SPRING 2017

(In Collaboration with the Religious Ethics Workshop) “The ‘Human Prejudice’ and Nonhuman Others” by Sara-Jo Swiatek (PhD Student, Religious Ethics, University of Chicago)

“Anatomy of a Ghost: An Essay on the Hauntological Commodity” by Cody Jones (PhD Student, Comparative Literature, University of Chicago)

“The Beautiful Cell: Image and Affect” by Sam Schulte (PhD Student, Conceptual and Historical Studies of Science, University of Chicago)

(In Collaboration with the Comparative Behavioral Biology Workshop) “Making, Breaking, Reinventing: engaging human-other animal interface research in the Anthropocene” by Agustin Fuentes (Professor of Anthropology, University of Notre Dame)

*CANCELLED* “Barren Cows and the Restoration of Kingship at Ithaca” by Claudio Sansone (PhD Student, Comparative Literature, University of Chicago)

 

WINTER 2017

Around the World in 80 Animal/Nonhuman Studies: Regional Perspectives on Beings at the Margins of Humanity

(In Collaboration with the Latin American Studies Workshop) “Energetic Loló Soldevilla” [Energy Exploration and the Art of Dolores Soldevilla (1901-71)] by Rachel Price (Associate Professor of Spanish and Portuguese Studies, Princeton University) with discussant Laura Gandolfi (Assistant Professor of Latin American Literature, University of Chicago)

“Shapeshifting Iranian Demons” by Sam Lasman (PhD Student, Comparative Literature, University of Chicago) 

“Prehistoric Natives in the Anthropocene: The Case of the Iguanas” by Jess Robinson (PhD Candidate, Anthropology, University of Chicago) 

“Africa in/and the Anthropocene” by Brady Smith (Humanities Teaching Scholar, English, University of Chicago)

“Canine Visions: Working with Sight in Veterinary Ophthalmology” by Adam Bain (MD-PhD Student, Conceptual and Historical Studies of Science, Anthropology, Pritzker School of Medicine, University of Chicago)

 

FALL 2016

(In Collaboration with the Comparative Behavioral Biology Workshop) “Forced Copulation for Conservation” by Juno Salazar Parrenas (Associate Professor of Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies, Ohio State University)

“Nature without God: The Birth of a Medieval Humanistic  Ecology in Johannes de Hauvilla’s Architrenius” by David Orsborn (Comparative Literature and Classics, University of Chicago)

“Women and Wild Animals on the Silent Screen” by Aurore Spiers (Cinema and Media Studies, University of Chicago)

(In Collaboration with the Early Christian Studies Workshop) “Animals in Christian Magical Texts from Egypt” by Korshi Dosoo (Early Christian Studies, Universite Paris-Sorbonne)

“The Nature of Capitalism: Homo Economicus and the Ecology of Human Nature” by Jacob Harris (English, University of Chicago)

 

SPRING 2016

(In collaboration with the History of Human Sciences Workshop) “Animal Encounters in The Unwild or What Is It Like To Hold Down A Baby Monkey: On Metaphysical Excess, and ‘The Three Rs’ as Paradoxes of Authority.” Sam Schulte, Committee on Conceptual and Historical Studies of Science, University of Chicago

“To be (a baboon), or not to be (a bat); On Time and Subjectivity in Baboon Mothers and Infants.” Sam Schulte, The Committee on the Conceptual and Historical Studies of Science, University of Chicago

“Carnivorous Cinema.” James Leo Cahill, Cinema Studies Institute and Department of French, University of Toronto

““Domesticated Necromancy: ‘Renart Magicien’ and the Non-Humanity of Language.” Matthew Vanderpoel, Divinity, University of Chicago

“Science as Fantasy: Conflicted Appeals in Maya the Bee and her Adventures (1925).” Tyler Schroeder, Cinema and Media Studies, University of Chicago

“Surra ( Trypanosma evansi) and the Transformation of Veterinary Medicine in Colonial India.” James Hevia, International History, University of Chicago

 

WINTER 2016

“Sufficient Delineation; or, What Mickey Mouse Proves.” Hannah Frank, Cinema and Media Studies, University of Chicago

“Mark Twain’s Human-Animal Studies: “Imperial” Morals, Biological Training, and the Politics of Nature.” Agnes Malinowska, Social Thought, University of Chicago

“Gorilla and Gorillai: Animals and Others in the Classical Tradition.” Clara Bosak-Schroeder, Classics, University of Illinois—Urbana-Champaign

“Pigs in the Parlor: Species and Nuisances in the American Suburbs.” Laura Perry, English, University of Wisconsin—Madison

“Charles Darwin’s Post-Mortem Natural History: (De)Composing the Earth Through the Action of Worms.” Sarah Bezan, English, University of Alberta

(In collaboration with the Theology and Religious Ethics Workshop) “Animals as Means and Ends: Taking the Teleological-Chain of Being Seriously.” Dylan Belton, Theology, University of Notre Dame

 

FALL 2015

“The Wind-Up Bird: Pigeons, Drones, and Biomilitarism.” Bill Hutchison, English, University of Chicago

(In collaboration with the University of Chicago Animal Welfare Society) “The Sexual Politics of Meat Slideshow”. Carol Adams, Independent Scholar

“Beyond Good and Evil: Reading Religion in the American Pitbull.” Katharine Mershon, Divinity, University of Chicago

“Determining what? Thoughts on pastoralism as a beastly problem in anthropology and beyond.” Hannah Chazin, Anthropology, University of Chicago

“Uncertain hog futures (or, two bacon shortages and the financial life of the capitalist pig).” Jan Dutkiewicz, Politics, New School

“Shelter Promises: Encounters in the Ruff.” Harlan Weaver, Women’s Studies, Kansas State University

 

SPRING 2015

April 6, 2015

“The Studio in the Field: Techniques of Early Wildlife Photography”

Carl Fuldner, Art History, University of Chicago

April 20, 2015

“Connection to the Collection: the value of human and non-human encounters in a Bahamian zoo”

Jessica Robinson, Anthropology, University of Chicago

May 4, 2015

“Of Dogs and Hot Dogs: Dialectics between Image and Language in Early Silent Shorts”

Pao-Chen Tang, CMS, University of Chicago

May 7, 2015

“Lousy Bodies”

Lynn Festa, English, Rutgers University
(in collaboration with the 18th- and 19th-Century Atlantic Cultures workshop)

May 11, 2015

Coffee with N. Katherine Hayles, Literature, Duke University

Join the Animal Studies workshop for an informal conversation with Professor Hayles about animals, plants, robots, software, and other forms of life.

May 18, 2015

“The Question of Gentile Bestiality: Shame, Subjectivity, and Sex with Animals in Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 55a-b”

Beth Berkowitz, Religious Studies, Barnard College
(in collaboration with the Jewish Studies workshop and the Chicago Center for Jewish Studies)

 

WINTER 2015

January 12, 2015

“Why Look at Plants?”
Giovanni Aloi, Antennae: The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, School of the Art Institute of Chicago

This workshop will consist of a presentation and talk, followed by a discussion. The attached essay, “Of Plants and Other Secrets” by Michael Marder, should be read in advance.

January 26, 2015

“The Production of Animal Boredom on the American Factory Farm”
Alex Blanchette, Anthropology and Environmental Studies, Tufts University

February 9, 2015

“A Field Guide to the Bestiarium Judaicum”
Jay Geller, Divinity, Vanderbilt University (in collaboration with the Jewish Studies workshop and the Chicago Center for Jewish Studies)

February 23, 2015

“A Chicken in Every Pot? Bird Exploitation in Ancient Egypt Re-considered.”
Rozenn Bailleul-Lesuer, Ph.D Candidate in Egyptology, NELC, University of Chicago

March 9, 2015

“Pussy Panic versus Liking Animals: Tracking Gender in Animal Studies”
Susan Fraiman, English, University of Virginia

 

FALL 2014

October 6, 2014

“Fat Pets”
Don Kulick, Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago

November 3, 2014

Implicit Faith, ‘Avant-Garde Conformity,’ and the Religious Life of Animals
Joanna Picciotto, English, Berkeley

Presented in collaboration with the Renaissance Workshop. This event is made possible by generous support from the Nicholson Center for British Studies.

November 4, 2014

“Implementing Animal Rights: the Ethical Foundation”
Martha Nussbaum, Professor of Law and Ethics, University of Chicago

**Please note unusual date and time: this event will be on a Tuesday from 12-1:30 PM in Classics 110. Please feel free to bring lunch; light refreshments will be served.**

(Note: this will be a lunchtime event. Please check back for more information, or join our mailing list.)

November 17, 2014

Carly Lane, Committee on Social Thought, University of Chicago
‘The Starry Heavens Above Me and the Moral Law Within’: Transcendentalism’s Claim Against Deep Ecology

Presented in collaboration with the Theology and Religious Ethics Workshop

December 1, 2014

Cassie Freeman and Ashley Drake, Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago
“Zoo Visitors’ Subjective Meaning-making Across Four Species”

 

SPRING 2014

April 23, 2014

“Of Dogs, Wolves, and Germs: Evolution and Technology in Jack London’s ‘Machine Age'”
Agnes Malinowska, Social Thought, University of Chicago

May 7, 2014

“‘Our Daily Bread’: Preservation, the Food Industry, and the Interrogation of Visual Evidence”
Alice Kuzniar, German and English, University of Waterloo

May 14, 2014 CANCELED

“Veterinary Medicine in Early Modern England”
Louise Curth, Medical History, University of Winchester

May 21, 2014

“Backstory: Migration, Assimilation, and Invasion in the 19th Century”
Harriet Ritvo, History, MIT

June 4, 2014

“Subjects of Justice: Representing Animals in Amsterdam”
Ashley Drake, Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago

 

WINTER 2014

January 10, 2014

“The ‘Anthropological Machine’ in Medieval Art: Cows, Martyrs, and Other Animals” (Friday, 12-1:30 pm, Cochrane Woods Art Center, room 152)
Robert Mills, Art History, University College London

January 15, 2014

“Animals Are Good to ____ with: Parallax and the Influence of the Medieval Bestiary on Resolving Binaries in ‘Proteus’ and ‘Nausicaa'”
Megan Boatright, Comparative Literature, University of Chicago

January 29, 2014

“Animals in the Garden of Eden: Carnivorousness and Eschatology in Medieval Jewish Thought”
David Shyovitz, History/Jewish Studies, Northwestern University

February 12, 2014

“Making the Przewalski’s Horse”
Nigel Rothfels, History, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

February 26, 2014

“America’s ‘Sacrificial Lambs:’ The Literary Construction of Minority Identity through Representations of Animality”
Katharine Mershon, Religion and Literature, Divinity School, University of Chicago

March 12, 2014

“Psychoanalytic Animal”
Maud Ellmann, English, University of Chicago

 

FALL 2013

October 9, 2013

“Encounters in the Space of Death: Predator and Prey at Chavín”
Mary Weismantel, Anthropology, Northwestern University

October 23, 2013

“Why Keep a Dog and Bark Yourself? Canine Narration and Human Perversion in German Literary Modernism”
Joela Jacobs, Germanic Studies, University of Chicago

November 6, 2013

“A Whale on the Beach: Ethics of Human-Whale Interaction at Makah”
Les Beldo, Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago

November 20, 2013

“Animals, Identity, and the Environment in the Hellenistic and Roman Worlds”
Jared Secord, Harper and Schmidt Fellow, University of Chicago

December 4, 2013

“The Ambivalence of Ahimsa for Animal Studies” (in Wieboldt 408!)
Wendy Doniger, History of Religions, Divinity School, University of Chicago