Expanding the Critical Animal Studies Imagination

We the editors (Nathan Poirier, Sarah Tomasello, and Amber E. George) of this book would like to thank first the contributors within this book – Charlotte Anne, Cam Whitley, Agnese Martini, Francesca Corradini, Matteo Porazzi, Nandita Bajaj, Kirsten Stade, John Tallent, Elisabeth Demitras, Ezgi Karaoğlu, Zane McNeill, Simon Springer, Will Boisseau, Jeremy Bendik-Keymer, and Seven Mattes. We would also like to thank those that wrote reviews for the book – Marquis Bey, David Naguib Pellow, Margaret Robinson, Federica Timeto, Amanda Williams, Richard Giles, Ruth Kinna, Eileen Crist, Sarat Colling, and Richard White. This book would not be possible if not for the organizations and academic departments that support our scholarship and activism such as Save the Kids, Academy for Peace Education, Journal for Critical Animal Studies, Green Theory and Praxis Journal, Transformative Justice Journal, Department of Criminal Justice at Salt Lake Community College, Peace Studies Journal, Institute for Critical Animal Studies, Academy for Critical Animal Studies, Critical Animal Studies Society, Lowrider Studies Journal, Punk Studies Journal, and Journal of Hip Hop Studies.

As the idea for this book originally arose between Nate and Sarah, we have some personal acknowledgements. Nate would like to thank my partner, Erin, who has played an indispensable role in my life. You have helped, in more ways than one, to create time and space for me to work on projects like this book. I thank my parents who encouraged my individuality without judgment since childhood. This is a privilege not everyone enjoys. Last but not least, to Marquis Bey: You have helped to majorly shift my intellectual and personal orientations for the better - you are my Fred Moten. Sarah is forever thankful for the support of my husband, Andrew, who is always available to listen and help me work through my ideas. His encouragement means the world to me. I’d also like to thank my two spunky cats, Nunu and Sprinks, for their love and companionship. They bring much joy into my life each day.

Hello dear reader, a warm welcome to a book intent on not only fueling your fires but sparking your imaginations beyond what we have come to expect. firstly, let me introduce myself. i’m a long-term revolutionary intersectional vegan. the “revolutionary” and “intersectional” parts ought to be superfluous but very much require emphasis contemporarily considering capitalism’s recuperation of, and therefore depoliticization, of veganism. i’ve been invested in various liberation struggles in my life which brought me to the attention of and into affinity with some of the contributors and organizers of these liberatory texts, and me to them. so, it is through what we might call comradeship, friendship, mutual respect and common ground that i was asked to prepare this foreword. i’m a white trans anti-binary feminist veganarchist race traitor living in Athens, greece. probably not the type of person regularly approached to script openings to academic works. and, as you’ll hopefully see, that’s partly the point.

The entries in this book work as individual but also as mosaic provocations amidst the stagnant and uninspired background of university education level engagement with animal lives. indeed, this is the aspiration of critical animal studies (CAS). Critical animal studies, as exemplified in the efforts contained in the following pages, is an intentional intervention into insincere and ineffective analysis, a captivating aberration, a molotov cocktail of seeds, water and nutrients for potentials otherwise effectively locked in the closets of public and campus libraries. what you hold in your hands isn’t supposed to create the enthusiasm of an over-tested and fatigued student looking for the answers expected of them. this book wants you to care as much as the writers care. they want you to think on it. to talk about it. and to act on it. this book emphasizes the inescapable necessity of attending to our collective needs which include our collective desires.

Considering this, it should be no surprise then that arguments laid out and subjects interrogated herein could easily be described as controversial. nevertheless, the tact, sensitivity and clarity of thought makes the ideas and proposals highly persuasive. nonhuman animals need books and co-conspirators like these. too long have human supremacist logics, forged largely in the heads of colonizing white men, sowed such deep doubts about animal liberation that scarcely a human voice is entertained that refuses to abandon some “groups” in the naive hope of protecting another. CAS is a spectacular thorn in the side of this dismal state of affairs, threatening to poison those in proximity, instilling in them an infectious drive for total liberation. the world is replete with impotent passages waxing lyrical about things that the reader senses the writer is palpably not genuinely committed to. these chapters feature people who are profoundly moved by and for total liberation and intend to cultivate in you richer understandings and capacities.

It would please them, as well as me, for you to not merely enjoy and appreciate their efforts, but for their efforts to be propellants firing you into your own total liberation efforts. treat this book with the excitement it deserves. it’s neither an ornament nor sacred text, but to be swept up by. this is to be passed between lovers or gifted to likeminded strangers. so have fun, reader, because there’s room left in this world for that too.

kisses to your whiskers x

The Emerging Context