CFP: Animals, Streets and Health

workshop

Hybrid Workshop, University of Liverpool, 15th June 2023

Streets are lively more-than-human spaces. Dogs, cats, monkeys, rats, cows, and pigeons are amongst those animals who share streets with humans. In different places and at different times, animals are variously welcomed, tolerated, or prohibited from streets. Street animals raise a host of questions around urban life and public health, as well as who belongs and who deserves care in urban environments. They are sometimes framed as evidence of healthy urban environments and sometimes as obstacles to urban health. Their presence on the street also invites us to consider animal agency, autonomy, and mobility.

This interdisciplinary workshop will explore the relationship between animals, streets, and health. We welcome proposals from any discipline that tackle any period and place. Topics might include:

  • Animals and waste
  • Zoonoses 
  • Affective responses to street animals
  • The politics and practices of welfare
  • Streets as sites of cruelty and care towards animals
  • Campaigns to remove animals from streets
  • More-than-human labour and streets as a place of work for animals
  • Animal agency, autonomy, and mobility
  • Animals and urban planning
  • Transnational/comparative approaches towards animals, streets, and health
  • Representing street animals
  • Ownership of street animals
  • Researching street animals
  • One Health Approaches

The workshop will be hybrid, with expenses covered for those attending in person from the UK. Papers will be considered for inclusion in a journal special issue.

The workshop is part of the Wellcome-funded project “Remaking One Health: Decolonial approaches to street dogs and rabies prevention in India” (ROH-Indies): https://rohindies.org/ 

Please send an extended abstract of between 500-750 words and a short bio by 31 March 2023 to the ROH-Indies team at the emails below.

For further information, please contact Dr Chris Pearson (chris.pearson@liverpool.ac.uk) or Dr Heeral Chhabra (chhabra.heeral@gmail.com )