Sick, Savage, Citizen- Vegetarian Propaganda and French Revolution
Open Access
- Author:
- O'Connor, Taylor
- Graduate Program:
- French
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- January 27, 2025
- Committee Members:
- Adlai Murdoch, Program Head/Chair
Emmanuel Jean-Francois, Major Field Member
Tracy Rutler, Chair & Dissertation Advisor
Benedicte Monicat, Major Field Member
Sarah Miller, Outside Unit & Field Member - Keywords:
- French Revolution
eighteenth century
vegetarianism
jacobin
revolutionary
france
Republic - Abstract:
- Recent scholarship on historical vegetarianism has made great contributions in underlining the presence and even prevalence of a meat-abstaining diet in western civilization, however this scholarship tends to focus on the occurrence of ethical vegetarians, and species-sympathetic philosophies as historical precursors to the modern movement of veganism. In Sick, Savage, Citizen: Vegetarian Propaganda and French Revolution, other instances of vegetarianism are explored, as they appear no less historically-consequential, yet perhaps counter to our contemporary notions of a diet dedicated to compassion, equanimity, and nonviolence. Within the context of the French Revolution beginning in 1789, this project will explore the ways in which vegetarianism appeared as a tool of revolutionary propaganda, and how a meat-free diet played an important role in the politics of the French republicanism, and the establishment of a new national tradition following the dismantling of the monarchy. Using the rhetorical platform of the revolutionaries, as it was inspired by Enlightenment thought, this interdisciplinary reading of dietary propaganda analyzes texts ranging from medical treatises to court transcripts, philosophical discourses to political cartoons to reveal the political power of vegetarianism. At a time of rapid social change, transformative civic relations, and violent revolution, vegetarianism appears at the intersection of popular emotions, class divisions, and moralized notions of corporal and civil “hygiene” as a weapon of political action, exclusion, or even erasure. Vegetarianism need not always be “bloodless.” Sick, Savage, Citizen problematizes current discourse on meat-abstaining diets in western history, revealing a legacy that expands our understanding of vegetarianism to be just as diverse in its motivations, just as susceptible to human ambition, just as morally “grey” as any other political institution.