Applications are now open for this year's Summer University at Aarhus University, where my popular course "Animal Matters: Transforming Perspectives Through Human-Animal Studies" is part of the programme.
Check it out and SHARE!
international.au.dk/education/ad...
For academics, it's arguably good to be well-known and to reach beyond #academia.
But then, on the other hand, they're now selling t-shirts with the words "sexy bitch" next to a picture of Albert Einstein. #outreach
Yes, it's a bit like those US states that have voted to enshrine the right to hunt in state constitutions (which is at least as much about gun rights as hunting per se, of course), just a bit more ridiculous. It's a kind of fortification when you realize your actual arguments aren't convincing.
Indeed it is.
History is useful here: Those defending bullfights in other countries have in the past tried to get that recognized, and been refused, by UNESCO.
The case for bullfighting as "cultural heritage" is bad, but the case for fox hunting is even worse. So thankfully this will not succeed.
"Science is a slaughterhouse" is an interesting way to start an argument about reducing nonhuman animal suffering in science.
If something is bad enough to be the tenor of such a metaphor, maybe something should be done about that something.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
While this focuses mostly on film, and I focus mostly on literary fiction, this makes an argument not unlike (albeit shorter and far more superficial than) the one I make in chapter 7 of my book "Reading Slaughter" (2022).
www.currentaffairs.org/news/the-hor...
Shit mand. Det bliver nogle store bunker vi kan lave rundt om Axelborg, når næste pandemi rammer...
You need the smoked paprika. Then at least it tastes like SMOKED dirt 😅. (seriously, though, probably my most used spice).
Fun fact:
Scherfig's gravesite doesn't have any name or inscription.
The tombstone is, however, an animal statue (not an okapi, though).
Anyone can go to Assistens Kirkegård in Copenhagen to see if they can find it 🙂🐢
Uuuh. Hvad skal der til for at man kan komme på besøg dér?
“But you are making plans / without a future and my now / is twisted into your crying.” Read “Entanglements,” a poem by Ursula K. Le Guin about cats.
And he proposed farther, that by employing Spiders, the Charge of dying Silks would be wholly saved; whereof I was fully convinced when he shewed me a vast Number of Flies most beautifully coloured, wherewith he fed his Spiders;
Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels (1735)
"Their business model is based on organized crime, so it would be unfair to ask them not to break the law."
And so f*cking what?
When did we decide that having a business model that relies on theft is okay?
Jeg har spist sojapølser siden 80erne. Dengang var ingen forbrugere i tvivl, og det er de heller ikke nu.
Det her er et resultat af lobbyisme, fordi plantebaserede produkter har vind i sejlene og den animalske industri vil lave benspænd for de virksomheder, der laver dem. Klimafodslæb. #suk
I suspect a double-edged sword here. At least, I remember when one of the most racist politicians in Danish history cited liking hummus as proof that his political views were not motivated by racism.
Jane Goodall's work insisting, with evidence from her brilliant and tenacious fieldwork, that we were not so separate from animals, and they were much more like us than the Eurocentric theorists asserted, was so important.
It's a great film. I often use it in teaching. For different reasons, incl. the way it redeems street dogs and, well, just for fun.
Jeg havde for et stykke tid siden en god snak om dyr og fortællinger med @sofiegraarup.bsky.social.
Det var sjovt, og det er der nu kommet et podcastafsnit ud af, som du kan lytte til når og hvor du vil :-)
Soon all the pigs were calm and quiet, as they had never been in life. But that did not excuse the crime. Their betrayal.
Neil Astley, The End of My Tether (2002) #Animals #Literature #Novels #Slaughterhouse
“Horses were a part of the daily fabric of life for many enslaved Black people.” On the importance of the horse in escaping slavery.
What about the caged half-crazed
orang-utan who vomits because
he has nothing else to do?
Miroslav Holub, From "Collision" #InternationalOrangutanDay #Zoos #Animals #Poetry
The collared lizards cry at night
because El Paso is too hot
for their detachable blue tails.
The desert turtle stops and
waits as a cartel truck drives by
and dark houses illuminate
what is hidden there.
Ray Gonzales, From "El Paso" (2023) #WorldLizardDay
What makes a dog run away, then?
The desire to live.
You’ve never seen a dog trembling?
A dog trembles when he doesn’t know what to do.
Like us!
No, you tremble when you know what to do as much as when you don’t.
Fart off, dog.
John Berger, King: A Street Story (1999) #dogs #literature
"I refuse to bend the knee to those environmental alarmist Thoreau-lovers—and not just because I’m missing a leg."
All of which is to say: This whole thing shows at least as much about how f*cked up people's relations to companion animals is as it does about zoos.
It's been interesting to follow on Danish social media. Most comments are either something like "Great idea" or "Horrible. Sick. Not for my cat/dog/horse/rabbit".
Surprisingly few (but some) ask the perhaps most relevant question: Why would you kill a healthy pet?
Ah, the simple beauty and truth of an Allingham couplet. #animals #literaryanimalstudies #poetry
"Det er faktisk først på mandag". Ligner jeg måske en matematiker eller anden naturvid-person?!?!?
Tid er alligevel en kulturel konstruktion, hvilket grundlæggende invaliderer alle påstande om fødselsdage.
