Kendra Coulter

Kendra Coulter
Nationality	Canadian
Alma mater	University of Toronto,Huron University College
Occupation	Professor
Known for	Humane jobs, animal protection
Awards	2015 Canadian Association for Work and Labour Studies Book Prize
Academic career
Discipline	Labour studies,Human–animal studies,Organization studies
Institutions	Huron University College
Notable works	Revolutionizing Retail: Workers, Political Action, and Social Change(2014) Animals, Work, & the Promise of Interspecies Solidarity(2016)
Notable ideas	Interspeciessolidarity Humane jobs

Kendra Coulteris a Canadian scholar who is Professor in Management and Organizational Studies atHuron University College at Western University.She is the author ofRevolutionizing Retail: Workers, Political Action, and Social Change(2014),Animals, Work, and the Promise of Interspecies Solidarity(2016), andDefending Animals: Inside the Front Lines of Animal Protection(2023). She is a fellow of theOxford Centre for Animal Ethics.

Career

Coulter was trained as ananthropologist,studying at theUniversity of Western Ontarioand theUniversity of Toronto.She is the co-editor ofGoverning Cultures: Anthropological Perspectives on Political Labor, Power, and Government,along with William R. Schumann, which was published in 2012 byPalgrave Macmillan.

Coulter's first monograph,Revolutionizing Retail: Workers, Political Action, and Social Changewas published in 2014 by Palgrave Macmillan. The book explores theretailsector, examining how the lives of workers in the industry can be improved. She first examines the nature of retail work, and then looks to the successes and promise of retailunionsin changing workers' lives and situations. Coulter then considers retail more broadly, examining a range of possible avenues for political change including through public policy. Amanda Pyman, who reviewed the book forTimes Higher Education,said that it was "Essential reading for all employment relations scholars... Coulter should be commended for this valuable contribution to what is still, despite the prominence of retail in global economies, an understudied sector. In the process, she offers a valuable reminder of the importance of workers' struggles in organising for social change."Revolutionizing Retailwas awarded the 2015 Canadian Association for Work and Labour Studies book prize.

In her second monograph, 2016'sAnimals, Work, & the Promise of Interspecies Solidarity,Coulter examines the work people do with animals as well as thework done by animals,drawing upon a range of theoretical perspectives includingfeminist political economy.Coulter argues that the work done by and for animals has been underexplored in labour andorganizational studiesandhuman-animal studies,Coulter not only analyses these topics, arguing that animals' work should be recognised as such, but critically engages with them, offering alternative ways to conceptualise the place of animals in the workplace and society, with a focus on improving lives and alleviating suffering. She introduced and elucidates the concept of ecosocial reproductionto recognise the effects of wild animals' labour on ecosystems. Coulter later expanded on the concept of humane jobs and how it can be used to encourage social change.On the website of her Humane Jobs project, Coulter writes that "There are compelling ethical and environmental reasons to move the workforce away from damaging patterns and towards more sustainable and positive practices and employment sectors. We can and should create humane jobs."This scholarship has significantly influencedhuman-animal studiesand Susanna Hedenborg calls it "unique, interesting, and important."

In 2017, in recognition of her research achievements, Coulter was one of the 70 academics chosen to become a member of theRoyal Society of Canada's College of New Scholars, Artists and Scientists.In the same year, she was awarded the Brock University Chancellor's Chair for Research Excellence, which recognises her "outstanding contributions in her field and encourages her position as a path-breaking scholar in research about animals".In 2020, she published the edited collectionAnimal Labour: A New Frontier of Interspecies Justice?withOxford University Press.The book was co-edited with the legal scholar Charlotte E. Blattner and the philosopherWill Kymlicka.

In 2020, Coulter was invited to serve on the Government of Ontario's Provincial Animal Welfare Services Advisory Table.She is also a member of the Canadian Violence Link Coalition's Strategic Planning Committeeand of the City of London's Animal Welfare Advisory Committee.

Select books

• Coulter, Kendra and William R. Schumann, eds. (2012).Governing Cultures: Anthropological Perspectives on Political Labor, Power, and Government.New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Coulter, Kendra (2014).Revolutionizing Retail: Workers, Political Action, and Social Change.New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Coulter, Kendra (2016).Animals, Work, & the Promise of Interspecies Solidarity.New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Blattner, Charlotte E., Kendra Coulter and Will Kymlicka, eds. (2019).Animal Labour: A New Frontier of Interspecies Justice?New York: Oxford University Press.
• Coulter, Kendra (2023).Defending Animals: Inside the Front Lines of Animal Protection.Cambridge: MIT Press.

Further reading

• "An interview with Kendra Coulter".Animals & Society Institute(1 May 2014). Accessed 29 December 2016.

External links

• Dr. Kendra Coulterat Huron University College
• Kendra CoulteratAcademia.edu
• Humane Jobs: Working for Human and Animal Wellbeing
• Revolutionizing Retail
• Kendra CoulteratHuffPost