Dr Matthew Cole

Professional biography

My current research centres on Critical Animal Studies and the sociology of human-nonhuman animal relations, especially childhood socialization, cultural reproduction and intersections between intra-human and inter-species relations (for example, affinities and entanglements between sexism, racism and speciesism). My first book: Our Children and Other Animals: The Cultural Construction of Human-Animal Relations in Childhood, co-written with Dr Kate Stewart, explores how children are socialized into accepting and reproducing the human domination of other animals.

I am also interested in the largely untapped potential of ‘classical’ and contemporary sociological theory to enhance our understanding of the human domination of other animals, and thereby to equip social movements for other animals with effective tactics for challenging that domination. I have also researched and written on the cultural representation of vegans and veganism, the genealogy of modern veganism and the sociology of unemployment.

Publications

Books

Almiron, N., Cole, M. & Freeman, C.P. (eds) (2016) Critical Animal and Media Studies: Communication for Nonhuman Animal Advocacy, Routledge.

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2014) Our Children and Other Animals: The Cultural Construction of Human-Animal Interaction in Childhood, Ashgate

Journal articles

Almiron, N., Cole, M. and Freeman, C.P. (2018) 'Critical Animal and Media Studies: Expanding the Understanding of Oppression in Communication Research', European Journal of Communication, https://doi.org/10.1177/0267323118763937

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2018) ‘Speciesism Party: an intersectional vegan critique of Sausage Party’, special issue of International Studies in Literature & Environment, isx075, https://doi.org/10.1093/isle/isx075

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2017) ‘A new life in the countryside awaits’: interactive lessons in the rural utopia in ‘farming’ simulation games’, Discourse 38 (3): 402-415.

Cole, M. & Morgan, K. (2013) ‘Engineering Freedom? A Critique of Biotechnological Routes to ‘Animal Liberation’’, Configurations 21 (2): 201-229.

Cole, M. & Morgan, K. (2011) ‘Veganism contra speciesism: Beyond debate’, The Brock Review, 12 (1): 144-163 (Special Issue: Animals in Human Societies)

Cole, M. & Morgan, K. (2011) ‘Vegaphobia: Derogatory discourses of veganism and the reproduction of speciesism in UK national newspapers’, British Journal of Sociology, 61 (1): 134-153

Cole, M. (2011) ‘From ‘animal machines’ to ‘happy meat’? Foucault’s ideas of disciplinary and pastoral power applied to ‘animal-centred’ welfare discourse’, Animals 1 (1): 83-101

Stewart, K. & Cole, M. (2009) ‘The conceptual separation of food and animals in childhood’, Food, Culture and Society, 12 (4): 457-476

Cole, M., Miele, M., Hines, P., Zokaei, K., Evans, B. & Beale, J. (2009) ‘Animal foods and climate change:  Shadowing eating practices’, International Journal of Consumer Studies, 33 (2): 162-167

Cole, M. (2008) ‘Asceticism and hedonism in research discourses of veg*anism’, British Food Journal, 110 (7): 706-716

Cole, M. (2008) ‘Sociology contra Thatcherism? The contest for the meaning of unemployment in UK policy debates’, Work, Employment and Society, 22 (1): 27-43

Cole, M. (2007) ‘From employment exchange to Jobcentre Plus: The changing institutional context of unemployment’, History of the Human Sciences, 20 (4): 129-146

Cole, M. (2007) ‘Rethinking unemployment: a challenge to the legacy of Jahoda et al.’, Sociology, 41 (6): 1133-1149

Book chapters

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2018) ‘‘A new life in the countryside awaits’: interactive lessons in the rural utopia in ‘farming’ simulation games’, in Pini, B., Mayes, R. & Castro, L.R. (eds) Rurality and Education, Routledge.

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2018) ‘Socializing superiority: the cultural denaturalization of children's relations with animals’, in Cutter-McKenzie, A., Malone, K. & Hacking, E.B. (eds) International Research Handbook on ChildhoodNature: Assemblages of Childhood and Nature Research, Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-51949-4_66-1

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2018) ‘Advertising oppression: The reproduction of anthroparchy on UK television’, in J. Sorenson and A. Matsuoka (eds.), 2018. Critical Animal Studies: Towards Trans-species Social Justice, London: Rowman and Littlefield, pp. 94-114.

Cole, M. (2017) ‘Hiding and legitimating oppression in ‘dairy product’ advertising’, in D. Nibert (ed) Capitalism and Animal Oppression, Praeger Press, pp. 19-33.

Cole, M. & Stewart, K. (2016) ‘‘I need fish fingers and custard’: The irruption and suppression of vegan ethics in Doctor Who’, in A. Potts (ed) Meat Culture, Brill Publishing, pp. 198-221. https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004325852_012

Almiron, N. & Cole, M. (2016) ‘Introduction: The Convergence of Two Critical Approaches’, in Almiron, N., Cole, M. & Freeman, C.P. (eds) Critical Animal and Media Studies: Communication for Nonhuman Animal Advocacy, Routledge.

Cole, M. (2016) ‘Still ‘getting [green] beef’? The marginalization of animal ethics in climate change discourse’, in Almiron, N., Cole, M. & Freeman, C.P. (eds) Critical Animal and Media Studies: Communication for Nonhuman Animal Advocacy, Routledge.

Stewart, K. and Cole, M. (2016) ‘Reproducing the speciesist boundaries of the social: Cultural rupture in representations of ‘urban foxes’ in UK newspapers’, in Almiron, N., Cole, M. & Freeman, C.P. (eds) Critical Animal and Media Studies: Communication for Nonhuman Animal Advocacy, Routledge, pp.124-137.

Cole, M. (2014) ‘‘The Greatest Cause on Earth’: The historical formation of veganism as an ethical practice’, in N. Taylor & R. Twine (eds) The Rise of Critical Animal Studies – From the Margins to the Centre, London: Routledge, pp. 203-224.

Morgan, K. & Cole, M. (2011) ‘The discursive representation of nonhuman animals in a culture of denial’, in R. Carter & N. Charles (eds) Humans and Other Animals: Critical Perspectives, London: Palgrave, pp. 112-132

• Social harms against nonhuman animals
• Media representations of nonhuman animals
• The socialisation and cultural reproduction of speciesest discourses and practices