Humanities Panel at the AT&T Conference Center

The Humanities panel at this discussion consisted of three very interesting and diverse speakers who present refreshing views on animals in literature.

Mr. Thomas Prasch was the first to speak and his discussion focused on the comparisons of expression in humans and animals. He believed that we could bring humans down to the same level as animals if we removed the concept of speceism. His supporting facts came from Darwin's study of expression that focused on a cultural difference between animals nd humans rather than the biological differences. Darwin saw expression as a legacy of the past with social influences. While some expressions are universal, they are learned through our environment rather than passed down genetically. Mr. Preach was a very interesting speaker. I just wish he would've expanded on his essay rather than reading aloud from it.



The second speaker was our very own refreshing Professor Bump. After the rather monotone lecture experience before, he brought some life to the panel and discussed cannibalism in the Alice books. He grabbed the interest of the audience through his quoting of the Bible and then questioning why animals are not understood to be included in the statement "thy neighbor." A brief discussion of The Alice in Wonderland movie where the difference between love of animals/good and hatred of animals/bad was portrayed in greater magnitude than the books. There was a chuckle amongst the crowd after he announced the IMAX 3D movie times for Alice at the Bob Bullock Museum.



Professor Stiles was the last to speak on the panel. She drew very interesting conclusions on the novel Dracula and its influence of vivisection through the author's brother. She explained that Dracula exploited animals and humans for the purpose of materialistic science and thus clearly supported vivisection during a time in history when animal rights were very strong. She cleverly proposed the idea that this novel may be revenge science fiction to the vivisection issue. The question of whether vivisection circulated around Victorian Society as a popular metaphor was then proposed and followed by the example of Dr. Seward in the popular Dorian Grey novel. My question for Dr. Stiles was whether or not society picked up on the anti-vivisection statements that she pointed out in the novel and whether or not it encouraged anti-vivisectors.