The Animals & Society Research Initiative (ASRI) is a research forum and working group at the University of Victoria for those who critically examine the normalized practices and conceptualizations of human-animal/interspecies relations.
ASRI provides a supportive, interdisciplinary research exchange opportunity in which faculty, students, and staff from across the university, as well as interested community members, can engage with critical animal studies. Critical perspectives interrogate societal practices and assumptions that objectify and subordinate more-than-human animals. This scope of research reveals the relationship with other forms of oppression such as sexism and racism.
ASRI also plays an advocacy role on campus, developing and distributing position papers from a critical animal studies and otherwise perspective on issues relating to university policies, practices, and events.
Members come together on a regular basis to present their works-in-progress, provide feedback for others, and generally expand their critical reading/knowledge of animal studies and interspecies ethics through talks, writing workshops, and film screenings. ASRI welcomes contributions from all points of view that are made in a spirit of respectful academic inquiry.
