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PODCAST

The Animal Turn

Claudia Hirtenfelder

Animals are increasingly at the forefront of research questions – Not as shadows to human stories, or as beings we want to understand biologically, or for purely our benefit – but as beings who have histories, stories, and geographies of their own. Each season is set around themes with each episode unpacking a particular animal turn concept and its significance therein. Join Claudia Hirtenfelder as she delves into some of the most important ideas emerging out of this recent turn in scholarship,

science social sciences

All Episodes

71:58

S8EB: Monstrous Others with Rachel Dean-Ruzicka

The Animal Turn ·

2025/12/29

We explore how Stranger Things signals a new monstrous moment, moving from unknowable creatures to human-made villains, and what that shift says about power, identity, and culture. Along the way, we ask how animals get coded as monsters and when their agency is reclaimed or removed in film and TV. Date Recorded: 22 April 2025 Featured: Tolerance Discourse and Young Adult Holocaust Literatureby Rachel Dean-Ruzicka Paranormal Maturation: Uncanny Teenagers and Canny Killers b...

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89:52

S8E10: Grad Review with Gina Song Lopez and Taylor...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/12/29

Gina Song Lopez, researching vegan movements in Taiwan and China through the lens of local culture and social media, and Taylor Jobling, a law lecturer unpacking how Australia’s legislation categorises animals, come on to the show to discuss the main themes and tensions to emerge in Season 8, Animals and Media Date Recorded: 8 December 2025 Featured: What Comes After Entanglement by Eva GiraudThe Birth of Korean Cool by Euny HongThe Omnivore’s Deception by John Sanbonmats...

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96:32

S8E9: News with Shatabdi Chakrabarti, Jessica...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/12/22

In this episode we bring together a photojournalist from India, a Canadian columnist, and a political scientist/reporter to discuss animals and the news. We discuss different types of news as well as some of the challenges that come with creating news content that focuses on animals. Date Recorded: 4 June 2025 Featured: How to Spot Misinformation and Bias About Climate and Food in the News by Jessica Scott-ReidMeatsplaining by Jason HannanFeed the People by Ja...

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97:11

S8E8: Film and TV with Lynda Korimboccus and Ankita...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/12/22

In this episode Ankita Rathour and Lynda Korimboccus join Claudia to discuss the interconnections of film, tv, and animals. Together they touch on everything from the Peppa Pig paradox in children’s media to the shifting role of animals in Hindi cinema, nationalism and caste politics. Date Recorded: 2 May 2025 Featured: The Subaltern Gazes: Commentary on Amit Masurkar's Sherni by Ankita Rathour.Pig-ignorant: The Peppa Pig Paradox. Investigating Contradictory Childho...

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86:30

S8E7: Social Media with Laura Fernández, Amanda...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/12/15

Guests Laura Fernández, Amanda Weiss, and Siobhan Speiran join Claudia to discuss case studies as wide ranging as Japanese animal cafes, Spanish bull fighting, and Costa Rican sanctuaries to unfurl the complex relations of social media and animals. Together they probe how social media packages animals as content, why that changes real lives, and where activism, policy, and platform design can push back. Date Recorded: 11 April 2025 Featured: Han Heroes and Yamato Warriors:...

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98:10

S8E6: Podcasting and Education with María Carreras...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/12/08

We celebrate 100 episodes by asking how podcasting can teach, build community, and improve animal welfare across languages, disciplines, and daily routines. Guests Maria Carreras and Kate Acton share concrete changes, strategic insights, and challenges that reshape how we listen to animals and to each other. Date Recorded: 11 April 2025 Featured: When Animals Speak by Eva MeijerThe Sexual Politics of Meat by Carol J Adams.Inside of a Dog by Alexandra HorowitzEvaluating the Addition of...

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107:07

S8E5: Gaming with Keung Yoon Bae, Osvaldo Cleger, and...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/10/13

Gaming is one of the most consumed forms of media globally making it an omportant space from to explore human-animal relations. In this episode, media scholars Michael Rübsamen, Osvaldo Cleger, and Keung Yoon Bae discuss the interconnections of gaming, representation, and identity and what the significance of this might be for considerations of animals. Date Recorded: 3 February 2025 Featured: The Witcher Thoughts towards an Ontology of Play by Eugene Fink ...

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99:47

S8E4: Popular Media and Pests with Lu Liu, Debra...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/10/10

In this episode we animals, power, and popular media. Emily Major, Debra Merskin, and Lu Liu help to think through how animals are manufactured as “pests” and “icons” in media and how those labels shape empathy, policy, and everyday cruelty towards animals. Date Recorded: 15 January 2025 Featured: Animals and MediaMass Media and Society edited by Debra Merskin Seeing Species by Debra Merskin Media, Minorities and Meaning by Debra Merskin Communicating Nature b...

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115:08

S8E3: Rhetoric and Supremacy with S. Marek Muller,...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/09/29

In this episode we discuss how rhetorical constructions of animality, and humanity are mobilized to serve specific power structures, including white supremacy and colonialism. Lauren Corman, David Rooney, and S. Marek Muller come on the show to talk about some of the complex networks of media influence and consumption that shape such thought. Date Recorded: 19 February 2025 Mentioned: “Pageantry of aggression”: QAnon, animality, and the violent pursuit of whiteness by Lauren...

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97:59

S8E2: (Mis)representation and Activism with...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/09/22

Carrie Freeman and Christopher Eubanks join Claudia on the show to explore animal (mis)representation in media. They examine some of the ways in which animals are represented in activist messaging and the interconnections of animal rights with other social justice movements. Date Recorded: 29 February 2025 Featured: The Human Animal Earthling by Carrie FreemanCritical Animal and Media Studies by Núria Almiron, Matthew Cole, Carrie P. FreemanFraming Farming by Carrie ...

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109:54

S8E1: Trans-Speciesism and the MARS Test with Natalie...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/09/15

The Animal Turn podcast launches Season 8 with a dive into the intersections of media, racism, and speciesism. Tobias Linné, Ellen Gorsevski, and Natalie Khazaal join Claudia on the show to discuss how race and species intersect each other in animated film and the development of their Media Analysis of Racism and Speciesism (MARS) test to evaluate the ways in which they do. Date Recorded: 31 March 2025 Featured: Media, Racism, Speciesism: Issues and Solutions for Creatur...

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85:52

Bonus: Death with Katja M. Guenther and Julian Paul...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/09/08

Death permeates our relationships with animals, yet we rarely confront the complex ethical questions it raises. In this conversation with Katja Guenther and Julian Paul Keenan, editors of "When Animals Die," we delve into the emerging field of animal death studies - an interdisciplinary approach examining how animals experience and humans justify animal death. Date Recorded: 21 April 2025 Katja M. Guenther is Professor of Gender and Sexuality Studies at the University of Californ...

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52:26

Bonus: FarmKind and Effective Altruism with Thom Norman

The Animal Turn ·

2025/09/01

Thom Norman joins Claudia on the show to discuss the work of FarmKind and the tenets of effective altruism. They talk about FarmKind’s compassion calculator and how it strategically doesn’t include vegan messaging. They discuss the organizations FarmKind supports and some of the critiques levelled against effective altruism. Date Recorded: 20 March 2025 Thom Norman is the co-founder of FarmKind, a nonprofit dedicated to accelerating the end of factory farming by expanding the ...

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58:41

Bonus: Sensory Pollution with Brett Seymoure and...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/04/28

In this crossover episode from The Deal With Animals Podcast, Marika S. Bell talks to two experts about the impacts of sensory pollution on animals. Sensory pollution from artificial light and noise has profound effects on wildlife behavior, reproduction, and survival. Brett Seymour and Jennifer Phillips share insights about how everyday choices impact everything from insect flight patterns to bird nesting success. Date Released: 7 May 2024 Dr. Jennifer Phillips is an assistant professor ...

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51:28

Bonus: Big Cat Trade with Vanessa Amoroso

The Animal Turn ·

2025/04/14

The global big cat trade encompasses both legal and illegal networks, with South Africa standing as the world's largest exporter of big cats including both live animals and parts. Vanessa Amoroso from Four Paws International explains how captive breeding facilities create a "conveyor belt of cubs" that fuels tourism attractions while obscuring the darker reality of what happens to these animals. Together Claudia and Vanessa discuss how loopholes in CITES allows for the large-scale legal breed...

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98:52

S7E10: Grad Review with Rashmi Singh Rana and...

The Animal Turn ·

2025/02/24

Rashmi Singh Rana and Priyanshu Thapliyal join Claudia on the show to discuss some of the key themes to emerge in Season 7, Animals and Multispecies Health. These include thinking beyond anthropocentric understandings of health; considering how geography and context shape health relations; and the importance of discourse in both imaginative and material impacts. Date Recorded: 29 January 2025 Priyanshu Thapliyal is a PhD Researcher based in the school of GeoSciences at University ...

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79:08

S7E9: Dogs’ Health with Jessica Pierce

The Animal Turn ·

2025/02/10

In this episode Jessica Pierce joins Claudia to explicitly discuss dogs’ health. They discuss everything from end-of-life care for dogs, to breeding practices, and discourses about dogs’ purpose in society. They unfurl some of the overlapping and similar health needs of street- versus pet-dogs and surmise that in general dogs are facing a range of both physical and psychological challenges. Date Recorded: 2 September 2024. Jessica Pierce is an American bioethicist known fo...

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86:13

S7E8: Pavlov’s Dogs with Matthew Adams

The Animal Turn ·

2025/02/06

Matthew Adams joins Claudia on the show to talk about the dogs who were used by Ivan Pavlov in his extensive laboratory operations in St Petersburg. They discuss the importance of psychology and psychological experimentation in debates about multispecies health, also pointing to the importance of art-based research that challenges anthropocentricism. Recorded: 10 September 2024. Matthew Adams is an academic in the School of Humanities & Social Sciences at the University of Bri...

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77:14

S7E7: Urban Health Histories with Heeral Chhabra

The Animal Turn ·

2025/01/20

In this episode we delve into how urban health histories can help us to understand changing multispecies health. Heeral Chhabra tells us how the welfare of free-roaming dogs in India was caught up with the colonial history of the country and how rabies saw drastic changes in human-dog relations. Date Recorded: 27 September 2024. Heeral Chhabra is a Post-Doctoral Research Associate with the Remaking One Health: Decolonial Approaches to Street Dogs and Rabies Prevention in...

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106:14

S7E6: Compassionate Conservation with Daniel Ramp

The Animal Turn ·

2025/01/13

This episode dives into the principles of compassionate conservation, emphasizing the importance of recognizing individual lives and experiences in conservation efforts. Daniel Ramp outlines how traditional conservation often overlooks the welfare of specific animals, leading to harmful outcomes, and presents compelling arguments for integrating compassion into conservation policies and practices. Date Recorded: 1 November 2024. Daniel Ramp is a behavioural ecologist, welfare expert...

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106 results

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