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- Very few law schools have robust programs in animal law.
Part of what animal law is aimed at
is changing the fundamental relationship of animals
to human society.
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There are a number of reasons why creating an animal law
program at USF is so exciting.
First among those is the institution itself,
with its long commitment to public interest law
and social justice.
And second is the students.
I've found them to be incredibly engaged and committed.
I think my favorite thing about this cohort
is that everyone is so inspired by social justice.
A lot of people come from very, very different backgrounds.
And I feel like I've been able to learn from them.
And third, USF's location in San Francisco in particular,
and California more broadly, is incredibly important.
California really is at the forefront of progressive animal
protection legislation.
It's one of the main locations for animal protection
litigation.
And so creating a program in California is very promising.
Why so many people are working toward expanding
it is that the way that animals are treated
by a society, really indicative of how the society treats
people, too.
The Justice for Animals Program was
created to address the fundamental injustice
of the way human society treats the non-human world.
A lot of people would be surprised to find out
that the legal system considers animals property, even
though the animals that many of us spend our lives with,
we consider more like members of the family.
The term personhood comes up a lot in animal law,
and whether animals can be considered persons
under the law.
Just think about whether you think of your own companion
animal as property, or if you think of them as family.
And that distinction is really the essence of animal law.
And you would really get to explore that
by studying animal law.
I teach animal law, an introductory animal law course
that covers the basic doctrinal regulation of humans'
treatments of animals in the United States legal system
as well as internationally.
And in that course we study some of the most central issues
in animal law.
That might be criminal anti-cruelty laws.
It would be the treatment of farmed animals,
regulation of companion animals, puppy mills, animals
in research.
And that class is really focused on introducing
students to the diversity of animal law,
the wide range of topics that it covers,
and the interesting theoretical and legal questions that it
raises.
The class was really transformative.
I learned how many areas of animal law there are.
It's really not a field.
It's a lens to be able to channel the laws that we have,
whether they are specifically related to animals or not,
for the benefit of animals.
USF just provided the groundwork and the platform--
a really solid platform-- to be able to explore areas of law,
like animal law, that I know I wouldn't
have gotten at another school.
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