General Exam: Day 1

Today was the first of four days of my general exams. The generals are the exams which allow you to advance to ‘candidacy’ for the PhD in our department. When/if I pass them, I will get to put a PhC after my name! In other departments, I believe this is sometimes called ABD (All But Dissertation). In […]

Will Potter in Portland, OR

I had the pleasure of going with Eric and my dad earlier this year to hear Will Potter speak at the lovely Elliott Bay Bookstore on Capital Hill in Seattle. The event at Elliott Bay was intimate and Potter was intelligent, thought-provoking and politically on point. Potter is a journalist whose latest book, Green is […]

New York City: Day 2

On Friday, I got up early and ate a delicious breakfast that Emma made for Gwen and me of steel-cut oatmeal with grilled bananas and apples, cinnamon, vanilla and pecans. It was delightful! I headed to the conference, which was on NYU’s campus. A cute little food market on the way: The conference, called Animal […]

Pre-departure New York Trip

This week, I’m headed to New York City for an animal studies conference at NYU called “Animal Studies: Changing the Subject“. This conference comes out of NYU’s exciting new animal studies initiative and is also registered as a pre-conference event for the massive Minding Animals International 2012 conference next summer in Utrecht, Netherlands. The conference at NYU is composed of […]

Animals in Human Societies- The Brock Review

A special issue of the open-access interdisciplinary academic journal The Brock Review came out this weekend. It has a number of really interesting articles on a range of subjects relating to the subject of animals in human societies. I have not yet gotten to read all of the articles yet, but I am excited to […]

“Loving Animals?” – Responses to Kathy Rudy

There is an interesting division in the animal studies field of academics and activists. Most animal studies folks agree that studying animals is important and that we should engage in a renewed consideration of animals in our ethical and political formulations. However, the way animal studies scholars and activists approach the ‘question of the animal’ varies considerably. […]