Deadline for Abstract Submissions: EXTENDED to Feb. 15, 2012.  

Conference Website

Poster

The 2012 Minding Animals Conference is the second in a series of conferences about scientific, ethical and social issues related to human animal interactions. The aim of the conference is to bring together academics from many disciplines with politicians and a broad variety of interest groups. The conference offers a platform for exchange of information about research developments, debates about controversial political and ethical issues concerning the human treatment of animals, and a variety of cultural activities around human animal interactions.

The Minding Animals Conference planned for Utrecht in the Netherlands is proud to follow up on the internationally celebrated first Minding Animals Conference (Newcastle, Australia, July 2009). Unlike Newcastle which was a seven day event, the 2012 event will be split into a Pre-conference Event at Leusden (near Utrecht) followed by a more traditional conference at Utrecht University. The Utrecht Conference will consist of keynote talks, parallel academic sessions based on the call for papers, workshops for the Minding Animals Study Circles, and the Protecting the Animals Seminar Series in which animal advocacy organisations and community advocates will present and discuss their work. The conference will be supported by an active social and arts programme.

How to Contribute?

Submit an abstract for an academic presentation. Besides a great number of excellent keynote speakers from different disciplinary backgrounds, there will be many parallel sessions featuring presentations based on this call for papers. Abstracts, of a maximum 600 words, should contain the main question, line or argument, and (expected) conclusions. The abstracts will be reviewed with respect to quality and academic rigor.

Submit a contribution for the Protecting the Animals Seminar Series. The PASS is a forum for animal advocacy organisations and other community advocates to present and discuss their work and concerns with all conference participants.

To lodge an abstract or contribute to the Protecting the Animals Seminar Series, you must complete the abstract form or PASS form available from the Minding Animals website.  Forms must then be sent as an email to: mindinganimals@uu.nl.

Conference Session Themes

On the Abstracts Form, you will be asked to nominate from one of six themes in which you would like your abstract considered for inclusion in the programme. These themes are:

• Session 1: The Human-Animal Relationship from Different Disciplinary Perspectives (including animals in art, literature, religion, history of the human animal relationships, animals in the history of philosophy, psychological approaches towards the human animal relationships, cultural aspects of human animal relationships)
• Session 2: The Human-Animal Relationship and Sustainability (including (public) health aspects, social consequences, landscape, environmental effects, climate change)
• Session 3: Scientific Developments in Human Understanding of Animal Abilities (including animal emotions, animal cognition, extrapolation of capacities from animals to humans and vice versa)
• Session 4:Welfare Concepts (including animal welfare at the interface between science and society, approaches of positive welfare, welfare assessment in practice, animal husbandry, animal slaughter.