Of Mice and Men: Animals in Human Culture

TOPIA: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies, 2009

Jodey Castricano frames her fascinating edited anthology, Animal Subjects: An Ethical Reader in a Posthuman World, as an intervention into cultural studies, or more precisely, a challenge to cultural studies scholars. "Simply put," she reflects, "the aim of this collection is to include the non-human animal question as part of the ethical purview of cultural studies" (7). Specifically, the text attempts to demonstrate the relevance of the question to a field that has conventionally critiqued the human subject, centrally interrogating the ways in which the traditionally unmarked category is, in fact, particularly constructed through power-laden gendered, racialized, sexualized and classed discourses. The text illuminates the limits of cultural studies which, despite its scholarly and political impact, nonetheless reproduces a politics of exclusion in regard to non-human animals. Such disavowal helps reproduce an essential border against which "the human" of the humanist tradition can be sustained. As Cary Wolfe notes (2003),

Second Language Learning and Teaching

This book brings together well-researched essays by established scholars as well as forward-thinking aspiring researchers to study how literary and non-literary texts highlight 'animal presence' and explore non-anthropocentric relationships between human and animals. To be precise, it offers Posthumanist readings of animal-centric Literary and Cultural texts. The contributors take positions that put the precepts and premises of humanism into question by considering the animal presence in texts seriously. The essays collected here focus primarily on literary and cultural texts from varied interdisciplinary and theoretically-informed perspectives advanced by critical approaches such as Critical Animal Studies and Posthumanism. Contributors select texts beyond geographical and period boundaries, and demonstrate how practices of close reading give rise to new ways of thinking about animals. By implicating the "Animal turn" for the field of literary and cultural studies, this book urges us to problematize the separation of the human from other animals and rethink the hierarchical order of beings through close readings of select texts. It offers some fresh perspectives of Posthumanist theory, so that we can revisit those criteria that created species' difference from the early ages of human civilization. This book will constitute a rich and thorough scholarly resource on the politics of representation of animals in literature and culture. The essays in this book are empirically and theoretically informed; and they explore a range of dynamic, captivating and highly relevant topics. This book does more than simply decentering the 'human' by bringing animals onto the center of critical discourse and challenging the anthropocentric hierarchical relationship, which are the basis of Posthumanist readings. It also highlights the theoretical intersections between Animal Theory and other relevant cultural theories, that is the latest advancement in this field. The volume is divided into four main sections

NECSUS. European Journal of Media Studies, 2015

Anthropocentrism is central to the nature of discourse across all disciplines, from science to philosophy and the arts. We argue that anthropocentrism has become particularly marked in modernity despite the avowal by some theorists that modernity signified a radical break with traditional approaches. A powerful strategy, invoked by such discourses, and designed to cement the anthropocentric perspective, is that of contradiction. Media theorists and scholars working in the broader field of (human) animal studies have begun to unravel and demystify such discourses, questioning the nature of these contradictory perspectives and the anthropocentric point of view at work in visual texts. This is particularly evident in the current work of contemporary theorists who are researching the representation of animals in media texts. For it is the figure of the animal, as represented in visual discourses, from film to photography and new media, that offers a powerful challenge to the dominant anthropocentric worldview.

2011

Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. 10.1057/9780230306240 -Popular Media and Animals, Claire Molloy Copyright material from www.palgraveconnect.com -licensed to McGill University -PalgraveConnect -2013-01-05 10.1057/9780230306240 -Popular Media and Animals, Claire Molloy Copyright material from www.palgraveconnect.com -licensed to McGill University -PalgraveConnect -2013-01-05 xi Series Preface This is a new book series for a new field of inquiry: Animal Ethics. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the ethics of our treatment of animals. Philosophers have led the way, and now a range of other scholars have followed, from historians to social scientists. From being a marginal issue, animals have become an emerging issue in ethics and in multidisciplinary inquiry. In addition, a rethink of the status of animals has been fuelled by a range of scientific investigations which have revealed the complexity of animal sentiency, cognition, and awareness. The ethical implications of this new knowledge have yet to be properly evaluated, but it is becoming clear that the old view that animals are mere things, tools, machines, or commodities cannot be sustained ethically. But it is not only philosophy and science that are putting animals on the agenda. Increasingly, in Europe and the United States, animals are becoming a political issue as political parties vie for the 'green' and 'animal' vote. In turn, political scientists are beginning to look again at the history of political thought in relation to animals, and historians are beginning to revisit the political history of animal protection. As animals have grown as an issue of importance, so have there been more collaborative academic ventures leading to conference volumes, special journal issues, indeed new academic animal journals as well. Moreover, we have witnessed the growth of academic courses, as well as university posts, in Animal Ethics, Animal Welfare, Animal Rights, Animal Law, Animals and Philosophy, Human-Animal Studies, Critical Animal Studies, Animals and Society, Animals in Literature, Animals and Religion -tangible signs that a new academic discipline is emerging. 'Animal Ethics' is the new term for the academic exploration of the moral status of the non-human -an exploration that explicitly involves a focus on what we owe animals morally, and which also helps us to understand the influences -social, legal, cultural, religious, and political -that legitimate animal abuse. This series explores the challenges that Animal Ethics poses, both conceptually and practically, to traditional understandings of human-animal relations. The series is needed for three reasons: (i) to provide the texts that will service the new university courses on animals; (ii) to support the 10.1057/9780230306240 -Popular Media and Animals, Claire Molloy Copyright material from www.palgraveconnect.com -licensed to McGill University -PalgraveConnect -2013-01-05 xii Series Preface increasing number of students studying and academics researching in animal-related fields; and (iii) because there is currently no book series that is a focus for multidisciplinary research in the field. Specifically, the series will provide a range of key introductory and advanced texts that map out • ethical positions on animals; publish pioneering work written by new, as well as accomplished, • scholars; and produce texts from a variety of disciplines that are multidisciplinary • in character or have multidisciplinary relevance. The new Palgrave Macmillan Series on Animal Ethics is the result of a unique partnership between Palgrave Macmillan and the Ferrater Mora Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics. The series is an integral part of the mission of the Centre to put animals on the intellectual agenda by facilitating academic research and publication. The series is also a natural complement to one of the Centre's other major projects, the Journal of Animal Ethics. The Centre is an independent think-tank for the advancement of progressive thought about animals, and is the first centre of its kind in the world. It aims to demonstrate rigorous intellectual enquiry and the highest standards of scholarship. It strives to be a world-class centre of academic excellence in its field. We invite academics to visit www.oxfordanimalethics.com, the Centre's website, and to contact us with new book proposals for the series.

Annals of Science, 2013

In 2005 a small group of academics gathered at the University of Western Australia for a modest yet highly significant interdisciplinary conference focused on scholarship in the emerging field of human-animal studies. A critical mass of academics from the University of Tasmania attended that first conference and pledged to host a second human-animal studies conference two years later. True to their word a second human-animal studies conference was held in Hobart, Australia, in 2007. The organisers called the second conference "Considering Animals" and the book under review here is a compilation of papers presented at that conference. The first striking feature of the book Considering Animals (hardback version), is the artwork on the dust jacket (Figure 1). While some may not pay a book's dust jacket much heed, I view Considering Animals stunning cover-art as quite a coup. In an age of publishing rationalisation and belt-tightening, I imagine that the editors must have fought hard for permission to display a colour image on the book's cover; and for the inclusion of such a large number of pictures throughout the book. If this is the case, then their persistence paid off. Not only is Yvette Watt's cover-art beautiful and thought provoking in and of itself, it also serves to remind readers that this book is dealing with a highly interdisciplinary field of academic inquiry. Human-animal studies is not only about words. It is about images, representation, art and interpretation. One of the most noteworthy features of the biannual Australian Animal Studies Group, and the Minding Animals, conferences is the extent to which visual and other creative artists contribute to the field. With the use of such powerful cover-art the editors give effect to the contribution made by creative arts to the emerging discipline of human-animal studies. The book opens with a forward by well-known ecologist Marc Becoff and an introduction by two of the book's editors: Carol Freeman and Elizabeth Leane. The remainder of the book consists of 14 papers by (often prominent) academics, all of who presented at the 2007 University of Tasmania "Considering Animals" conference.

The concept for the project and exhibition series »we , animals« is based on a view of human-animal relations as defined in Human-Animal Studies. They are viewed as having developed over the course of history, being in a constant state of flux and which, in our dealings with animals, are continuously being produced and reproduced anew. Addressing the agency of animals in societal spaces leads to one of the core issues: how can we perceive animals as independent actors within historical, social and cultural processes? For the five projects I invited 10 artists whose works reflect upon our language and actions concerning animals on a daily basis. They throw light on specific interactions, human misconceptions and contradictions in relation to animals. They challenge the rigid categories that are applied to animals as working animals, livestock, mythical figures, pets or beasts. Their scientific references and performative or activist approaches helped shape the curatorial concept. This catalogue published by the curator Anne Hoelck documents the selected artistic contributions to the current debate on human-animal relations. It is enriched by the essays »Deconstructing the Anthropological Machine« by Jessica Ullrich and »Animal Biographies« by Stephan Zandt.

2014

Animals' omnipresence in human society makes them both close to and ye tremarkably distant from humans. Human and animal lives have always been entangled, but the way we see and practice the relationships between humans and animals - as close, intertwined, or clearly separate - varies from time to time and between cultures, societies, and even situations. By putting these complex relationships in focus, this anthology investigates the ways in which human society deals with its...

Semiotica, 1997

As has been proposed by cultural observers as diverse as Ruth Benedict (1974 [1946]), Norman Denzin (1991a, 1991b), David Riesman (1950), Northrup Frye (1973 [1957]), and Umberto Eco (1966), one potent approach for comprehending a society's values and beliefs is to examine the stories it tells. Because cultural narratives are created and consumed by those dwelling within a commonly-shared ideological community, they both preserve and perpetuate that society's sense of itself (Urban 1991). Cultural texts address such ongoing concerns as gender relationships, racial categories, and social class distinctions, while establishing boundaries between the society's conceptions of Good and Evil, Culture and

Journal of Animal Ethics, 2021