Animal Encounters: Human and Animal Interaction in Britain from the Norman Conquest to World War I Reaktion
Marvin, G (2002) ‘Unspeakability, inedibility and structure of pursuit in the English foxhunt’ in N. Rothfels (ed) Representing animals, Bloomington: Indiana University Press
Nadasdy, P (2007) ‘The gift in the animal: the ontology of hunting and human-animal sociality’ in American Ethnologist, 34 (1): 25-43
Nelson, R (1997) Heart and blood: living with deer in America, New York: Vintage
Wallen, M (2006) Fox Reaktion
Willerslev, Rane (2007) Soul Hunter: Hunting, Animism and Personhood among the Siberian Yukaghirs. Berkeley , CA : University of California Press
Week 10
Animals as spectacle
This week we focus on animals and spectacle looking at how animals are used as entertainment. This ranges from racing animals such as horses, greyhounds and pigeons, through making animals perform in circuses, showing them, and competing with them in activities like dog agility. We shall explore the relation of these activities to social divisions of gender, race and class.
Key reading
Atkinson, M and Young, K (2009) ‘Grehound racing and sports related violence’ in Arluke, A and Sanders, C (eds) Between the species, Pearson Education, Part 6, Article 20
Cassidy, R (2002) The sport of kings: kinship, class, and thoroughbred breeding at Newmarket, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, Chapter 4
Haraway, D (2008) When species meet, University of Minnesota Press, Chapter 8
Marvin, G (2007) ‘On being human in the bullfight’ in L. Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) The Animals Reader, Oxford: Berg, section 4, 22
Pliny the Elder (2007) ‘Combats of elephants’ in L Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) The Animals Reader, Oxford: Berg, section 4, 21
Seminar questions
1. How does Marvin use ideas of nature and culture to understand the symbolic significance of the bullfight? How is his analysis gendered?
2. How do ideas of authority, control and partnership operate in Haraway’s analysis of training for dog agility? What sort of human-dog relationship is she arguing for?
3. What relationship is there between humans and animals in greyhound and horse racing?
4. How do social divisions of class, gender and race structure animal spectacle?
Additional reading
Cassidy, R (2002) The sport of kings: kinship, class, and thoroughbred breeding at Newmarket, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Davis, S G (1997) Spectacular nature: corporate culture and the sea world experience, Berkeley: University of California Press
Franklin, A. (1999) Animals & Modern Cultures: A Sociology of Human-Animal Relations in Modernity London: Sage, chapter 6
Geertz, C (1973) ‘Deep play: notes on the Balinese cock fight’ in The interpretation of cultures, New York: Basic Books, pp. 412-453
Haraway, D. (2003). The Companion Species Manifesto. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press
Haraway, D (2008) When Species Meet, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
Hardouin-Fugier, E (2010) Bullfighting: A Troubled History, Reaktion
Howe, J (1981) ‘Fox hunting as ritual’ in American Ethnologist 278-300
Jerolmack, C (2007) ‘Animal archaeology: domestic pigeons and the nature-culture dialectic’ in Qualitative Sociology Review, 3 (1): 74-95
Kalof, L (2007) Looking at Animals in Human History, London: Reaktion Books, chapter 8
Marvin, G (1984) ‘The cockfight in Andalusia, Spain: images of the truly male’ in Anthopological Quarterly, 57 (2): 60-70
Marvin, G (1988) Bullfight, Oxford: Blackwell
Marvin, G (2000) ‘The problem of foxes: legitimate and illegitimate killing in the English countryside’ in J. Knight (ed) Natural enemies: people-wildlife conflicts in anthropological perspective, London: Routledge, pp. 189-212
Marvin, G. (2001) ‘Cultured Killers: Creating and Representing Foxhounds’ Society and Animals 9(3): 273- 292
Marvin, G (2003) ‘A passionate pursuit: foxhunting as performance’ in Sociological Review, 52 (2):46-60
Marvin, G (2005) ‘Disciplined affection: the making of a pack of foxhounds’ in J.Knight (ed) Animals in person: cultural perspectives on human-animal intimacies, London: Berg
TERM 2
Week 11
Animals and cultural identities
In this lecture our focus is on how groups and nations are defined through animal symbolism and the consequences of this for animals. We shall look at the symbolic importance of animals in hunter-gatherer societies, how the processes involved in colonial conquest affected the animals involved and the obsession with breeding pedigree animals associated with establishing national identities.
Key reading
Baker, S (2001) Picturing the beast, University of Illinois Press, Chapter 2, pp.33-73
Emel, J (1998) ‘Are you man enough, big and bad enough? Wolf eradication in the US’ in J Wolch and J Emel (eds) Animal Geographies, London: Verso, pp. 91-116
Franklin, A (2011) ‘An improper nature? Introduced animals and “species cleansing” in Australia’ in Carter, B and Charles, N (2011) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Palgrave, pp. 195-216
Pandian, A (2012) ‘Pastoral power in the postcolony: on the biopolitics of the criminal animal in South India’ in A Gross and A Vallely (eds) Animals and the human imagination, Columbia University Press, pp. 70-111
Seminar questions
1. How have animals been used as symbols of national identity? What consequences has this had for real animals?
2. Emel draws parallels between wolves, bison and native American Indians in her discussion of the colonial encounter. How does she do this?
3. How does Franklin link processes of species cleansing to ideas of cultural identity?
4. How does Pandian theorise animality and pastoral power? How does this relate to the biopolitics of colonialism and postcolonialism?
Additional Reading
Adams, C J and Donovan, J (eds) (1995) Anmals and women: feminist theoretical explorations, Durham, N C: Duke University Press
Anderson, V D (2004) Creatures of Empire: how domestic animals transformed early America, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Bernd, B (2007) Bears: a brief history, New Haven: Yale University Press
Blake, C, Molloy, C and Shakespeare, S (eds) (2012) Beyond human: from animality to transhumanism, London: Continuum
Brüggemeier, F J, Cioc, M and Zeller, T (eds.) (2005), How Green Were the Nazis? Nature, Environment, and Nation in the Third Reich, Athens, OH: Ohio University Press
Bryld, M and Lykke, N (2000) Cosmodolphins: Feminist cultural studies of technology, animals and the sacred, London and New York: Zed Books
Cassidy, R (2002) The sport of kings: kinship, class, and thoroughbred breeding at Newmarket, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Coates, P (2007) Strangers on the Land, California
Crosby, A (1986) Ecological Imperialism: the biological expansion of Europe, 900-1900, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
de John Anderson, V (2004) Creatures of Empire: How Domestic Animals Transformed Early America, New York
Derr, M (2004) A Dog's History of America: How Our Best Friend Explored, Conquered, and Settled a Continent, North Point Press
Derry, M (2003) Bred for Perfection: Shorthorn Cattle, Collies, and Arabian Horses since 1800, Johns Hopkins
Einarsoon, N (1993) ‘All animals are equal but some are cetaceans: conservation and culture conflict’ in K Milton (ed) Environmentalism: the view from anthropology, London: Routledge
Franklin, A. (2006). Animal Nation: The True Story of Animals and Australia. University of New South Wales Press
Franklin, S (2007) Dolly Mixtures: The Remaking of Genealogy. Duke University Press
Gaard, G (ed) (1993) Eco-feminism: women, animals and nature, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Gruffydd, P (2011) ‘On the prowl with the Possum Posse: nature and nation in Aotearoa/New Zealand’ in Carter, B and Charles, N (2011) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Palgrave, pp.217-235
Hogan, L, Metzger, D and Peterson, B (1998) Intimate nature: the bond between women and animals, New York: Ballantine
Isenberg, A C (2000) The Destruction of the Bison: An Environmental History, Cambridge University Press
Jones, R (2012) Mosquito Reaktion
Marvin, G (2012) Wolf Reaktion
Melville, E G K (1997) A Plague of Sheep: Environmental Consequences of the Conquest of Mexico, Cambridge University Press
Schwartz, M (1997) A History of Dogs in the Early Americas, London: Yale University Pres
Skabelund, A H (2011) Empire of Dogs: Canines, Japan, and the Making of the Modern Imperial World, Cornell University Press
Skabelund, A H (2008) ‘Breeding racism: the imperial battlefields of the “German” Shepherd dog’, in Society and Animals, 16 (4): 354-371
Swart, S (2010) Riding High: horses, humans and history in South Africa, Johannesburg, SA: Wits University Press
Van Driesche, J and R (2000) Nature out of place: biological invasions in the global age, Wahsington, DC: Island Press
van Sittert, L and Swart, S (eds) (2007) Canis Africanis, A Dog History of Southern Africa BRILL
Willis, R (ed) (1994) Signifying animals: human meaning in the natural world, New York: Routledge
Representing animals
Week 12
The call of the wild – zoos, safaris and conservation
What are zoos? What are they culturally/socially? When did they originate and why? How do they relate to conservation? This lecture explores cultural representations of animals in different contexts and their relationship to imperial conquest and the advancement of scientific knowledge. The development of safaris and eco-tourism and the cultural representations of the animals concerned are also considered.
Key reading
Davies, G (1998) ‘Virtual animals in electronic zoos: the changing geographies of animal capture and display’ in Philo, C and Wilbert, C (eds) Animal spaces, beastly places, London: Routledge, pp.243-267
Malamud, R (2007) ‘Zoo spectatorship’ in L. Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) The Animals Reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 4, 24
Hurn, S (2012) Humans and other animals, Pluto Press, Chapter 13, pp.165-175
Peace, A (2005) ‘Loving Leviathan: the discourse of whale-watching in Australian ecotourism’ in J. Knight (ed) Animals in person: cultural perspectives on human-animal intimacies, Oxford: Berg, pp.191-210
Seminar questions
1. What relations of inequality are enshrined in zoos? What can we learn about the gaze of spectatorship? How does Malamud relate spectatorship to gender?
2. How are zoos related to scientific knowledge about and human classification of animal species?
3. What types of conservation are identified in the readings? How do these incorporate different human-animal relations and representations of animals?
4. Is eco-tourism another form of cultural domination that is damaging the environment?
Additional reading
Bancel, N et al (eds) (2009) Human Zoos: from the Hottentot Venus to reality shows, Liverpool: University of Liverpool Press
Baratay, E and Hardouin-Fugier, E (2004) Zoo: A History of Zoological Gardens in the West, Reaktion
Baron, D (2004) The beast in the garden: a modern parable of man and nature, New York: W W Norton
Benson, E (2010) Wired Wilderness: Technologies of Tracking and the Making of Modern Wildlife, Johns Hopkins University Press
Berger, J (2009) Why look at animals, London: Penguin Books, pp. 12-37
Bostock, S (1993) Zoos and animal rights: the ethics of keeping animals, New York: Routledge
Cioc, M (2009) Game of Conservation, Ohio University Press
Hancocks, D (2001) A different nature: the paradoxical world of zoos and their uncertain future, Berkeley: University of California Press
Hancocks, D (2007) ‘Zoo animals as entertainment and exhibitions’ in R Malamud (ed) A cultural history of animals in the modern age, vol 6, Ozford: Berg
Hoage, R J and Deiss, W A (eds) (1996) New worlds, new animals: from menagerie to zoological park in the nineteenth century, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press
Mullan, R and Marvin, G (1999) Zoo Culture, Champaign: University of Illinois Press
Rothfels, N.(2002) Savages and Beasts: The Birth of the Modern Zoo, Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press
Rothfels, N (2007) ‘How the caged bird sings: animals and entertainment’ in K Kete (ed) A cultural history of animals in the age of empire, vol 5, Oxford: Berg
Week 13
Anthropomorphism and animal tales
Most of us are familiar with stories like Lassie, Black Beauty and the fairy stories of the Brother Grimm. Stories for children rely on animal characters, but so do many that are written for adults. We look at the place of anthropomorphism in different literary genres and consider how it functions to create relations of attachment between humans and animals.
Key reading
Manquin, T (2007) ‘Narrative dominion of the animals write back? Animal Genres in literature and the arts’ in K Kete (ed) A cultural history of animals in the age of empire, vol 5, Oxford: Berg, pp. 153-174
Fudge, E (2002) Animal, Reaktion Books, Chapter 2, pp. 67-92
Superle, M (2012) ‘Animal heroes and transforming substances: canine characters in contemporary children’s literature’ in A Gross and A Vallely (eds) Animals and the human imagination, New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 174-202
Leane, E and Pfennigwerth, S (2011) ‘Marching on thin ice: the politics of penguin films’ in C Freeman, E Leane and Y Watt (eds) Considering Animals: Contemporary Studies in Human-Animal Relations, Ashgage, pp. 29-40
Seminar questions
1. What is anthropomorphism?
2. How is it put to work in literature for adults and children? Does it have a role in promoting a particular form of relations between animals and humans?
3. What values do the anthropomorphic representation of penguins reinforce?
4. Identify the effect of anthropomorphism on human-animal relations as discussed in the readings. Can we avoid anthropomorphism in representing animals in fiction?
Additional reading
Armstrong, P and Potts, A (2004) What animals mean in the fiction of modernity, London and New York: Routledge
Coetzee, J M (2000) Disgrace, New York: Penguin
Coetzee, J M (1999) The Lives of Animals, Princeton University Press: Princeton, NJ
Daston, L. and Mitman, G. (2006). Thinking with Animals : New Perspectives on Anthropomorphism. Columbia University Press.
Denenholz Morse, D and M. A. Danahay. (eds) (2007) Victorian animal dreams : representations of animals in Victorian literature and culture, Farnham: Ashgate
Fudge, E. (2002) Animal, London: Reaktion Books
Morris, B (2000) Animals and ancestors: an ethnography, New York: Berg
McHugh, S. (2006) ‘One or Several Literary Animal Studies?’ Ruminations 3, .
Norris, M (2006) ‘The human-animal in fiction’, Parallax, 12 (1): 4-20
Orwell, G (1989) Animal Farm: a fairy story, Penguin Books
Pollock, M S and Rainwater, C (eds) (2005) Figuring animals: essays on animal images in art, literature, philosophy, and popular culture, New York: Palgrave Macmillan
Sewell, A (1877/1905) Black Beauty, New York: Scholastic Paperbacks
Shapiro, K. and Copeland, M. (2005) ‘Toward a Critical Theory of Animal Issues in Fiction’ in Society and Animals, 13 (4): 343-346
Woolf, V (2002) Flush: a biography, Vintage
Zipes, J (2006) Fairy tales and the art of subversion, 2nd edition, Routledge, 2006
Zipes, J (1986) Don’t bet on the prince, Gower
Zipes, J (2002) The brothers Grimm: from the enchanted forest to the modern world, Palgrave Macmillan
Week 14
Visual representation of animals
This lecture looks at how animals are represented in art and film, focussing particularly on wildlife programmes. How have representations of animals and their cultural meaning changed with changing visual technologies?
Key reading
Burt, J (2007) ‘Animals in visual art from 1900 to the present’ in R Malamud (ed) A cultural history of animals in the modern age, vol 6, Ozford: Berg, pp. 163-194
Coe, C (2006) Watching wildlife, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, Chapter 3
Siegel, S (2005) ‘Reflections on anthropomorphism in The disenchanted forest’ in L Daston and G Mitman (eds) Thinking with animals, New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 196-222
Seminar questions
1. Burt identifies different ways animals are used in art – what are they and what meanings to these representations convey? What challenges does art pose for thinking about humanity and animality?
2. How does Siegel justify her approach to representing the orang-utangs for a wildlife documentary?
3. What is the appeal of wildlife documentaries? How do they construct the ‘wild’ and the ‘tame’?
Additional reading
Arluke, A and R Bogdan, (2010) Beauty and the Beast, Syracuse
Baker, S (1993) Picturing the beast: animals, identity and representation, Manchester: Manchester University Press
Baker, S. (2000). The Postmodern Animal. London: Reaktion Books.
Benton, J (1992) The Medieval Menagerie: Animals in the Art of the Middle Ages London: Abbeville Press
Birke, L. (2006) ‘Meddling with Medusa: on genetic manipulation, art and animals’, AI and Society, 29, 103-117
Brower, M (2010) Developing Animals: Wildlife and Early American Photography, Minnesota
Burt, J (2002) Animals in film, London: Reaktion Press
Chris, C (2006) Watching wildlife, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
Copeland, M.W. (2003) ‘Critter Crusader: “Wildlife Mystery Thriller”’ in Society and Animals.
Costlow, J T and Nelson, A (eds) (2010) Other Animals: Beyond the Human in Russian Culture and History, Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press
Donald, D (2007) Picturing Animals in 19th century Art, Yale University Press
Ingram, D (2000) Green Screen: Environmentalism and Hollywood cinema, Exeter: University of Exeter Press
Kalof, L (2007) Looking at Animals in Human History, London: Reaktion Books
Lucie-Smith, E (1998) Zoo: Animals in Art, London: Aurum Press
Malamud, A (2012) An introduction to animals and visual culture, Palgrave Macmillan
Mitman, G (1999) Reel nature: America’s romance with wildlife on film, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press
Mitman, G (2005) ‘Pachyderm personalities: the media of science, politics, and conservation’ in L Daston and G Mitman (eds) Thinking with animals, New York: Columbia University Press,
Molloy, C (2011) Popular media and animals, Palgrave Macmillan
Pollock, M S and Rainwater, C (eds) (2005) Figuring animals: essays on animal images in art, literature, philosophy, and popular culture, New York: Palgrave Macmillan
Rothfels, N (ed) (2002) Representing animals, Bloomington: Indiana University Press
Ryan, J (2000) ‘“Hunting with the camera”: photography, wildlife and colonialism in Africa’ in G Philo and C Wilbert (eds) (2000) Animal spaces, beastly places: geographies of human-animal relations, London Routledge
Thomas, K. (1984). Man and the Natural World, Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Werness, H. B (2007) Continuum Encyclopaedia of Animal Symbolism in World Art. Continuum.
Willis, R (ed) (1994) Signifying animals: human meaning in the natural world, New York: Routledge
Wilson, A (1992) The culture of nature: North American landscape from Disney to the Exxon Valdez, Cambridge, Mass: Blackwell
Zipes, J (2011) The enchanted screen: the unknown history of fairy-tale films, Routledge
Challenging speciesism
Week 15
Social movements, animal welfare and animal rights
This lecture looks at social movements which aim to improve animal welfare and/or campaign for animal rights. Movements in support of animal welfare emerged in the 19th century which was when organisations such as the RSPCA were founded, and in the latter years of the 20th century welfare movements, environmental movements and animal rights movements have campaigned in different ways to challenge human-animal relations. What is the social basis of these movements and what are their underlying philosophies?
Key reading
Kete, K (2002) ‘Animals and ideology: the politics of animal protection in Europe’ in Rothfels, N (ed) Representing animals, Indiana University Press. Pp.19-34
Lansbury, C (2007) ‘The brown dog riots of 1907’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 6, 31
Lyle, M (2008) ‘Caring about blood, flesh and pain: women’s standing in the environmental protection movement’ in C P Flynn (ed) Social Creatures, Lantern Books, pp. 386-400
Noske, B (2009) ‘Two movements and human-animal continuity’ in A Arluke and C Sanders (eds) Between the species, Pearson Education, Article 33, pp. 354-360
Seminar questions
1. What does Kete’s analysis reveal about the class and gender basis of animal protection movements in the 19th century?
2. How can we explain the gender basis of animal protection movements? Is there a difference between movements in the 19th and 20th centuries?
3. What is Noske’s argument? What role does sentience play in animal rights movements? What is the difference between the philosophical basis of the animal rights and the environmental movements?
4. Is there a philosophical difference between the basis of the animal protection movements of the 19th century and the animal rights movements of the 20th century?
Additional reading
Best, S and Nocella, A J (2004) Terrorists or freedom fighters? Reflections on the liberation of animals, Lantern Books
Boddice, R (2009) A History of Attitudes and Behaviours toward Animals in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Britain. Anthropocentrism and the Emergence of Animals, Edwin Mellen Press
Cochrane, A (2010) An introduction to animals and political theory, Palgrave Macmillan
Donovan, J and Adams, C J (eds) (1996) Beyond animal rights: a feminist caring ethic for the treatment of animals, Continuum
Einwohner, R. L. (1999) ‘Gender, Class, and Social Movement Outcomes: Identity and Effectiveness in Two Animal Rights Campaigns’ in Gender and Society, 13 (1) pp. 56-76.
Emberly, J (1998) The cultural politics of fur, Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press
Emberly, J (1998) Venus and Furs: Cultural politics of fur, I B Tauris,
Francione, G L and Garner, R (2010) The animal rights debate: abolition or regulation? Columbia University Press
Franklin, A. 1999 Animals & Modern Cultures: A Sociology of Human-Animal Relations in Modernity London: Sage. Chap.9
Gaardner, E (2008) ‘Risk and reward: the impact of animal rights activism on women’ in Society and Animals, 16 (1): 1-22
Greenebaum, J (2009) ‘“I’m not an activist”: animal rights vs animal welfare in the pure bred dog rescue movement’ in Society and Animals, 17(4): 289-304
Kalof, L (2007) Looking at Animals in Human History, London: Reaktion Books, chapters 4 and 5
Kean, H (2000) Animal Rights: Political and Social Change in Britain since 1800, Reaktion
Kemmerer, L (ed) (2011) Sister Species: Women, Animals and Social Justice, University of Illinois Press
Lansbury, C (1985) The old brown dog: women, workers, and vivisectin in Edwarian England, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press
Leahy, M (1994) Against liberation: putting animals in perspective, London: Routledge
Linzey, A and Clarke, P B (2004) Animal Rights: A Historical Anthology, Columbia
Molloy, C (2011) Popular media and animals, Palgrave Macmillan, Chapter 2
Munro, L (2005) ‘Strategies, action repertoires and DIY activism in the animal rights movement’ in Social Movement Studies: Journal of Social, Cultural and Political Protest, 4 (1): 75-94
Nibert, D. 2002 Animal Rights/Human Rights: Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation Lanham MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
Peek, C.W., Bell, N J and Dunham, C C (1996) ‘Gender, Gender Ideology, and Animal Rights Advocacy’ in Gender and Society, 10 (4): 464-478
Peggs, K. (2009) ‘The social constructionist challenge to primacy identity and the emancipation of oppressed groups: human primacy identity politics and the human/‘animal’ dualism’ in Sociological Research Online 14(1). 1-18
Pichardo, N. A. 1997 ‘New Social Movements: A Critical Review’ in Annual Review of Sociology, 23: 411-430.
Rowlands, M. (2002) Animals Like Us, London: Verso, Chapter10
Rudy, K (2008) The role of gender in our social treatment of nonhuman animals, BRILL
Singer, P (1974) Animal liberation, New York: Avon
Singer, P. 1977. Animal liberation : towards an end to man's inhumanity to animals, London: Paladin
Sunstein, C and Nussbaum, M (eds) (2004) Animal rights: current debtates and new directions, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Sztybel, D (2011) Universal animal rights: winning the ethical debate, Palgrave Macmillan
Taylor, A (2003) Animals and ethics: an overview of the philosophical debate, Orchard Park, N Y: Broadview Press
Tester, K (1991) Animals and Society: the humanity of animal rights, London: Routledge
Zimmerman, M E (ed) (1993) Environmental philosophy: from animal rights to radical ecology, Englewood Cliffs, N J: Prentice Hall
Week 16: Reading week
Week 17
Species, social construction and power
What is speciesism and how are relations between humans and animals constructed? Moral questions of how animals should be treated, do they feel pain, do they suffer will be considered. George Orwell. Kay Peggs. Erika
Key reading
Cudworth, E (2011) Social Lives with Other Animals, Palgrave, Chapter 3.
Donovan, J (1990) ‘Animal Rights and Feminist Theory’ in Signs, 15(2): 350-375 and in J Donovan and C J Adams (eds) (1996) Beyond animal rights: a feminist caring ethic for the treatment of animals, Continuum, pp. 34-59
Noske, B (2008) ‘Speciesism, anthropocentrism, and non-Western cultures’ in C P Flynn (ed) Social creatures: a human and animal studies reader, New York Lantern Books, pp 77-87
Peggs, K (2012) Animals and sociology, Palgrave Macmillan, Chapter 3
Regan, T (2007) The rights of humans and other animals’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 1, 5
Singer, P (2007) ‘Animal liberation or animal rights?’ in Kalof, L and Fitzgerald, A (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 1, 4
Seminar questions
1. What is speciesism? Is it limited to Western cultures?
2. What is the difference between Singer’s and Regan’s arguments? On what basis do they disagree?
3. What is the basis of Donovan’s critique of Singer and Regan? Is this critique justified?
4. Why does Cudworth develop the concept anthroparchy and how does she define it? Is it useful?
Additional reading
Adams, C J and Donovan, J (eds) (1995) Anmals and women: feminist theoretical explorations, Durham, N C: Duke University Press
Bat-Ami, B O and Ferguson, A (eds) (1998) Daring to be good: essays in feminist ethico-politics, New York: Routledge
Benton, T (1993) Natural Relations: Ecology, animal rights and social justice, London: Verso
Cochrane, A (2010) Animal rights without liberation, Columbia University Press
Cohen, C and Regan, T (2001) The animal rights debate, Lanham, Md: Rowland and Littlefield.
Cudworth, E (2011) Social Lives with Other Animals, Palgrave
Donaldson, S and Kymlicka, W (2011) Zoopolis, Oxford University Press
Fellenz, M R (2007) The moral menagerie: philosophy and animal rights, Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press
Francione, G L and Garner, R (2010) The animal rights debate: abolition or regulation? New York: Columbia University Press
Francione, G L (2009) Animals as persons: Essays on the abolition of animal exploitation, Columbia University Press
Franklin, J H (2005) Animal rights and moral philosophy, New York: Columbia University Press
Francione, G L (1995) Animals, Property, and the Law, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Garner, R (1996) Animal rights: the changing debate, London: Verso
Gold, M (1995) Animal rights: extending the circle of compassion, Oxford: Carpenter
Gruen, L (2011) Ethics and animals: an introduction, Cambridge University Press (in library)
Herzog, H (2010) Some we love, some we hate, some we eat, Harper-Collins
Langley, G (ed) (1989) Animal experimentation: the consensus changes, London: Macmillan
O’Sullivan, S (2011) Animals, equality and democracy, Palgrave Macmillan
Peggs, K. (2011) Risk, Human Health and the Oppression of Nonhuman Animals: the Development of Transgenic Nonhuman Animals for Human Use. Special issue of Humanimalia: A Journal of Human/Animal Interface Studies.2 (2). 49-69
Peggs, K. (2009) ‘A hostile world for nonhuman animals: human identification and the oppression of nonhuman animals for human good’ in Sociology 43 (1): 85-102
Peggs, K. (2010 ) ‘Nonhuman animal experiments in the European Community: human values and rational choice’ in Society and Animals 18 (1): 1-20
Regan, T (1983) The case for animal rights, Berkeley: University of California Press
Ritvo, H (1997) The Platypus and the Mermaid, and other Figments of the Classifying Imagination (about classifying animals, naturalists in the 18th and 19th centuries)
Rowlands, M (2009) Animal rights: moral theory and practice, 2nd edition, Palgrave Macmillan
Ryder, R. (2000). Animal Revolution: Changing attitudes towards speciesism. Oxford: Berg
Singer, P and Regan, T (eds) (1989) Animal rights and human obligations, Englewood Cliffs, N J: Prentice Hall
Singer, P (2006) In defense of animals: the second wave, Oxford: Blackwell
Singer, P (1974) Animal liberation, New York: Avon
Spiegel, M (1988) The dreaded comparison: human and animal slavery, London: Heretic
Steeves, H P (ed) (1999) Animal others: on ethics, ontology and animal life, Albany, N Y: State University of new York Press
Wise, S (2000) Rattling the cage: towards legal rights for animals, Cambridge, Mass: Perseus Books
Zimmerman, M E (ed) (1993) Environmental philosophy: from animal rights to radical ecology, Englewood Cliffs, N J: Prentice Hall
Week 18
Embodiment - the elephant and the ant
This lecture looks at research into animal behaviour, how communication happens between different species and how scientists understand other animals. It explores phenomenological approaches to understanding other animals and raises questions such as: Can we ever understand what it is to be a bat?
Key reading
Bekoff, M (2007) Wild justice and fair play: cooperation, forgiveness, and morality in animals in L Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 2, 11
Candea, M (2010) ‘“I fell in love with Carlos the meerkat”: engagement and detachment in human-animal relations’ in American Ethnologist, 37 (2): 241-258
Masson, J M and McCarthy, S (2007) ‘Grief, sadness and the bones of elephants’ in L Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 2,12
Sanders, C G and Arluke, A (2007) ‘Speaking for dogs’ in L Kalof and A Fitzgerald (eds) (2007) The animals reader, Oxford: Berg, Section 2, 10
Shapiro, K (2008) ‘Understanding dogs through kinaesthetic empathy, social construction, and history’ in C P Flynn (ed) Social creatures: a human and animal studies reader, New York Lantern Books pp.31-48
OR
Shapiro, K (1997) ‘A phenomenological approach to the study of nonhuman animals’ in R W Mitchell, N S Thompson and H L Miles (eds) Anthropomorphism, anecdotes, and animals, State University of New York Press, pp. 277-295
Seminar questions
1. Why is an emotional attachment to individual animals considered not to be part of ‘good’ science?
2. What is ‘critical anthropomorphism’? How does it help us understand animal behaviour?
3. What evidence is there for the existence of culture and morality amongst non-human animals?
3. How does Shapiro define a phenomenological approach and how can it help us understand other animals?
Additional reading
Balcombe, J (2006) Pleasurable kingdom: animals and the nature of feeling good, New York: Macmillan
Balcombe, J (2010) Second Nature: the inner lives of animals, Macmillan
Bekoff, M and Jamieson, D (eds) (1990) Interpretation and explanation in the study of animal behaviour, Boulder, Colo: Westsview Press
Bekoff, M and Jamieson, D (eds) (1999) Readings in Animal Cognition, Bradford Books.
Bekoff, M and Jamieson, D (2002) The Cognitive Animal. Bradford Books.
Burkhardt, Jr, R W (2005) Patterns of behaviour: Konrad Lorenz, Niko Tinbergen, and the founding of ethology, Chicago: University of Chicago Press
Cavalieri, P and Singer, P (eds) (1993) The great ape project: equality beyond humanity, New York: Macmillan
Crist, E (1999) Images of animals: anthropomorphism and animal mind, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
De Waal, F (2006) Primates and philosophers: how morality evolved, Princeton, N J: Princeton University Press
De Waal, F (2001) The ape and the sushi master: cultural reflections by a primatologist, New York: Basic Books
Grandin, T and Johnson, C (2006) Animals in translation: using the mysteries of autism to decode animal behaviour, Bloomsbury: London
Gates, P (1997) Animal communication, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Griffin, D R (2001) Animal minds: beyond cognition to consciousness, Chicago: University of Chicago Press
Haraway, D. (2003) The Companion Species Manifesto, Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press
Haraway, D (2008) When Species Meet, University of Minnesota
Masson, J M (2003) The pig who sang to the moon: the emotional world of farm animals, New York: Ballantine Books
Masson, J M and McCarthy, S (1995) When elephants weep: the emotional lives of animals, New York: Delta Trade Paperbacks
Mitchell, R W et al (eds) (1997) Anthropomorphism, anecdotes and animals, Albany: State University of New York Press
Pepperberg, I M (1999) The Alex studies: cognitive and communicative abilities of grey parrots, Cambridge:Harvard University Press
Pepperberg, I M (2008) Alex and me: how a sceintist anda parot uncovered a hiden world of animal intelligence – and formed a deep bond in the process, New York: Harper Collins
Risau, C (ed) (1991) Cognitive ethology: the minds of other animals, Hillsdale, N J: L.Erlbaum Associates
Week 19
The animal challenge to sociology
Why is it that sociology has taken so long to begin looking at animals? What is it about the study of other animals that is problematic for sociology? We consider how notions of animal agency, personhood and selfhood pose problems for sociology and challenge the very idea of society and sociology’s object of study.
Key reading
Hobson-West, P. (2007) ‘Beasts and Boundaries: An introduction to animals in sociology, science and society’ Qualitative Sociology Review, 3, 2-41.
Hurn, S (2012) Humans and other animals, Pluto Press, Chapter 10
Irvine, L (2007) ‘The question of animal selves: implications for sociological kowledge and practice’ in Qualitative Sociology Review, 3 (1): 5-22
Nibert, D (2003) ‘Humans and Other Animals: Sociology’s Moral and Intellectual Challenge’ in International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 23(3): 4-25
Smith, J A (2003) ‘Beyond dominance and affection: living with rabbits in post-humanist households’ in Society and Animals, 11 (2): 181-97
Seminar questions
1. Why is it that studying non-human animals poses a challenge to sociology? What are the implications of sociological studies of animals for the way we conceptualise society?
2. Nibert argues that animals pose a moral and intellectual challenge to sociology – what form does this challenge take?
3. Is intersubjectivity possible between humans and other animals? What are the arguments for and against this possibility?
4. What arguments are advanced in support of animal agency? Which intellectual traditions are they derived from?
Additional reading
Alger, J. and Alger, S. (1997) ‘Beyond Mead: Symbolic Interaction between Humans and Felines’ Society and Animals 5 (1): 65-81
Alger, J. M. and Alger, S. F. (2003) ‘Drawing the line between humans and animals: an examination of introductory sociology textbooks’ International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 23(3): 69-93.
Arluke, A and Sanders, C R (1996) Regarding animals, Philadelphia: Temple University Press
Arluke, A. (2002) ‘A Sociology of Sociological Animal Studies’ in Society and Animals 10 (4), 369-374.
Arluke, A. (2003) ‘Ethnozoology and the future of sociology’ in International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 23(3): 26-45.
Blake, C, Molloy, C and Shakespeare, S (eds) (2012) Beyond human: from animality to transhumanism, London: Continuum
Carter, B and Charles, N (eds) (2011) Human and other animals: a critical approach, Palgrave Macmillan (chapter 1)
Cerulo, K A (2009) ‘Nonhumans in social interaction’ in Annual Review of Sociology, 35: 531-52
Flynn, C. P. (2003) A course is a course, of course, of course (unless it’s an animals and society course): challenging boundaries in academia. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 23(3): 94-108.
Ingold, T (2000) The Perception of the Environment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling and Skil,. London : Routledge.
Irvine, L. (2004) If you tame me: Understanding our connection with animals, Temple University Press
Irvine, L. (2003) ‘George's Bulldog: What Mead's Canine Companion Could Have Told Him About the Self’ Sociological Origins 3 (1): 46-49.
Jerolmack, C (2009) ‘Humans, animals and play: theorising interaction when intersubjectivity is problematic’ in Sociological Theory, 27 (4): 371-389
Johnson, L (2012) Power, knowledge, animals, Palgrave Macmillan
Kheel, M. (2008) Nature Ethics: An Ecofeminist Perspective, Lanham: Rowan and Littlefield Publishers
Knight, J (ed) (2005) Animals in person: Cultural perspectives on human-animal intimacies, Oxford: Berg
Kruse, C. R. (2002) ‘Social Animals: Animal Studies and Sociology’ Society and Animals 10 (4), 375-378.
Laurier, E, Maze R and Lundin, J. (2006). ‘Putting the Dog Back in the Park: Animal and Human Mind-in-Action’ in Mind, Culture, and Activity, 13: 2-24.
McFarland, S E and Hediger, R (eds) (2009) Animals and Agency: An Interdisciplinary Exploration, Brill
Morris, B (2000) Animals and ancestors: an ethnography, New York: Berg
Newton, T (2007) Nature and sociology Routledge: London and NewYork
Peggs, K (2012) Animals and sociology, Palgrave Macmillan, chapter 1
Sanders, C. R. (1995) ‘Killing with kindness: veterinary euthanasia and the social construction of personhood’, Sociological Forum, 10, 195-214.
Sanders, C. R. (1993). ‘Understanding dogs: caretakers’ attributions of mindedness in canine-human relationships’ in Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 22, 205-226.
Tovey, H (2003) ‘Theorising nature and society in sociology: the invisibility of animals’ in Sociologia Ruralis, 43 (3): 196-215
Willerslev, R (2007) Soul Hunter: Hunting, Animism and Personhood among the Siberian Yukaghirs. Berkeley , CA : University of California Press
Wolfe, C (2003) Animal Rites – American Culture, the Discourse of Species, and Posthumanist Theory, Chicago University Press
Wolfe, C (2009) What is Posthumanism? University of Minnesota Press
Wolfe, C (ed) (2003) Zoontologies: the question of the animal, Minneapolis/London: University of Minnesota Press
Week 20
Understanding the social and cultural positioning of animals
This lecture draws the course together and evaluates the different theoretical perspectives used to understand human-animal relations. Is it important to consider social structures or are networks a better way of comprehending the ways in which humans and animals relate to each other? What are the moral questions raised by the current state of human-animal relations?
Key reading
Carter, B and Charles, N (2011) ‘Human-animal connections: an introduction’ in B Carter and N Charles (eds) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1-30
Coetzee, J M (2001) ‘The lives of animals’ in The Lives of Animals, Princeton University Press, pp.15-72
Law, J and Miele, M (2011) ‘Animal practices’ in B Carter and N Charles (eds) Human and other animals: critical perspectives, Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 50-68
Michael, M. (2000). Reconnecting Culture, Technology and Nature: From Society to Heterogeneity, London: Routledge, Chapter 2, pp 18-44.
Seminar questions
1. How do you think we can best understand the relationship between human and other animals in western societies? What can sociology contribute to this understanding?
2. What can we learn about human-animal relations by looking at different types of society?
3. What are the key theories we have used to explore human-animal relations?
4. Is it important to retain a conception of social structure in order to understand human-animal relations? How, if at all, does this relate to animal agency?
Additional reading
Haraway, D. (1992) ‘Other worldly conversations; terrain topics; local terms’ in Science as Culture, 3: 64-99.
Haraway, D. (2003) The Companion Species manifesto, Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press.
Haraway, D. (2008). When Species Meet. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
Horigan, S. (1988) Nature and Culture in Western Discourses, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Latour, B. (2004) The Politics of Nature, Harvard University Press.
MacNaghten, P. and Urry, J. (1998) Contested Nature, London: Sage
Michael, M. (2000). Reconnecting Culture, Technology and Nature: From Society to Heterogeneity, London: Routledge, Chapters 2 and 6.
Philo, G and Wilbert, C (eds) (2000) Animal spaces, beastly places: geographies of human-animal relations, London Routledge
Shukin, N (2009) Animal Capital: Rendering Life in Biopolitical Times
Twine, R (2010) Animals as biotechnology – ethics, sustainability and critical animal studies, Earthscan
Whatmore, S (2000) Hybrid geographies: natures, cultures and spaces, London: Sage
Wolch, J and Emel, J (eds) (1998) Animal geographies: place, politics, and identity in the nature-culture borderlands, London: Verso
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