E22: Ecofeminism and Entangled Empathy with Lori Gruen

Episode4, Series 3: Equity and Social Justice in Animal Advocacy: Ecofeminist Lori Gruen, shares insights with us about ecofeminist values and the connection between the oppression of women, people of global majority, animals, and the environment. 

Guest: Lori Gruen is the William Griffin Professor of Philosophy at Wesleyan University.  She is also a professor of Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Science in Society, and founder and coordinator of Wesleyan Animal Studies.  She is the author and editor of 15 books, including Entangled Empathy (Lantern, 2015); Critical Terms for Animal Studies (Chicago, 2018) and Ethics and Animals: An Introduction (Cambridge, 2011, second edition 2022). Gruen’s work lies at the intersection of ethical and political theory and practice, she critically interrogates oppressive systems that impact those often overlooked in traditional ethical investigations, e.g. women, people of color, incarcerated people, non-human animals.

Gruen has been involved in animal issues as a writer, teacher, and activist for over 25 years. Her relationships with scholars thinking about animals, activists working to protect animals, and, perhaps most importantly, with many different animals, uniquely inform her perspective on how we need to rethink our engagement with other animals.  She has published extensively on topics in animal ethics and ecofeminism and has become known as a bit of an archivist for chimpanzees in the US given her work documenting the history of The First 100 chimpanzees in research in the US (http://first100chimps.wesleyan.edu) and the journey to sanctuary of the remaining chimpanzees in research labs, The Last 1000 (http://last1000chimps.com).

See: www.lorigruen.com

Host: Marika started her career with non-human animals while obtaining her University degree in Zoology (UW). Initially she worked with large carnivores at zoos but after taking a course in dog training, and obtaining her CPDT-KA from the Certification Council for Professional Dog Trainers, she caught the animal welfare ‘bug’ and has been working with shelters and sanctuaries internationally for more than a decade. During this time she received the Susan Wilkens Achievement Award from APDTAU for her work in the sheltering community and The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee award for Meritorious Volunteer Service.

She completed her MA in Anthrozoology at the University of Exeter, UK in 2016 and upon moving back to the Seattle area of Washington state she joined the board of Homeward Pet Adoption Center. She served a term as the board president in 2020 and continues to serve on the leadership team as the past president. Now, host of The Deal with Animals, she enjoys chatting with people who know a lot more than she does about the various research disciplines of Anthrozoology as well as authors, nonprofits, professionals, and enthusiasts!

Credits: The Deal With Animals is hosted and edited by Marika. Music was composed by Kai Strandskov, https://kaistrandskov.com/

Recording and post production software by Zencastr and hosting provided by Anchor.

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Humans interact with animals every day of our lives. Even those without pets interact with animals in various ways: diet, wildlife, the clothes they wear. Even most medicines use animals in testing or in the medicine itself. This is a podcast about Anthrozoology: the study of interaction between humans and non-human animals.

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