Description
This is the first international Companion volume to humane education with contributors from many countries, including South Africa, Israel, Singapore, Croatia, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada and the United States. It draws together multi-disciplinary perspectives on the history of humane thought, humane education practices, and offers appraisals of what is effective. Humane education is a broad field that aims to cultivate compassion, respect, and understanding for all living beings and the environment. The desirability of cultivating empathy as an educational goal is now widely accepted, but in many countries humane education has yet to establish a foothold among all the competing claims on the modern curriculum. However, it remains a key tool that can be used to lessen violence and insensitivity to humans and animals alike. The purpose of this Companion volume is to inspire and facilitate the teaching of humane education, which the authors believe should be on the agenda of every school and college in the world.
This Companion volume is a project of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, which pioneers ethical perspectives on animals through academic research, teaching, and publication.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Introduction: The Case for Humane Education.- Part I Traditions of Empathy.- Chapter 2. Long Before Aesop: Sumerian Animal Fables and Their Educational Messages.- Chapter 3. Compassion and Character: Animal Welfare in Fictional Narratives of Moral Improvement by Nineteenth-Century English Women Writers.- Chapter 4. The Human as Animal: Scottish Fantasy and the Importance of Imagination for Humane Empathy.- Chapter 5. Empathy in Art.- Chapter 6. In Defense of “Sentimental Nonsense”: Richard Adams’s The Plague Dogs and Animal Compassion.- Chapter 7. Webs of Empathy: Animal Subjectivities and the Teaching of Charlotte’s Web.- Chapter 8. A New Binary: Creator and Created.- Chapter 9. Moral Education and Animal Rights.- Part II Making Progress.- Chapter 10. Concerning Critical Humane Education.- Chapter 11. The Kindness-to-Animals Ethic in Antebellum America.- Chapter 12. “Habits of Mercy”: RSPCA Humane Education in Nineteenth-Century Britain.- Chapter 13. Deep in the Heartland: Humane Education in Oklahoma.- Chapter 14. Is the Singapore Education System Ready to Introduce Humane Education?.- Chapter 15. The Educational Role of Croatian Children’s Magazines in Promoting Animal Rights.- Chapter 16. Stories from an Animal Rescue: Changing Behavior Through Indirect Education.- Chapter 17. The Importance of Seminary Education on “Creation Care” and “the Integrity of Creation”.- Part III Developing Practice.- Chapter 18. Building a Bright Future: Humane Education from Theory to Practice.- Chapter 19. “Cool to Be Kind”: An Evaluation of a Classroom-Based Humane Education Intervention.- Chapter 20. Building Empathy through Picture Books: Grades 2 and 5 Teacher and Student Perspectives on an Animal-Themed Book Program.- Chapter 21. Can Humane Education Motivate Students to Learn? Teachers’ Perceptions.- Chapter 22. The Five Freedoms for Animals as a Basic Learning Requirement for All Young Learners.- Chapter 23. An Unconscious Bias Toward Non-human Animal Exploitation in the British Schooling System.- Chapter 24. Effect of Humane Education on Middle School Reading Comprehension.- Chapter 25. Raising Consciousness About Animals Across the Curriculum: A Personal Journey.
