Toward a Postcolonial, Posthumanist Feminist Theory: Centralizing Race and Culture in Feminist Work on Nonhuman Animals

Hypatia ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 527-545 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maneesha Deckha
Keyword(s):  
Feminist Theory ◽  
Animal Ethics ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Race And Culture ◽  
Feminist Work

Posthumanist feminist theory has been instrumental in demonstrating the salience of gender and sexism in structuring human–animal relationships and in revealing the connections between the oppression of women and of nonhuman animals. Despite the richness of feminist posthumanist theorizations it has been suggested that their influence in contemporary animal ethics has been muted. This marginalization of feminist work—here, in its posthumanist version—is a systemic issue within theory and needs to be remedied. At the same time, the limits of posthumanist feminist theory must also be addressed. Although posthumanist feminist theory has generated a sophisticated body of work analyzing how gendered and sexist discourses and practices subordinate women and animals alike, its imprint in producing intersectional analyses of animal issues is considerably weaker. This leaves theorists vulnerable to charges of essentialism, ethnocentrism, and elitism despite best intentions to avoid such effects and despite commitments to uproot all forms of oppression. Gender‐focused accounts also preclude understanding of the importance of race and culture in structuring species‐based oppression. To counter these undesirable pragmatic and conceptual developments, posthumanist feminist theory needs to engender feminist accounts that centralize the structural axes of race and culture.

Intersectional disgust? Animals and (eco)feminism

2010 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 397-406 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Twine
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Humanities And Social Sciences ◽  
Intersectional Theory ◽  
Feminist Work

This paper explores tensions between feminisms on the issue of nonhuman animals. The possibility of a posthuman or more-than-human account of intersectionality is explored through the retelling of an encounter with a feminist academic colleague and her experience of disgust toward a book I was carrying (Animals and Women: Feminist Theoretical Explorations, Adams and Donovan, 1995). I argue that such disgust responses can be read as the affective embodiment of unacknowledged human/animal hierarchy and act to impede intersectional theory and politics. Moreover this disgust response is paradigmatic of a certain feminist disavowal of ecofeminism misread as a stereotypical representation of essentialist thinking. Reversing this I argue that it is humanist disgust rather than ecofeminism that may be seen as ‘out of date’ especially when one appreciates how the more-than-human have come to occupy a significant place in both feminist work and the broader humanities and social sciences. In conclusion the paper claims that feminist engagement with nonhuman animals is entirely consistent with its multi-faceted interrogation of dualist ontology, and, whilst the ethics of this engagement may be complex, it is no longer tenable for feminist work to exclude nonhuman animals from its understanding of sociality, politics or ethics.

scholarly journals Human–Animal Relations in Business and Society: Advancing the Feminist Interpretation of Stakeholder Theory

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Linda Tallberg ◽  
José-Carlos García-Rosell ◽  
Minni Haanpää
Keyword(s):  
Stakeholder Theory ◽  
Business And Society ◽  
Feminist Interpretation ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Care Relationships ◽  
Human Actors ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Animal Care ◽  
Scholarly Attention

AbstractStakeholder theory has largely been anthropocentric in its focus on human actors and interests, failing to recognise the impact of nonhumans in business and organisations. This leads to an incomplete understanding of organisational contexts that include key relationships with nonhuman animals. In addition, the limited scholarly attention paid to nonhumans as stakeholders has mostly been conceptual to date. Therefore, we develop a stakeholder theory with animals illustrated through two ethnographic case studies: an animal shelter and Nordic husky businesses. We focus our feminist reading of Driscoll and Starik’s (J Bus Ethics 49:55–73, 2004) stakeholder attributes for nonhumans and extend this to include affective salience built on embodied affectivity and knowledge, memories, action and care. Findings reveal that nonhuman animals are important actors in practice, affecting organisational operations through human–animal care relationships. In addition to confirming animals are stakeholders, we further contribute to stakeholder theory by offering ways to better listen to nontraditional actors.

scholarly journals The Ethics of Touch and the Importance of Nonhuman Relationships in Animal Agriculture

2021 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Steve Cooke
Keyword(s):  
Stress Reduction ◽  
Animal Ethics ◽  
Physiological Responses ◽  
Animal Agriculture ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Social Animals ◽  
Reduction Methods ◽  
Salient Features

AbstractAnimal agriculture predominantly involves farming social animals. At the same time, the nature of agriculture requires severely disrupting, eliminating, and controlling the relationships that matter to those animals, resulting in harm and unhappiness for them. These disruptions harm animals, both physically and psychologically. Stressed animals are also bad for farmers because stressed animals are less safe to handle, produce less, get sick more, and produce poorer quality meat. As a result, considerable efforts have gone into developing stress-reduction methods. Many of these attempt to replicate behaviours or physiological responses that develop or constitute bonding between animals. In other words, humans try to mitigate or ameliorate the damage done by preventing and undermining intraspecies relationships. In doing so, the wrong of relational harms is compounded by an instrumentalisation of trust and care. The techniques used are emblematic of the welfarist approach to animal ethics. Using the example of gentle touching in the farming of cows for beef and dairy, the paper highlights two types of wrong. First, a wrong done in the form of relational harms, and second, a wrong done by instrumentalising relationships of care and trust. Relational harms are done to nonhuman animals, whilst instrumentalisation of care and trust indicates an insensitivity to morally salient features of the situation and a potential character flaw in the agents that carry it out.

Canine Rescue as a Social Movement: The Politics of Love

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 670-687
Author(s):  
Anna L. Peterson
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Public Sphere ◽  
Animal Rights ◽  
Animal Advocacy ◽  
The Social ◽  
Human Animal Bond ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Political Approach ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Politics Of Love

Abstract Canine rescue is a growing movement that affects the lives of tens of thousands of nonhuman animals and people every year. Rescue is noteworthy not only for its numbers, but also because it challenges common understandings of animal advocacy. Popular accounts often portray work on behalf of animals as sentimental, individualistic, and apolitical. In fact, work on behalf of animals has always been political, in multiple ways. It is characterized both by internal political tensions, especially between animal rights and welfare positions, and by complex relations to the broader public sphere. I analyze canine rescue, with a focus on pit bull rescue, to show that an important segment of canine rescue movements adopts an explicitly political approach which blurs the divide between rights and welfare, addresses the social context of the human-animal bond, and links animal advocacy to social justice.

Feminist theory and the problem of misogyny

2021 ◽  
pp. 146470012110393
Author(s):  
Samantha Pinson Wrisley
Keyword(s):  
Feminist Theory ◽  
Feminist Scholarship ◽  
Gendered Violence ◽  
Institutional Effects ◽  
Comprehensive Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Dynamic ◽  
Emotional Complexity ◽  
Feminist Work

Feminist theory, broadly construed, lacks a comprehensive theory of misogyny. While there has been a great deal of feminist work dedicated to analysing the social, cultural, political, and institutional effects of misogyny, the ancillary theories of misogyny these analyses produce are only ever partial, fragmented, vague or conceptually inconsistent. This article engages and critiques these theories by focusing on three separate but related issues within existing feminist scholarship on misogyny: the conflation of misogyny with sexism, the elision of misogyny's affective elements and the supplanting of misogyny with gendered violence. Through my identification and critique of these issues, I argue that misogyny should be understood as a profoundly complicated and emotional social dynamic. Moreover, I argue that to attempt to cleanse misogyny of its affective/emotional complexity or conflate misogyny with sexism and/or violence is to rob theorists of possible loci of apprehension and intervention. My hope is that this article will stimulate feminist theorists to work collectively towards a more comprehensive feminist understanding of misogyny – one that grapples with the interpersonal and affective complexities of how misogyny emerges, circulates and self-perpetuates.

Animals in Political Theory

2015 ◽  
pp. 42-64
Author(s):  
Sue Donaldson ◽  
Will Kymlicka
Keyword(s):  
Political Theory ◽  
Animal Rights ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Animal Ethics ◽  
Moral Rights ◽  
The Public ◽  
History Of ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Animal Question ◽  
Blind Spots

Western political theorists have largely ignored the animal question, assuming that animals have no place in our theories of democracy, citizenship, membership, sovereignty, and the public good. Conversely, animal ethicists have largely ignored political theory, assuming that we can theorize the moral status and moral rights of animals without drawing on the categories and concepts of political theory. This chapter traces the history of this separation between animals and political theory, examines the resulting intellectual blind spots for animal ethics, and reviews recent attempts to bring the two together. Situating animal rights within political theory has the potential to identify new models of justice in human-animal relations, and to open up new areas of scholarship and research.

Introduction: managing and experiencing an equestrian event.

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Katherine Dashper ◽  
Guðrún Helgadóttir ◽  
Ingibjörg Sigurðardóttir
Keyword(s):  
Animal Studies ◽  
Research Process ◽  
Background Information ◽  
Critical Examination ◽  
Active Involvement ◽  
Sports Events ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Human Animal

Abstract This introductory chapter begins with a brief discussion of key findings in the wider field of event studies, focusing mainly on sports events as our case study is primarily an elite sporting competition. We then introduce the idea of multispecies events, drawing on insights from human-animal studies to consider how the active involvement of nonhuman animals shapes all aspects of the event experience. After discussing equestrian tourism and equestrian events more broadly, we introduce the case study event - Landsmót, the National Championships of the Icelandic horse - in more detail to provide the reader with important background information to the event which provides the empirical base and therefore unites subsequent chapters. The chapter ends with an overview of the research process underpinning the book and an outline of the chapter contributions that enable holistic critical examination of a multispecies event and cultural festival.

Does Beast Suffering Count for Kant

2004 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 375-390 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heike Baranzke ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Animal Rights ◽  
Animal Ethics ◽  
Emotional Needs ◽  
Animal Suffering ◽  
Moral Concepts ◽  
Perfect Duties ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Human Responsibility

Ever since Schopenhauer´s accusation, it has been disputed whether Kant´s few remarks concerning the ethical human-animal-relationship in the Lectures and in the Doctrine of Virtue fail to support ethical arguments on behalf of animals. One critique that plays a central role is whether Kant would have forbidden cruelty to brutes for educational purposes. In addition to these old objections, Kant´s ethics is charged to be speciesistic by animal ethicists and animal rights philosophers at present.The following article examines especially §17 of the Doctrine of Virtue, which is the only animal ethical text authorized by Kant himself. The interpretation starts by taking the context of §17 into account, particularly the “Episodic Section on an Amphiboly in Moral Concepts”. The systematic output of the cruelty-account and of the duty classes is then analyzed. Central for the understanding of Kant´s argumentation relating to animals are the perfect duties to oneself, which are linked to Kant´s foundation of human dignity. Finally the roles of the physical and emotional needs of brutes and humans in Kant´s ethics are compared with each other. Some conclusions are then drawn concerning human and animal rights in relation to a duty-based argumentation. The article therefore appreciates Kant´s integration of animal suffering into the very core of his virtue ethics, an integration that may be able to open the door for an enlightened animal ethics based on human responsibility.

scholarly journals Visualizing Human-Animal-Technology Relations

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 225-256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Bear ◽  
Katy Wilkinson ◽  
Lewis Holloway
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Animal Studies ◽  
Social Research ◽  
Dairy Farms ◽  
Visual Ethnography ◽  
Human Research ◽  
Nonhuman Animals ◽  
Field Notes ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
Robotic Milking

This paper explores the potential for less anthropocentric approaches to researching human-nonhuman relations through visual ethnography, critically examining the conceptualization of nonhuman animals as participants. Arguing that method in animal studies has developed more slowly than theory, it proposes visual approaches as a way of foregrounding nonhuman animals’ behavior and actions in “social” research. Questioning the meaning of “participation,” this challenges underlying anthropocentric assumptions of visual ethnography. The paper presents a comparison of approaches used in studying sites, moments and movements of robotic milking on United Kingdom dairy farms: field notes, still photography, and digital video. While visual approaches are not a panacea for more-than-human research, we suggest that they offer a means through which nonhumans might “speak for themselves.” Rather than presenting definitive accounts, including video in such work also leaves the actions of nonhumans open to further interpretation, destabilizing the centrality of the researcher.

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