Animal Subjects and the Logic of Human Domination

Abstract

Luke argues that the concept of “animal” occupies a logically basic position within rhetorical treatments of systemic domination. Analyzing four narrative interrogations of intra-human domination (human sacrifice in Iphigenia at Aulis, male supremacy in The Taming of the Shrew, race-based slavery in Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and worker exploitation in The Jungle), Luke shows how in each story human exploitation of nonhuman animals is accepted as appropriate and natural, and the presumed inferior status of the animal is unreflexively employed as a means of conceptualizing the human subordination under consideration. In addition to our efforts at the practical and philosophical levels, animal liberationists must also challenge the subordination of animals at the rhetorical level, offering alternative narratives of respect for all subjects, human and nonhuman.