Critical Animal Studies and Animal Law
![handle is hein.journals/anim18 and id is 219 raw text is: CRITICAL ANIMAL STUDIES AND ANIMAL LAW
By
Maneesha Deckha*
Law is anthropocentric. With the limited exception of its treatment of the
corporation, law is a system of rules that privileges the concept of the human
and ascribes reality through a human perspective. Appreciating this, it is
truly impressive that animal issues in the law have become so prominent
throughout the legal education system. With this increased exposure to pos-
thumanist critiques of the legal system and its status for and treatment of
animals, an increasing number of those involved in legal education are re-
thinking the law's species-based hierarchy that places humans at the apex.
This flourishing interest in animal law is paralleled by growth in the field
of Critical Animal Studies (CAS). However, these two disciplines have de-
veloped independently of each other. Acknowledging this, animal law schol-
arship is currently poised to incorporate the insights of CAS. Integrating
such insight into the analysis of animal issues in the law will rectify the
speciesist and otherwise exclusionary formulations of the socially con-
structed differences between various species, which have so far been unques-
tioned assumptions. CAS offers an understanding of these socially
constructed differences and advances a common mission between issues
identified as animal injustices and those identified as human injustices.
CAS stresses the interconnection between human and animal issues, not
simply parallels. This important synthesis can subvert the confinement of
animal issues in the legal sphere and is key to extending these essential is-
sues into a more diverse community.
I. INTRODUCTION ................................. 208
II. CRITICAL ANIMAL STUDIES-ANOTHER
BURGEONING FIELD.... ........................ 212
A. Posthumanism, Human-Animal Studies, and CAS ...... 212
B. Main Tenets of CAS ................................ 214
1. Power Circulates Through the Human-Animal
Binary ........................................ 214
2. Animal Subjectivity Is Marginalized ................. 215
3. Animals as Other ............................... 217
a. Interconnectedness of Oppressions and Social
Constructions of Difference .................... 219
* @ Maneesha Deckha 2012. Maneesha Deckha is an Associate Professor of Law at
the University of Victoria. Professor Deckha would like to thank Sarah Fitzpatrick for
her excellent research assistance and the Editors for their invitation to participate in
the Symposium. She is grateful to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
of Canada for funding the author's participation at the Symposium as well as the re-
search and writing of this Article.
[207]](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/anim18&div=15&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
What Is HeinOnline?
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most
Critical Animal Studies and Animal Law
Contact us for annual subscription options:
Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?
profiles profiles most