S1E6: Urban Cows?

In episode six, Claudia Hirtenfelder makes an argument for why cows should be thought of as urban animals who have varied experiences.The Animal Highlight is a spinoff and sister podcast to the award winning show, the Animal Turn Podcast. Season 1 is focused on “Animals and The Urban.” 

 Featured: 

• The afterlives of the lively commodity: Life-worlds, death-worlds, rotting-worlds by Kathryn Gillespie
• Floating Farm Rotterdam
• The Union Stock Yards
• Ankole
• Cow plays with Pilates ball by Kinder World
• The Animal Turn "Animal Highlights (Animals and The Urban)" Playlist on Youtube. 

 Credits:

• Claudia Hirtenfelder, producer and host 
• Christiaan Mentz, sound editor and producer 
• Rebecca Shen, content producer and designer (logo and episode artwork)
• Gordon Clarke, bed music composer
• Learn more about the team here. 

 Support the podcast via: 

• Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/join/TheAnimalTurn 
• Buy Me a Coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/theanimalturn 
• Buzzsprout: https://theanimalturn.buzzsprout.com/ 

Sponsor:

• Animals in Philosophy, Politics, Law and Ethics sponsored the season of The Animal Turn Podcast where these highlights were originally aired. Originally Aired/Recorded: 28 April 2021.

A.P.P.L.E
Animals in Politics, Law, and Ethics researches how we live in interspecies societies and polities.

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The Animal Highlight is a spinoff and sister podcast to the award winning show, the Animal Turn Podcast.

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Transcript

00:00 - Introduction 

• This first season animals and the urban and is extracted from Season 3 of The Animal Turn Podcast.  
• In today’s highlight we are focusing on cows.

0:40 – Cows in cities?

• For many people in North America and Europe the idea of cows in the city might seem strange but even in urban areas where you can’t see an urban animal it doesn’t mean they are not urban animals. 
• They can be in intimate relationships with cities as meat, leather – their “afterlives”, as Kathryn Gillespie would say, is an indicator or their urbanness. 

02:25 - Range of different urban cow relations

• There are tons or different urban cow relations – they can be revered and/or entangled in dairy and meat industries. 
• The Pamplona bull run – what does it mean for the bulls themselves?
• The floating farm in Rotterdam with 35 cows, all done in the name of climate change. 
• What kind experiences do cows have in these relations?
• The were historical ubiquitous – Go and check out images of the Union Stockyards. 

05:02 – Facts about cows

• Despite cows being animals, everyone knows many people don’t know a lot about them. 
• “We don’ know a lot about them as animals instead of as commodities”
• They like to live in matriarchal herds and are fantastic mothers who have deep friendships. They have best friends. 
• Extremely curious and social animals. 
• Have you ever seen a cow playing with a Pilates ball? A joy to watch them run and jump. 
• Cows’ ancient ancestors were called Aurochs who had impressive horns and weighed over a ton. 
• Most cows are meant to have horns, but they have been bred out of many breeds, they are called polled. 
• ‘Cattle’ is etymologically linked to concepts of property and capital. 
• There are over 1400 breeds of cows, 184 are extinct and 490 are at risk lists. Only a handful of cows are used in industries, such as the iconic Holstein the most ubiquitous breed used in global dairy. 
• Have you ever heard of Ankole? They have beautiful, massive horns and are found in Uganda. 
• They were domesticated at least 15,000 years ago. 

08:58 – Credits 

“A huge thank you to Animals in Philosophy, Politics, Law and Ethics for sponsoring The Animal Turn Podcast, where these clips were taken from. To Christiaan Mentz for editing this episode. Thank you also goes to Rebecca Shen for designing the Animal Highlight logo and episode art work.”

Show notes compiled by Claudia Hirtenfelder