IN THE FIRST FACULTY MEETING I attended at Emory University’s Center for Ethics, we were invited to share our research interests. One scholar—Lori Marino, a cetologist and professor of psychology—mentioned her varied and profound projects in animal studies, including animal mentation and psychology. Intrigued, I approached her to learn more, and those conversations led us to develop a new cotaught course, Animal Ethics, combining psychology, ethology, philosophy, religion, anthropology, history, and more—to spur rethinking about how we humans conceive the very category of “animal.” The years of teaching that course with Lori, as well as the decades of working alongside Aaron S. Gross, a brilliant scholar of religion and animal studies and founder of the animal-advocacy organization Farm Forward, and the seeming lack of a venue devoted to animal ethics broadly construed inspired me to organize a symposium in which myriad disciplines would be welcome to offer fresh thoughts about animals. The first Animal Ethics Workshop, in 2012, was without theme and gathered only local scholars. To be sure, the scholarship was excellent, and the energy was as palpable as the interest in deepening and expanding the conversation. Emboldened, I composed a theme for the next year’s conference—exploring the question of Beastly Morality—and advertised more strategically. Proposals streamed in from around the world, and I invited what I thought were the best dozen to present at a one-day conference. That day’s conversation in 2013 brought together an internationally and disciplinarily diverse scholarly community. When Frans de Waal asked in his plenary presentation who among those present worked with actual animals, the silence was both telling and unsurprising. The resounding quiet eloquently articulated the increasing need for scholars throughout the academy who work in, on, and with animals to speak with and to one another. For how could the field of animal studies be a field if its ostensible contributors do not interact? To at least approximate this more ideal and mixed conversation, I sought out a few more ethologists to contribute to this otherwise humanities-rich collection.
Gratitude is thus due to the scholars who contributed to that conference and this volume. They worked and reworked their pieces to make even more compelling arguments on whether, whence, and whither animal morality. I also appreciate the support of Wendy Lochner at Columbia University Press for honing and improving the project, as well as the responses of the anonymous reviewers. Those conferences and this book would not have come into being were it not for the unwavering support of Paul Root Wolpe, the director of the Center for Ethics. Thanks are also extended to Kristina Johnson, who diligently worked on the manuscript and kept my loose ends tidy. I am grateful to the Department of Religion at Emory University, the Judith London Evans Director’s Fund of Emory University’s Tam Institute for Jewish Studies, and the Center for Ethics for their critical support completing this volume.
Thanks are also due to colleagues in the Society of Jewish Ethics and the American Academy of Religion who offered suggestions and encouragement throughout this endeavor. I am grateful for the many scholars at Emory University who contributed to and took interest in this project. Of course, included in this group of supporters is my greatest thinking partner, provocateur, and muse, Lindy Miller, whose insights and challenges inspire me no end.
Thinking about animals, and animal morality in particular, is no easy task; to be sure, more needs to be done. I hereby acknowledge and thank that future conversation for enriching us all.