‘The Invisible Violence of Everyday Words’ - Video Companion

Intro

In 2011, a study by Haslam et al. confirmed that most animal metphors fall into three main insult categories: you’re depraved, disagreeable, or unintelligent.

Reference: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258153350_Beastly_What_Makes_Animal_Metaphors_Offensive

Even the word "coward" has animal origins: it comes from the Latin cauda, meaning tail—an allusion to animals tucking their tails in fear. Across many languages (English, Spanish, Serbian), animal metaphors are common—and especially used to insult women.

Reference: https://sciendo.com/article/10.2478/genst-2013-0020

Part 1: The Hidden Power of Language

A 2023 study by Leach et al. analyzed billions of words and found that the more "human" a word is, the more it's associated with care and moral value. The more "animal" it is, the more emotionally irrelevant it becomes.

Reference: https://bpspsychub.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bjso.12561

There's also a hierarchy among animals:

• Pets (dogs, cats) = adored

• Farm animals = forgettable

• Wild animals = pests or background noise

Pronouns reveal this hierarchy. We say "he" or "she" for pets, but "it" for farmed or lab animals. This shift from subject to object allows us to emotionally distance ourselves.

Part 2: De-naming & De-storying

Names shape identity. One study even found people often choose careers resembling their names (e.g., Dennis the dentist).

Reference: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2002-12744-001

Books referenced:

• When My Name Was Keoko by Linda Sue Park

• Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

To erase a name is to erase a story. In farming, animals are deliberately left unnamed. Instead, they're tagged, numbered, and renamed as "beef," "pork," and "poultry."

Gary Nabhan's concept of "re-story-ation" suggests we can't heal without giving back stories.

Part 3: The Legal Landscape

Happy the elephant passed the mirror test (self-awareness) and became the subject of a legal personhood case in NY. The court denied her rights in 2022, ruling 5-2 against the case.

In contrast, India has taken legal steps toward animal personhood:

• 2014: Supreme Court of India granted constitutional protections

• 2019: Punjab & Haryana High Court declared all animals legal persons

Reference: https://legalonus.com/animal-law-protection-laws-in-india/

Part 4: Euphemisms

We sanitize violence with language:

• "Culling" = mass killing of animals (geese, deer, pigs, kangaroos)

• "Meat" = animal flesh

• "Dairy" = forcibly taken milk from another species

These euphemisms make killing sound like logistics. Language turns blood into metrics.