Annual Meeting of the International Association of Vegan Sociologists
Title: The Promise of Vegan Sociology: Vegan Sociology as a Conduit for Human and Nonhuman Emancipation
Date: October 9-10, 2021
Location: Online
In 1959 C. Wright Mills wrote of ‘the promise’ of sociology in highlighting the broader structural links between individual biographies, and the historical context that shapes them. Now, more than half a century later, sociology has been used to inform a range of perspectives on current social issues. While much of the sociological field is focused on human experiences, sociological animal studies have played a crucial role in highlighting that the social world is a shared one — with many other species entangled in relations that are presumed to be human specific. As the consequences of human exploitation of nonhuman others manifest with increasing severity in climate events, environmental destruction and nonhuman suffering, our multispecies scholarly endeavours are needed now more than ever. Sociology, with its attention to the manifestation and influence of power in everyday life, is well placed to not only highlight the structural roots of multispecies social issues, but to critique the anthroparchal construction of knowledge that further contributes to this oppression.
The importance of this scientific inquiry is not lost on animal advocates. Vegan pioneers consistently advocated science as a means to understand optimal human diet and nutritional requirements, create viable alternatives to cruel animal products, and validate the connection they perceived between human and nonhuman injustices. Indeed, veganism was, in many ways, an invention of modern scientific thinking as activists challenged mainstream dogmas with their fact-finding mission to expand knowledge for the betterment of global society. When the Vegan Society formed in the midst of World War 2, its founders envisioned veganism as a promising solution to many sufferings arising with modernity including sickness, famine, war, environmental destruction, and alienation from human, nonhuman and natural communities. As we know, sociology also emerged in response to modernization and its many unexpected consequences, and many practitioners (like Mills) certainly believe in its capacity to serve the social good.
As sociologists are well aware, information exchange between peer scholars, field experts, and community stakeholders is vital for expanding our knowledge and improving the quality of our research. Early vegan activists (having forged their fledgling vegan society in response to the stonewalling of the Vegetarian Society) were especially keen to maintain a robust, critical dialogue for the benefit of the movement and its constituency. Vegan sociology, then, emerges from a long tradition of reflexivity, discourse and debate in both activist and scholarly spaces that is rooted in a rigorous commitment to social justice. With these considerations in mind, this online event spotlights the promise of a new sociology, one that is informed by a specifically vegan epistemological stance. In line with the mission of both veganism and sociology, it also situates knowledge in explicitly anti-oppressive stances that challenge animal exploitation alongside other sites of domination such as white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism and ableism. We ask contributors to consider what a sociology that is explicitly vegan looks like, and how this might be employed to conduct scholarship that is for nonhuman animals.
This online conference, organised by the International Association of Vegan Sociologists will be held online from October 9th-10th, 2021.
IAVS Conference 2021 Lectures
Vegan Sociology
Situating Humans and Nonhuman Animals in ‘The Promise’ of Vegan Sociology
Zoei Sutton, Josephine Browne, Chantelle Bayes, Fiona De Rosa
Nonhuman Animals and Food
Catherine Oliver, University of Cambridge
Galline Promises: Urban Chicken-keeping through a Vegan Lens
Lyndsey Kramer, University of York
Creating a Paradigm to Understand Diet and Power
Kate Stewart, University of East Anglia
Claire Markham, Nottingham Trent University
“Look into the Pewter Pot”: The Agnotology of Selling a Rural Brew
Animal Agency in a Human-Dominated World
Hanna Mamzer, Adam Mickiewicz University
Agency Taken Away? Vegan Diets for Companion Animals
Krzysztof Niedziałkowski, Polish Academy of Sciences
Controversies around Animal Agency in Wildlife Conservation Programs
Interspecies Abuse, Gender, and Speciesism
Rochelle Stevenson, Thompson River University
Hierarchies and Bonds: Men’s Relationships with Companion Animals
Sarah May Lindsay, McMaster University
Speciesism in Emergency Intimate Partner Violence Shelters in Ontario, Canada
Serena Girard, Thompson Rivers University
Domestic Violence and Animal Abuse
Student Scholars of the ASA
Victoria Brockett, University of Illinois at Chicago
Veganism: A Lifestyle Movement for Whom?
Miri Eliyahu, Northwestern University
A Vegan Market for Non-Vegans
Carol Glasser, Minnesota State University, Mankato
Joining Human-Animal Studies and Public Sociology
British Innovations in Vegan Sociology
Lynda M. Korimboccus, University of East Anglia
Wee Vs: The Lived Experiences of Young Vegan Children in Scotland
Kate Stewart, University of East Anglia
Matthew Cole, Open University
Nick Pendergrast, University of Melbourne
Incorporating a Structural Approach into Animal Advocacy
Donelle Gadenne, Edgehill University
Veganism and the Veterinary Profession
Jessica Greenebaum, Central Connecticut State University
Liz Cherry, Manhattanville College
From Alternative to Mainstream: Being Vegan in a Non-Vegan World (1990s) to Convenience of Veganism in 2021
Christina Vasilopoulou & Alexandra Halkias, Panteion University
Animals and Biopolitical Power at the Attica Zoological Park
Human-Nonhuman Animal Coexistence
Maria Martelli
Vegan Sociology for Urban Coexistence: A Case Study of Pigeons and the European City
Brett Mills, Edge Hill University
Banal Speciesism
Jennifer Schauer, Boston College
Rights, Nonhuman Personhood, Sentience, and Legal Standing
Erika Cudworth, De Montfort University
Utopian Action is Survival Action: Anthroparchy, Capitolocene and a Sociology of Existential Threat