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Feral Pig Panics: Racialized Reproduction Anxieties and the Uprooting of U.S. Domesticity

Feral Pig Panics
Thursday, April 18, 2019
5:30 pm - 7:00 pm
Dr. Logan Natalie O'Laughlin

Many southern states in the U.S. are facing a "pig bomb," according to wildlife scientists, conservationists, farmers, and landowners; feral and wild pigs are reproducing rapidly and their populations are exploding across North America. With them, they bring many toxic illnesses, land destruction, and outright aggression. This lecture uses feminist science, critical race, and queer studies to rethink the panics about these so-called nuisance species. Drawing on a portion of their current book project, Dr. O'Laughlin examines the stories people tell about feral and wild pigs and argues that these feral figures function to reinforce norms of white, heterosexual human reproduction in the U.S.

Bio
Logan Natalie O'Laughlin (they/them) is a Postdoctoral Associate of Feminist Environmental Studies in the Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies Program at Duke. Their first book project, Toxic Animal Encounters: Queer Environmental Threats & Racialized Reproduction Anxieties, traces contemporary environmental panics and their feared effects on sex, sexuality, and reproduction in North America. Logan has taught courses on feminist environmentalisms, queer theory, and environmental reproductive justice at Duke as well as at the University of Washington, where they completed their Ph.D. in Feminist Studies in 2018.

Contact: Julie Wynmor