I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings: Domestication, Disability, and Moral Repair

Abstract

Owing to the unique challenges posed by domestication, the literature on animal captivity has been trapped for years in a gridlock. On the one side, there have been the continued-use advocates, who urged that, were it not for their instrumental value, many domesticated animals would never have been bred. On the other side, there have been the vegan abolitionists, who argued that, contrariwise, non-existence would be preferable. Despite the newness of the topic, however, neither theoretical position was especially novel. Quite the opposite, the moral debate over domestication has in many ways paralleled the arguments from past social movements, ranging from eugenics to the emancipation of slavery. Therefore, in order to think of alternative possibilities, this project first endeavors to discover why the same theoretical dead-ends have recurred continuously. The primary thesis is that domestication is something humans did first to themselves, so that, by tracing the history of these intraspecies relations, an "edible complex" is revealed at the heart of the Western psyche. More importantly, however, rather than eschew the argument from marginal cases, this dissertation gestures towards new forms of alliance, where the liminal status of the oppressed, and most especially people with cognitive disabilities, turns out to be an epistemic boon.