In this episode, we highlight the student experience. As we discuss how activists might realize their dream to be better advocates through sociological training, Loredana shares her unique path to animal studies from a nonprofit background in animal and environmental advocacy. She also offers insight on the importance of networking and using the growing interest in climate change as a platform for addressing speciesism. Loredana has been active with the ASA Animals & Society Section for a decade and operates the section newsletter and social media. She received her BS in Economics from the Romanian Academy Of Economic Studies, her MA in Sociology & Media from New York University, and is currently completing her PhD at Cornell University in Sociology. Her research interests include the politics of climate change, social movements, institutional discourse, organizations, and animals and society.
This episode covers the growth of animal studies in social psychology and spotlights emerging research, such as that investigating the “meat paradox” and vegan feminism. We also chat about some useful strategies for finding support in academia and getting your work recognized. Learn more about the upcoming Animal Advocacy Conference here.
Dr. Kristof Dhont is a Senior Lecturer and Director of Graduate Studies (Research) in the School of Psychology at the University of Kent in Canterbury, England. He is the founder and director of SHARKLab, dedicated to the study human intergroup and human-animal relations. He currently serves as Associate Editor for the journal Group Processes & Intergroup Relations (GPIR) and as Consulting Editor for the European Journal of Personality (EJP). Kristof’s interests include the situational and personality factors that drive and sustain intergroup biases such as ethnic and gender-based prejudice as well as speciesism, with a special interest in social-ideological variables (e.g. social dominance orientation and authoritarianism) and identity-based processes. He investigates the factors shaping people’s perceptions and thinking about animals, the complexities and paradoxes in human-animal relations, and the moral psychology of eating and exploiting animals. You can learn more about this fascinating research in his 2020 book, Why We Love and Exploit Animals: Bridging Insights from Academia and Advocacy (Dhont & Hodson eds., Routledge).
In this episode, Dr. Nibert shares his path to the field beginning in 1983 and the institutional barriers the subfield has faced through its formation to present day.
Professor David Nibert is a scholar/activist who teaches courses on animals and society, global injustice, the sociology of law, and social stratification. He has worked as a tenant organizer, as a community activist, and in the prevention of mistreatment and violence against devalued groups. He is the author of several books: Animal Oppression and Human Violence: Domesecration, Capitalism and Global Conflict (Columbia University Press); Animal Rights/Human Rights: Entanglements of Oppression and Liberation (Rowman/Littlefield) and a two-volume work titled Animal Oppression and Capitalism (Praeger Press).
For additional commentary on the importance of Nibert’s work, see this complementary video by sociologist Dr. Roger Yates.
This episode discusses new sociological research on species-inclusive culture and the social construction of species. Dr. Sutton also discusses some strategies for survival in the discipline, including networking, building relationships, and adopting a broad sociological training. We also chat about the differences between animal law and sociology as well as new developments in sociology for other animals.
Dr Zoei Sutton is a sociologist specialising in qualitative research with both human and nonhuman animals. Dr. Sutton draws on her sociological expertise to analyse the relationships between human and nonhuman animals through qualitative interviews, observation and media analysis. Through this research she has examined both micro and macro levels of society to understand the nuances of everyday relationships as experienced by participants, and how these reflect and inform a broader social context. Her research interests include critical animal studies, social inclusion, the complexity and intersectionality of inequality and inclusive methodologies. Her research is available on Academia.edu and Researchgate.net.
In this episode, we discuss the connections between communication studies and sociology, how section membership can nurture our interests and a variety of career paths, and the importance of bridging academics and activists with public sociology. Casey also outlines her work with the scholar-activism nonprofit, Faunalytics.
Casey Riordan spent five years working as a communications specialist in the U.S., U.K., and Australia before following her heart and dedicating her career to the animal advocacy movement. In 2018, Casey was accepted to New York University’s inaugural Animal Studies M.A. program, where she became involved in the Animals & Society Section of the American Sociological Association first as a conference committee member and then as the newsletter editor. Upon graduating from NYU in 2020, Casey joined Faunalytics as their Communications & Development Manager, where she works closely with advocates and academics in the animal protection movement.
In this episode, we chat about the deeply intersectional nature of human/nonhuman relations and environmental issues. Dr. York also highlights the importance of thinking historically in our discipline with regard to how these issues have emerged over time. We also talk about the importance of centering our sense of justice in our academic endeavors.
Dr. Richard York is a professor of Sociology and Environmental Studies with the University of Oregon. He is an environmental sociologist whose work combines human ecology and political economy. He is both a theorist and an empirical researcher, who primarily uses quantitative methods. One focus of his research is on how the structural characteristics of societies, including demographic, economic, and technological factors, influence levels of resource consumption and pollution emissions. Additionally, he examines the connections between animals and societies. He also studies the sociology, philosophy, and history of science.
This episode discusses the importance of mentorship, developing a strategy for employment outside of academia, and applying classical sociological theory and Black feminist theory to Critical Animal Studies. Dr. Greenebaum is a professor of sociology at Central Connecticut State University. She specializes in feminism, inequalities, and animal rights activism. Her research covers issues related to vegan feminism and vegan identity. Her research is available on Academia.edu and Researchgate.net.
Dr. Grassian earned a PhD in Social Policy with the University of Kent. In this episode, he discusses how scholars can integrate social policy, intersectionality, and sociological theory for a variety of academic and applied career paths. Folks interested in pursuing a degree outside of the US may also find this episode useful.
Dr. Grassian conducted research with non-profit organizations promoting meat reduction and veg*nism, in the largest study of its kind and has given presentations all over the world about the project. The project is mixed methods, incorporating a longitudinal survey, focus groups and individual interviews with campaign staff and participants. The full dissertation is freely available online, as well as a summary report. He also contributed to the seminal volume Environmental Nutrition(ed. Joan Sabaté), authoring a chapter entitled Food Policy: Where does environmental nutrition fit in?, and has additional publications currently in the pipeline.
His other research interests include behavior change, systems thinking approaches, humane education and policy and intervention effectiveness. You can follow his work via his blog, For Us All, or get in touch with him via email.
Humans across the globe share their homes with dogs, cats, rodents, and other animals. We call them companions, pets, or even family members. Thousands of pounds are invested in these animals with regard to food, treats, toys, clothing, kennels, healthcare, and even birthdays and funeral services. Clearly humans deeply care about other animals. At our core, we have empathy for animals other than ourselves.
Exploitative Economies Distort Our Empathy for Animals
So why do so many humans stop short of extending this compassion to animals categorized as food, clothing, or labour? Sociology offers a variety of explanations according to theoretical perspectives. Many sociologists, however, point to the economic structure of a society and the commodification of nonhuman animals. David Nibert has argued that our switch to a hunting economy not only created a society newly structured around the oppression of animals (speciesism) but it also created a society divided by gender. The transition to agriculture entrenched speciesism further with the advent of domestication. This also introduced class division since agriculture allowed for surplus goods (and unequal distribution).
By the late 1500s, early capitalism and colonial expansion spread and deepened speciesism across the globe (and, in doing so, introduced racial division as well). Today, in late-stage capitalism, speciesism (animal agriculture in particular) is more intensive than ever. It is rapidly normalizing in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and other previously colonized spaces as a result of Western coercion. These are regions where plant-based consumption was once normative. The loss of traditional foodways is not only harmful for nonhuman animals identified as “food,” but the global poor identified as their consumers. Social stratification, in other words, is rooted in the adoption of speciesism as a primary economy both past and present.
Distorted Empathy for Animals Includes Humans, Too
Notice how human oppression codeveloped with animal oppression. This intersectionality is key to the sociological understanding of speciesism. Species, race, class, gender, and other social categories are economically functional. They ensure that unpleasant jobs will be filled and that labour may be exploited for low cost (or for none at all). These categories also represent social difference and tend to facilitate conflict and discourage cooperation. For sociologists, this tendency is politically relevant. A divided society, after all, is more easily manipulated by the dominant class in support of its own interests.
The most fundamental social division is that between humans and other animals. It is this animalization which separates those who are marginalized from those who are centered in society with regard to social recognition and allocation of resources. Women are animalized, people of color are animalized, humans with disabilities are animalized, homosexual people are animalized, ethnic minorities are animalized, and non-binary and trans humans are animalized. Even nonhuman animals themselves are animalized.
This is because “animal” is a social category imbrued with symbolic meaning. Just like race really has more to do with power, prestige, and access to resources than it does with one’s actual skin color, species is also not so much about one’s biological makeup (i.e. if one has hands or hooves, skin or scales). All groups, whether human or nonhuman, that are labeled “animal” are described as physically and cognitively inferior to the dominant class and can be denied rights accordingly.
Unteaching Empathy
True, nonhuman and human animals are indeed biologically different. But there are many more commonalities between the two groups. Why do we emphasize difference over sameness? I have described a society that is fundamentally in conflict. In order to maintain such a volatile system, powerful ideologies must be introduced and enforced through institutions and socialization. Psychologists point to a variety of cognitive and emotional mechanisms for managing the discomfort humans feel when faced with contradictions in their empathy toward other animals. Sociologists, however, are interested in how our empathy for some animals and our lack of empathy for others is learned (or, more accurately, is taught).
We are taught by our parents that some animals are for petting, some animals are for admiring, some are pests we should kill, and others are food we should eat. Doctors (who generally lack nutritional training) teach us that eating animals and drinking nonhuman breastmilk is good for us. We are taught by our teachers, museums, and zoos that nonhuman animals are ours to exploit. Mainstream media (which long since converged in the 1990s under the ownership of a handful of powerful billionaires) programs us that animals are objects and our using them is good for the economy. We’re being taught these lessons from childhood throughout our life course.
Reclaiming Empathy
Fortunately, if speciesism is something that is learned, that means it is something which can be unlearned. Sociologists are also interested in how social change happens and how social justice can be achieved in a society that is fundamentally unequal. Although the system may be rigged against us (and nonhuman animals), individuals can resist the erosion of our empathy by choosing food, clothing, and entertainment which does not harm other animals. Individuals can also work to create a more inclusive, peaceful world by getting active in our communities and putting pressure on policy-makers. It is possible to reclaim our empathy for animals.
Originally published in ASA Footnotes , vol. 48 no. 3. pp. 16-17.
Corey Wrenn, University of Kent
Loredana Loy, Cornell University;
Bonnie Berry, Social Problems Research Group
Founded at the turn of the 21st century, our section has long been committed to unpacking the complex web of relationships that exist between humans and other animals. As COVID-19 can be traced to exposure to animals used for food (likely in wet markets or piggeries), our subfield is perhaps ideally positioned to offer critical insight.
Zoonotic diseases, like other natural disasters, have amplified in number and severity with the intensification of animal agriculture. Industrial production and consumption of animal products has entailed astonishing levels of environmental damage. One consequence is the increased contact between humans and other animals living in undeveloped spaces. The disruption to human communities created by the Western expansion of land-hungry “meat” and dairy has created widespread food insecurity, forcing many to rely on “bushmeat” to survive (Cawthorn and Hoffman 2015).
Harm is also imposed on communities where animal-based industrial operations reside and to the workers for these operations (who overwhelmingly originate in marginalized communities). As of this writing, several meat processing plants have reported outbreaks of COVID-19 (Almeida and Del Giudivice 2020), while Smithfield’s meat processing plant in South Dakota is host to the largest clustered outbreak in the U.S. (Lee 2020). The corporation has blamed the outbreak on “the living circumstances” and culture of its (mostly Latinx) workforce (Samaha 2020). Slaughterhouses are one of the country’s most dangerous industries, with or without a pandemic.
Likewise, the racialized narrative of Asian wet markets which dominates the COVID-19 origin story also avoids the root of the issue. Animal agriculture itself breeds pathogens (and has reduced the efficacy of antibiotics) as a matter of course. Although the scale and intensity of factory farming can exacerbate the development of disease, even smallscale family operations can produce global killers. This was the case of the 1918 influenza pandemic which began on a small Kansas farm. A farmer contracted the virus from his ducks only to unknowingly release it through the trenches of WWI soon after he enlisted (Humphreys 2018).
Despite these compelling links, research finds that the risk that animal agriculture poses to public health and environmental sustainability is largely dismissed, if acknowledged at all (Bristow and Fitzgerald 2011). Although this may seem irrational, it is not especially surprising. David Nibert (2003), one of our section’s founders, argues that economically driven speciesism has been fundamental to the manufacture and maintenance of human societies the world over, and rarely (if ever) sustainably so. Perhaps it is the mundane ubiquitousness of animals to social design that lends to their invisibility in mainstream sociological analysis.
Fundamental to our subdiscipline is the notion that humanity’s relationships with other animals are socially constructed. Sociology has challenged the notion that gender, race, and class are somehow biologically-based; and we apply this logic to the manufacture of species and nature. As humans, we are taught how to interact with one another, other animals, and our environments. The animal existing as “other” helps us to define what it is to be human (Irvine 2004). Put succinctly, the animal as other becomes a useful symbolic category for the purposes of rationalizing and legitimizing systemic exploitation.
As COVID-19 and hundreds of other zoonotic diseases have demonstrated, humanity’s oppressive relationship with other animals is not only dangerous for non-humans, but for humans as well (particularly marginalized groups). The toxicity of anthropocentric social structures must be tackled head-on in order to curb the lethal consequences to humans, other animals, and ecosystems. The task is formidable, but as the global response to COVID-19 has indicated, big change can happen fast when there is the impetus to do so.
Neo-colonial practices that serve to spread Western dietary practices, entrench developing regions in animal agriculture, and fan food insecurity, must be challenged. Much of the non-Western world has traditionally relied on plant-based consumption, a diet that has been gradually undermined by Western capitalist expansion. The heavy subsidization of animal agriculture and other animal-based industries shape economic landscapes, consumption patterns, and health (Allen 2011, Robison and Mulvany 2019, Simon 2013). Governmental bodies will need to cease subsidizing these industries and begin transitioning farmers toward truly sustainable, plant-based production. Such efforts are already taking shape and should be supported (Splitter 2020).
The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted all that sociology holds dear, from major social institutions to the most minor of social interactions. As such, sociologists cannot afford to continue ignoring and devaluing the nonhuman factor in human social life. We must begin to include non-humans in our research, not just as variables, but as sentient beings who, like ourselves, have a stake in our society’s present and future. Furthermore, the institutional and organizational dimensions of animal-based industries (as well as efforts to resist or reform them) deserve scholarly attention. It is our hope that sociology will take heed and expand its imagination to include other animals.
