Chapter about therians and Derrida in academic animal rights book

[frameacloud]

Trigger warnings: For this article, none.


2013: Jay Johnston, senior lecturer of the Department of Studies in Religion at the University of Sydney, published a chapter about otherkin in a book. The book, Animal Death, is an academic non-fiction book about animal rights and the relations between humans and animals. The chapter is titled "On having a furry soul: Transpecies identity and ontological indeterminacy in Otherkin subcultures."

Johnston cites one source on otherkin for this chapter. It's Lupa’s book from 2007, A Field Guide to Otherkin. (Note that as of last April, Lupa no longer identifies as a therianthrope, and took the Field Guide out of print to get away from the subject.) Johnston focuses on people who identify as animals (therianthropes) (Johnston, p. 295). Because Johnston’s source is the Field Guide, Johnston repeats Lupa's system of categorizing therianthropes as a type of otherkin. (Judging by my research, this categorization is technically correct or at least satisfactory in some uses, but otherwise socially and historically incorrect.)

Johnston "questions the usefulness of distinguishing between 'animal' and 'human' for individuals who understand themselves as simultaneously both" (Johnston, p. xix). Johnston examines excerpts from the Field Guide regarding therianthropy in context with ideas from the philosopher Derrida.

Portions of Johnston’s article are visible via Google Books.



Sources

Jay Johnston, "On having a furry soul: Transpecies identity and ontological indeterminacy in Otherkin subcultures." In Jay Johnston and Fiona Probyn-Rapsey, eds., Animal Death (Sydney: Sydney University Press), p. 293-306.

Lupa, "Letting go of therianthropy for good." 2013-04-02. Therioshamanism. http://therioshamanism.com/2013/04/02/letting-go-of-therianthropy-for-good/

Comments

[avianthrophile.livejournal.com]

With all the fuss that recently appeared in the otherkin community over the word "transspecies" (and, different from a lot of things that really are a bigger experience than just Tumblr, I do think it started on Tumblr), it's interesting to see academic people using the word when our own community is nervous to do it. It's not the first time I have seen the academic community compare the two things.

It's a little hard to read, for me, particularly when the pages are missing, but I think there are some interesting things being said in that article. About how we can avoid appropriation and also how the idea of otherkin and therians can be seen as a way of moving past "human" and "animal" as separate things.