Veganism,virtue, and vigils : human-animal interactions, vegan activism, and social meanings in a Johannesburg-based non-profit organisation

Abstract

This dissertation centres on the South African chapter of an international vegan activism organisation that intends to “build a vegan world” by way of organising “vigils” outside slaughterhouses. At these vigils, activists bear witness to the animals destined for slaughter, in the hope that curious passersby might question their own relationship to animals-as-food. Drawing on field research – consisting of participant observation and interviews conducted over a period of 14 months – as well as textual analysis, I argue that this local iteration of vegan activism departs in important ways from the vision of its overarching international organisation. Through the life histories of the three key activists involved in these vigils, I explore how international animal rights activism is transposed in a South African context, and how this context may complicate the overarching organisation’s aspirations of creating a vegan world. Furthermore, I illustrate how these three individual vegan activists pursue divergent but often rhyming projects to live meaningful, good lives. Despite their differences, the activists are unified in their attempts to find meaning, community and care, and “the good” amidst the insecurities and precarity, insecurity, and ambiguities of life under late capitalism.