October 28th, 2009 at 7:02 am
Animal Studies round-up
The Chronicle Review recently featured a series of articles exploring the rise of animal studies in the academy. Articles include Creature Consciousness, which explores some of the theoretical and philosophical foundations of animal studies as well as the line that some academics juggle between scholarship and advocacy. The article includes a quote from Matthew Calarco, author of Zoographies: The Question of the Animal from Heidegger to Derrida, on the impact of animal studies on philosophy. From the piece:
Thinkers on both the analytic and Continental sides “are beginning to say that this primacy we give to the human-mind relationship to the world needs to be displaced,” Calarco says. “There’s a kind of implicit anthropomorphism that dominates philosophy, and that is being attacked from different angles.”
In another article, Presses, Journals, and Meetings Buzz With Animal Studies, Wendy Lochner, editor of the animal studies list at Columbia University Press is quoted and cited for developing one of the strongest lists in the field. From the article:
Columbia University Press has also established itself as a strong publisher of animal-studies scholarship. Wendy Lochner, a senior executive editor for philosophy, religion, and animal studies at the press, emphasizes work in which species functions as a critical category, like race or gender. “It requires a radical rethinking of our life on earth and how we view human beings” relative to other animals and the planet, she says.