Animals and Plants: A Preview of the Debate Between Gary Francione and Michael Marder

This week we will be featuring a debate between Gary Francione, author of Animals as Persons: Essays on the Abolition of Animal Exploitation, The Animal Rights Debate: Abolition or Regulation?, and several other titles, and Michael Marder, author of the forthcoming Plant-Thinking: A Philosophy of Vegetal Life.

The debate was inspired by Michael Marder’s controversial New York Times op-eds Is Plant Liberation on the Menu? and If Peas Can Talk, Should We Eat Them? which generated a variety of critical among animal right advocates. Marder’s argument about the sentience of plant life has been challenged by some animal studies scholars and animal rights advocates who fear it might equate animal and plant life.

We will begin the debate tomorrow and it will continue through Thursday. In the meantime, we wanted to remind you of our cutting-edge list in animal studies. We also have four forthcoming titles in animal studies coming out this fall, including:

Animals and Society: An Introduction to Human-Animal Studies
Margo DeMello

Animalia Americana: Animal Representations and Biopolitical Subjectivity
Colleen Glenney Boggs

Animal Rights Without Liberation: Applied Ethics and Human Obligations
Alasdair Cochrane

Experiencing Animal Minds: An Anthology of Animal-Human Encounters
Edited by Julie Smith and Robert W. Mitchell