Melanie Joy

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Melanie Joy
Melanie Joy on TEDx in 2015
Born (1966-09-02) September 2, 1966 (age 57)
NationalityAmerican
EducationHarvard University (M.Ed.)
Saybrook University (Ph.D.)
Occupation(s)Social psychologist, non-fiction author, President of Beyond Carnism
Websitewww.melaniejoy.org

Melanie Joy (born September 2, 1966) is an American social psychologist and author, primarily notable for coining and promulgating the term carnism.[1] She is the founding president of nonprofit advocacy group Beyond Carnism, previously known as Carnism Awareness & Action Network (CAAN),[2] as well as a former professor of psychology and sociology at the University of Massachusetts Boston.[3] She has published the books Strategic Action for Animals, Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows and Beyond Beliefs.[4]

Background

Joy received her M.Ed. from the

Saybrook Graduate School. At age 23, while a student at Harvard, she contracted a food-borne disease from a tainted hamburger and was hospitalized, which led her to become a vegetarian.[5][6] In a speech related by Indian cabinet minister Maneka Gandhi
, Joy recalled how her dietary choice, made for non-moral reasons, transformed her perspective on the treatment of animals:

That experience led me to swear off meat, which led me to become more open to information about animal agriculture—information that had been all around me but that I had been unwilling to see, so long as I was still invested in maintaining my current way of life. And as I learned the truth about meat, egg and dairy production, I became increasingly distraught. [...] I wound up confused and despairing. I felt like a rudderless boat, lost on a sea of collective insanity. Nothing had changed, but everything was different.[6]

Afterwards, Joy made a gradual transition to veganism.[1]

In a 2013 interview, she explained that her doctoral research had initially focused on the psychosociology of violence and discrimination, but later shifted to questions about the psychology of eating meat. Perceiving a pattern of irrational and inconsistent thinking among the subjects she interviewed, she was led to theorize that attitudes about meat reflected acquired prejudice. This idea became the basis for much of her later work.[7]

Theory of Carnism

Main article: Carnism

Joy introduced the term carnism in a 2001 article published in Satya,

meat paradox—the apparent inconsistency in common attitudes toward animals, wherein people may express affection towards some animals while eating others—and the cognitive dissonance it entails. A number of psychologists are supportive of Joy's beliefs concerning the influence of eating meat on attitudes toward animals.[10][11][12]

Activism

Joy founded Carnism Awareness & Action Network (CAAN), later renamed Beyond Carnism, in 2010.[13] According to a review by Animal Charity Evaluators, the organization uses public talks, media campaigns, video development, and activist training in an effort to shift the public conversation about meat mainly in the United States and Germany. The review judged CAAN's novel organizational strategies to be promising in terms of their potential to foster a sustained network of animal rights advocates, but noted that the relatively new group lacked a track record, and that the effects of its approach would be difficult to assess.[14]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Guerrero, Teresa (December 16, 2013). "Por qué queremos a los perros pero nos comemos a los cerdos" [Why we love dogs but we eat pigs]. El Mundo. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  2. ISBN 978-3-319-33418-9
    .
  3. ^ Gander, Kashmira (September 6, 2017). "Carnism: Why we love dogs, eat pigs and wear cows". The Independent. Archived from the original on May 12, 2022. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  4. ^ "Melanie Joy". Women Economic Forum. January 4, 2020. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  5. ^ Brumm, Felix (August 24, 2013). "Bio-Fleisch ist ein Mythos" [Organic meat is a myth]. Der Spiegel. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  6. ^ a b Gandhi, Maneka (July 5, 2015). "From cuisine to corpses to 'carnism'". The Statesman. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  7. ^ Hoffman, Sophia (March 4, 2019). "Carnism: Interview with Melanie Joy". Sophia Hoffmann. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  8. ^ Joy, Melanie (September 2001). "From Carnivore to Carnist: Liberating the Language of Meat". Satya. 18 (2): 126–127.
  9. ^
    ISBN 978-94-007-0929-4
    .
  10. S2CID 145339463
    .
  11. S2CID 11686309
    .
  12. ^ Singal, Jesse (June 25, 2015). "How people rationalize eating meat". CNN. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  13. ^ Langley, Liz (November 29, 2010). "Why Are We Against Wearing Fur, But OK with Eating Meat?". Alternet. Archived from the original on August 16, 2017. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  14. ^ "Carnism Action and Awareness Network". Animal Charity Evaluators. December 10, 2014. Archived from the original on August 27, 2016. Retrieved August 29, 2020.

Bibliography

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to Melanie Joy.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Melanie_Joy&oldid=1209147102"