Animal Studies
The Animal Studies minor (18 semester hours) offers students the opportunity to learn about the lives of nonhuman animals and to investigate the representation in human cultures of their diversity and complexity. For course information, visit the Undergraduate Bulletin.
As our global environmental crisis intensifies and the vulnerability and interrelation of all life systems becomes increasingly apparent, the interdisciplinary field of Animal Studies has emerged, bringing together scholars in the sciences, social sciences and humanities to address past and present relations between human and nonhuman animals. This minor provides an understanding of the concept of the animal by examining how our relationships with nonhuman animals are mediated by culture. Complementing a broad array of majors in the sciences and humanities, the minor explores the social, political and ecological effects our attitudes toward other animals have in and on the world.
This minor helps prepare students for careers and/or graduate education in a number of possible fields including, but not limited to:
- wildlife rehabilitation
- park services
- conservation
- animal advocacy
- non-profit work
- veterinary medicine
- primate anthropology
- animal-assisted therapies
- sustainable farming
- publishing, advertising, creative writing and/or professional writing
- cultural studies
- teaching on any level
Faculty Contacts
Dr. Michael Dale
Department of Leadership & Educational Studies
Watauga Residential College
Office: LLA 128
Email: dalemw@appstate.edu
Phone: (828) 262-3121
Dr. Kathryn Kirkpatrick
Department of English
Office: Sanford 234
Email: kirkpatrick@appstate.edu
Phone: (828) 262-2910