Скачать или смотреть Searching for Inedibility in Literary Fiction and Non Fiction of India

The Animals & Society Colloquium Series is co-sponsored by the Animals and Society Institute and the ASA Animals & Society Section.

Description: In this talk, Dr. Mayank Jha examines how Indian literature can represent and construct farm animals as inedible. He discusses how both literary fiction and nonfiction, in the Indian context, provide avenues to depict encounters in which the impending death of a farm animal—particularly en masse—is accompanied by a range of responses not limited to consumption, nutrition, or economic exchange. This talk engages with questions that challenge the preordained fates of animals, often viewed merely as walking larders or livestock, including: Is the transformation of these animals from edible to inedible in India, where meat consumption is among the lowest in the world, exceptional?; Is inedibility merely a change in status, from domesticated to pet?; Is the desire for meat part of our omnivorous heritage?; Does animal sacrifice, as depicted in some of these fictions, counteract forms of institutionalized violence in the killing of agricultural animals?; Is being human dependent on these deaths, and, importantly, how can we redefine and improve our relationships with these animals?

Speaker: Mayank Jha is an Assistant Professor at Nirma University, Ahmedabad, India. His research interests include Cultural Studies, Gender Studies, and Human-Animal Studies. His ongoing research focuses on representations of animality in film and fiction.