Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the place of the animal in Egypt's colonial history to complicate contemporary definitions of cruelty and actions of care. It imagines more attentive, localized ethical codes that take into account the context of both animals and humans.

Paper long abstract:

This paper, based on ethnographic research in Egypt, complicates unchallenged notions of cruelty and animal rights by looking at the history of colonization and the imposition of western ethical codes through development rhetoric and animal care projects. It takes an intersectional approach to explore how contemporary animal care projects are affected by Egypt's colonial history to argue for the embeddedness of animals in our political and social worlds. “Animals” are not the same everywhere: innocent and saveable and so context is important in deciding the care they need.

The paper specifically interrogates the impulse of foreign women to intervene and give care or "save" animals in the Global South without regard to their context and existing relationships. It argues for more attentive, localized ethical codes and care practices that take into account the context of both animals and humans.

The paper ends with an opening of imagination: what would our world look like if we build our ethical codes and definitions of care in community with non-humans?