Virtual seminar with Dr. Richard Twine and Julia Castellano on Animals in Food Systems

This free virtual seminar will take place on Wednesday 27 November 2024, from 3–4:30 PM Irish Standard Time. This seminar is part of a series that runs in the academic year
2024-2025, organised by the Animal Studies Research Network UCD, as part of its Environmental Humanities strand.

Richard Twine will join us to outline a critique of the 2023 Dublin Declaration 1 (Twine 2024) – a concerted attempt by meat scientists to push back against calls for the reduction of animal source food (ASF) consumption.The Declaration (see also Leroy & Ederer 2023) is situated within my work on the animal-industrial complex (Twine 2012; 2013; 2024) and understood within broader attempts to maintain the status quo and shape policy in favour of the ASF industries. Important questions around the uses of ‘scientific knowledge’ are raised by the declaration and attempts by industry to exploit the veneer of scientific knowledge claims. Twine will also consider what an alternative Dublin Declaration would look like, centred on values of ecological public health and the transcendence of anthropocentric dogma. Relatedly, how can a vegan imaginary best position itself moving forward?

Júlia Castellano will join us to present preliminary findings from an ongoing doctoral thesis. Castellano examines the social media posts of a Spanish vegan product brand to identify various strategies employed to persuade consumers. Through a critical analysis, the study assesses the consequences and implications of these strategies on non-human animals, exploring both potential benefits and harms they may experience. By scrutinizing the brand's tactics, this research contributes to a deeper understanding of the intersection between marketing approaches and animal welfare concerns in the context of plant-based alternative products.

About the speakers:

Richard Twine is Reader in Sociology and Co-Director of the Centre for Human- Animal Studies (CfHAS) at Edge Hill University, UK. He is author of The Climate Crisis and other Animals (Sydney University Press, 2024), and previously (w/ Nik Taylor) The Rise of Critical Animal Studies – From the Margins to the Centre (Routledge, 2014), and Animals as Biotechnology – Ethics, Sustainability and Critical Animal Studies (Routledge, 2010). His website is http://www.richardtwine.com

Júlia Castellano is a PhD candidate and researcher in the Department of Communication at Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF), a member of the CRITICC research group and the
UPF-Centre for Animal Ethics. Her research focuses on Vegan Studies, particularly on strategic communication for vegan brands and political consumerism, under the supervision of Dr Núria
Almirón. Julia holds a Psychology degree from the University of Barcelona (UB), a Postgraduate in Socio-environmental Analysis and Intervention, (UB/UAB), and a MA in Media, Power, and Difference (UPF).

The Animal Studies Research Network at UCD is organised by Deborah Schrijvers and Poulomi Choudhury.

Thanks to @Elena Mozhvilo via Unsplash