This inescapably controversial study envisions, defines, and
theorizes an area that Laura Wright calls vegan studies. We have an
abundance of texts on vegans and veganism including works of
advocacy, literary and popular fiction, film and television, and
cookbooks, yet until now, there has been no study that examines the
social and cultural discourses shaping our perceptions of veganism
as an identity category and social practice. Ranging widely across
contemporary American society and culture, Wright unpacks the
loaded category of vegan identity. She examines the mainstream
discourse surrounding and connecting animal rights to (or omitting
animal rights from) veganism. Her specific focus is on the
construction and depiction of the vegan body-both male and
female-as a contested site manifest in contemporary works of
literature, popular cultural representations, advertising, and new
media. At the same time, Wright looks at critical animal studies,
human-animal studies, posthumanism, and ecofeminism as theoretical
frameworks that inform vegan studies (even as they differ from it).
The vegan body, says Wright, threatens the status quo in terms of
what we eat, wear, and purchase-and also in how vegans choose not
to participate in many aspects of the mechanisms undergirding
mainstream culture. These threats are acutely felt in light of
post-9/11 anxieties over American strength and virility. A
discourse has emerged that seeks, among other things, to bully
veganism out of existence as it is poised to alter the dominant
cultural mindset or, conversely, to constitute the vegan body as an
idealized paragon of health, beauty, and strength. What better
serves veganism is exemplified by Wright's study: openness, debate,
inquiry, and analysis.
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