12th newsletter of Minding Animals Norway made and sent

I have just composed and distributed the 12th newsletter of Minding Animals Norway (6 pp), including a call for the general meeting 2016 and info on the 5th Norwegian Animal Ethics Conference.

Minding Animals Norway's 3rd research seminar to be held August 23rd in Oslo

Minding Animals Norway's 3rd annual research seminar will be held in Oslo on Friday August 23rd. The deadline for submission of abstracts - in Norwegian or another Scandinavian language - is August 15th. The Call For Papers is available in my Norwegian language blog Utopisk Realisme.

General Meeting of Minding Animals Norway to be held in Oslo August 23rd

The General Meeting of Minding Animals Norway will be held in Oslo on Friday August 23rd. The Norwegian language call for GM is available in my Norwegian language blog Utopisk Realisme.

First newsletter of Minding Animals Norway distributed

Two days ago I composed and distributes the very first newsletter of Minding Animals Norway (in Norwegian) - 6 pp. The newsletter is sent to members, some 33 people by the last count. The MAN newsletter will appear approximately twice every semester (= four times a year).

Minding Animals Norway: Members email distributed; newsletter to appear

In the end of January a members' email (2 pp.) that I had composed was distributed to all members of Minding Animals Norway. Contents included info about media appearances, preliminary plans/ambitions for an annual awards ceremony, info about the Norwegian Animal ethics conference 2012 (already held) and 2013 (upcoming, August 22), and about Minding Animals Norway's newly established gift account.

 

The next comparable transmission will be in the form of a newsletter, in PDF format. Such newsletters will be issued by Minding Animals Norway approximately four times a year. The first one is due really soon.

Research seminar, General Meeting of Minding Animals Norway to be arranged August 23rd

On May 13th Minding Animals Norway had a board meeting. Among other things it was decided that the 3rd Research Seminar of Minding Animals Norway will take place on August 23rd in Oslo, and the General Meeting of MAN the same evening. This year's Norwegian animal ethics conference takes place the day before.

Another letter to the editor in weekly magazine - debate with farmers' union on predator management and sheep husbandry

As mentioned in a recent post I published a letter to the editor in the Norwegian weekly newsmagazine Ny Tid just before Christmas, titled "Gjør sauen en bjørnetjeneste" [Doing the sheep a disservice]. In the January 11th issue of that weekly the deputy chair of The Norwegian Farmers' Union, Berit Hundåla, replied, in a letter to the editor titled "Ulven løper ikke forbi matfatet" [The wolf does not run past the dinner plate]. An image of her article is to be found in my Norwegian language blog Utopisk Realisme, as is my reply which was published today in the January 18th issue, "Sauen som ble til fem høns" (The sheep that were turned into five chickens). Both my letters to the editor were written on behalf of Minding Animals Norway. Among the topics I address is today's low price of animal feed and its consequences for use of outer pastures (or lack thereof). One of my points is, implicitly, that the farmers' union has chosen to complain about predators' predation on sheep rather than to address the problematic and often not desirable ramifications of its own policies with regard to the low price of animal feed (which supports expansion in pig and poultry husbandry - animals that are kept indoors all year - but discourages use of outer pastures and thus outdoor keeping of animals and sheep husbandry in general).

Call for General Meeting of Minding Animals Norway

As the chair of Minding Animals Norway, about a week ago I wrote the call of the board for this year's General Meeting, which will take place in Oslo September 22nd in connection with the first Animal ethics conference (Dyreetikkonferansen, September 21st) and this year's Minding Animals Norway research seminar (September 22nd). The whole call is available in Norwegian in my Norwegian language blog Utopisk Realisme.

Web page of Minding Animals Norway under construction

The homepage of Minding Animals Norway is under construction. You'll find a simple English language version here.

For those who understand Norwegian, here's a page where you can register as a member, and here's a presentation of the board members (including me, as the chair of MAN - see my Norwegian language blog Utopisk Realisme for the academic blurb on me).

Minding Animals Norway formally registered as NGO

Minding Animals Norge has now been registered as an NGO in Norway's Brønnøysundregistrene (Enhetsregisteret). Organisasjonsnummer: 997 336 216.

I am a founding member and a member of the board along with Rune Ellefsen and Rhys Evans. The first general meeting of MAN will take place in Oslo October 15h, at the closure of our Shared Worlds seminar (see our Facebook page here).

See also the webpage of Minding Animals International.

Minding Animals Norway to be established

We the organizing team of the October 14-15 Oslo event "Shared Worlds" had a meeting last Thursday, where we confirmed and agreed that we will establish Minding Animals Norge (Minding Animals Norway) as an NGO associated with Minding Animals International.

Rune Ellefsen, Rhys Evans and I will from the outset be the three board members of the NGO. The primary task of MAN is to arrange the Shared Worlds event in October. Rounding of that one and a half day event on human-animal relations, the participants will, if there is any interest, discuss possible future activities of Minding Animals Norge, and consider whether its regulations should be altered, for instance opening up for membership and/or local groups.

Minding Animals is an organization - first and foremost a network of scholars and activists - devoted to promoting an ethical perspective in (human-)animal studies, and to make the connection between scholarship and activism related to animals.

See also:
Joining the Board of Directors of Minding Animals International (as alternative representative)

Joining the Board of Directors of Minding Animals International (as alternative representative)

As of today it has been confirmed that I have become Minding Animals Norway Alternative Representative in Minding Animals International's Board of Directors. Rhys Evans is our regular National Representative. Norway is thus the fourth country to become represented in Minding Animals International's Board of Directors, after Australia, Germany and India.

I will further be one out of three board members for the soon-to-be-established Minding Animals Norway (Minding Animals Norge), along with Rhys and Rune Ellefsen - cf. our Oslo event in October.