Ecologies of Meat I: Reflections on Production, Trade and Consumption Practices in the Global South

Panel Convenor(s)

• SN

  Soheb Niazi

  Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

Panel Chair(s)

• SN

  Soheb Niazi

  Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

Presenter(s)

• VS

  Vishal Singh Deo

  Manipal Institute of Social Science Humanities and Arts (MISHA)
  Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India
• MH

  Mohomodou Houssouba

  Malian Society of Applied Sciences, Switzerland
• SN

  Soheb Niazi

  Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

While ecological concerns and contemporary livestock practices have generated criticism in
Western societies, the production of animal flesh for human consumption continues to expand
persistently. One contributing factor to this expansion is the robust nature of the meat trade
itself, which is deeply entrenched within global capitalism and entangled within unequal
economies. The aim of this panel is to provide critical analysis of these contemporary
concerns by examining the interconnected networks of meat and its allied industries of
livestock, hides and skins, as well as dairy, in regions across the Global South. Expanding on
historical debates on how cultivation and marketing of commodities drove social and
economic transformations across the modern world, the panel will foreground the impact of
commercialization and technological advancements that produce hierarchies in the
commodity chains, and the accompanied transformations of skills, work status and social
hierarchies in production, trade and consumption of these commodities.
The panel will bring together scholars and case studies from African-Asian regional contexts
to reflect on social, cultural and economic practices associated with meat and its allied
industries in the Global South. As key methodological approach, ‘meat’ is a conceptual focus
that binds together other aspects that will be foregrounded in papers, such as the various
associated commodities of trade, production and consumption, social actors involved in
different stages\levels of the commodity chain, sites and spaces of production, effects of
commercialization and the impact of technological innovations, as well as environmental
implications associated with these industries. Contributions are invited from diverse
disciplinary backgrounds including historians, anthropologists, geographers as well as
regional area specialists.

Presentations:

• 09:00 - 10:45 GMT

  Hurting over What? Examining the Character of the Cattle and Livestock Economy within sentiments of hurt in Colonial India (1890-1940)
  

  Presenter: Vishal Singh Deo – Manipal Academy of Higher Education
• 09:00 - 10:45 GMT

  Cowhide patterns as cross-cultural library in the agropastoral Sahel
  

  Presenter: Mohomodou Houssouba – Malian Society of Applied Sciences
• 09:00 - 10:45 GMT

  Deconstructing Hindustani Qassab: The Politics of the All India Jamiat ul Quriash in Colonial India
  

  Presenter: Soheb Niazi – Freie Universität Berlin