Date: 10/9

Time: 5pm - 6:30pm

Location: CBIS Auditorium

In her talk Terike Haapoja will discuss her recent art and research project, [Against] Animal Capitalism, that explores animal liberation and multispecies politics in the framework of anticapitalist resistance. In the last decade awareness of the ecological crises have entered main stages of left politics, and multispecies politics and posthumanism have taken center stage in the arts. Despite this, serious critique of industrial animal agriculture and the role of nonhuman animals in capitalist economy remains marginal. In her talk Haapoja explores how anthropocentric ontologies within marxist theory inform current day left politics, as well as how recognizing animal labor as a central arena of capitalist exploitation is necessary for anticapitalist struggle. Questions that drive her research include: are nonhuman animals part of the working class? Is all labor animal labor? Is socialism good for animals?

How do we build a multispecies left politics? Haapoja's current research builds on her extensive research and creative work on multispecies politics in relationship to knowledge production (Closed Circuit – Open Duration, 2008), governance ( The Party of Others 2011), law (The Trial, 2013), history (Museum of the History of Cattle, 2013) and ideology (Museum of Nonhumanity, 2016).