The Territorializing Function of Penitentiary Farms

Land, Agriculture, and the Carceral: The Territorializing Function of Penitentiary Farms

Kelly Struthers Montford

Abstract: The Correctional Service of Canada is currently re-instituting animal-based agribusiness programs in two federal penitentiaries. To situate the contemporary function of such programs, I provide a historical overview of prison agriculture in relation to Canadian nation-making. I argue that penitentiary farms have functioned as a means of prison expansion and settler territorialisation. While support for agricultural programming is rooted in its perceived facilitation of rehabilitation and vocational training, I

ought to be viewed as an institution made possible by and that reproduces,show that thesesettler justifications colonial power are untenable.relations to Rather animals, the prisonlabour, farm and territory. Prison agribusiness is then an expression of colonial, agricultural, and carceral powers.

I. Introduction rior to confederation in 1867, and until 2010, Canadian penitentiary farms were a component of federal male incarceration.1 In P2009, under the direction of the Conservative government, the

I have reviewed do not provide a rationale as to why penitentiary agriculture 1. wasArchambault unique to “Report men’s ofinstitutions. the Royal Commission,” Women under 136. federal The archival sentence records were thathis-

- vants.torically See “rehabilitated” Hannah-Moffat, according Punishment to standards in Disguise of. middle-classPrison labour whiteness in women’s so that they could become marriageable and find employment as domestic ser

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Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) announced the closure of its agribusiness programs.2 Prior to their closure, the penitentiary farms employed approximately 716 federal prisoners (less than 1 percent of the prison population) in six institutions3 whose work included animal-based farming activities such as dairying, egg-production, and the rearing, slaughtering, and butchering of farmed animals. The government stated that less than one percent of prisoners working in agribusiness found work in this - erating at a loss of $4 million per year—costing $11 million to operate, the farmsfield upon generated release. $7 Furthermore, million in revenue. at the time4 The of government closure, the farmspositioned were opthe - - mentfarms had as both announced financially that unviablethis program and wouldas having be replaced little return by updated on “invest and relevantment” in employmentthat prisoners training were not initiatives. trained in5 marketable skills. The govern In 2010, amidst public resistance and protest, the farms closed. In the summer of 2016, as a result of ongoing public pressure from food activists,

exploring the possibility of reopening prison farms.6 thefarming liberal groups, government public officials, committed and citizens,$4.3 million CSC ran dollars a public to re-openconsultation two In February 2018, In the presentation of their federal budget, the current liberal government statedpenitentiary that reopening farms in thetwo Kingston, of the previously Ontario areaclosed over farms the wouldnext five “provide years. federal inmates with training opportunities to acquire new skills, while

penitentiaries also continues to be gendered and in service of the larger men’s institutions. This includes laundry services, textiles, and the sewing of prison- - Penitentiary Act of 1868 issued men’s clothing, towels, bed linens, and drapery. See Office of the Cor rectional Investigator Canada, “Annual Report.” The - sons,also provided I suspect for that the agriculture imposition was of “hardnot seen labour” as an for appropriate a period notrehabilitative exceeding programthree months, for women see Canada, as it is “Anrooted Act inrespecting beliefs about Penitentiaries.” strenuous physical For these labour rea - Creatures of Empire Cattle Colonialism Dangerousand masculine Crossings dominance. over nature. See MacDonald, “(Confidential Memo randum)”; Anderson, ; Fischer, ; Kim, - 2. Goodman and Dawe, “Prisoners, Cows and Abattoirs.” 3. Mehta, “Trudeau Government Considers Reopening Prison Farms”; Fitzger ald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse.” 4. Neufield, “The Herd at the Pen.” 5. Francis, “Ottawa Failing on Prison Farm Replacement.” 6. CSC “Penitentiary Farm Online Public Consultation.”

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preparing for employment and successful reintegration and rehabilitation 7

intomilk thefrom community.” approximately 500 goats will be sold to a Chinese-based infant As a first step, the re-opened farms will operate a goat dairy, in which been positioned as responsive to an increased demand for goat dairy productsformula producer,in the region Feihe in which International. the two farms Penitentiary will re-open. goat-dairies This increased have - lion to build an infant formula plant in the Kingston, Ontario area. The plantdemand, will however, purchase is Canadian the result dairy of Feihe to make International 60,000 tonnes investing of dry$225 infant mil

the baby boom expected with the repeal of their one-child policy.8 With thefood opening per year; of 85 the percent plant, of the which government will be transported plans to double to China penitentiary to support herds from 500 goats to 1000 goats to support production demands.9 Subsequent announcements reveal that thirty cows will also be part of the re-opened farms.10 CSC also plans to have penal agricultural labourers slaughtering and butchering goats not used in the dairy, as well as animals for 350 farms in the surrounding area. In total, the farms will occupy 1,500 acres of land.11 The Government has directed that the farms would 12 13 Despite the historical importance of agriculture in Canada’s colonial againproject be and managed the place by CORCAN of the penitentiary using a for-profit farm in model. Canada’s penological history, it has received little academic attention. Of the attention paid, much of it addresses contemporary penal agriculture, and fails to consider farmed animals as subjects who are targeted by overlapping forms

7. Canada, “Federal Budget 2018.” 10.8. McGregor, “New Chinese Baby Formula Plant to Buy Canadian Milk.” 9. Vincent, “The Return of Prison Farms and Tattoos.” 11. MacAlpine, “Cows, Goats Headed Back to Jail,”; Snowdon, “More than 30 Dairy 12. Cows.” MacAlpine, “Cows Not in Initial Prison Farm Plan.” CorrectionalCORCAN is a SpecialService Operating of Canada Agency (CSC). thatIt contributes manages federal to safe prison communities industries by providingin Canada. offenders As per the with CSC, employment “CORCAN isand a keyemployability rehabilitation skills program training ofwhile the incarcerated in federal penitentiaries, and for brief periods of time, after they

are released into the community.” They currently produce four “business 13. lines” spanning textiles, manufacturing, construction, and services. See CSC, “CORCAN.” Canada, “Federal Budget 2018”; MacAlpine, “Cows, Goats Headed Back to Jail.”

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of carceral power.14 Of the criminological literature that takes the question of animal subjectivity seriously, attention is not paid to the role of colonialism and animal subjugation.15 spatial similarities shaping separate locations and institutions of human Recent scholarship has considered the- 16 but the prison farm remains unaddressed.and animal confinement This paper respondssuch as prisons, to these solitary omissions confinement by situating cells, the fedfac- eraltory prisonfarms, farmzoos, asand an research instrument laboratories, of settler colonialism that has served to expand the geographical footprint of the prison itself, while at the same time instituting settler-colonial ways of relating to animals, labour, land,

current debates surrounding the reinstatement of the penitentiary farms. and Ipunishment. show that in In the so context doing, thisof Canada, paper seeksprison to farms nuance are and distinctly contextualize rooted in a settler colonial project of territorialisation whereby land and animals are transformed into property.17 I approach prison-based agriculture as historically contingent penal practice that requires an account of its conditions of possibility.18 - lated to prison-based agriculture, labour, and nation-making, I show that the penitentiary farm wasBy analyzing not an inevitable archival and result historical of historical documents process, re but was articulable because it tracked onto dominant tenets of Canadian

on my analysis, I argue that the penitentiary farm is rooted in a settler colo- nialnation-making project of nation-making in the late nineteenth in four overlappingand early twentieth manners: centuries. (1) the prisonBased

itfarm reproduces has enabled settler the colonial prison tonorms expand of labour its geographical and life as footprint;natural and (2) su it- relies on colonial relations of private property to animals and to land; (3) food to the prison, and for sale outside of the prison, it contributes to the perior; and (4) as an income generating program that provides labour and

theoverall penitentiary viability of farm the prisonis a settler and reproduceslocation of punishment,a specific vision pedagogy, of civilized and punishment. Rather than offering a uniquely rehabilitative programme,

14.labour extraction. Settler colonialism—a racialized project of territorial

15. See, further, Goodman and Dawe, “Prisoners, Cows and Abattoirs”; Dawe and 16. Goodman, “Conservative Politics, SacredSolitary Cows.” Confinement Carceral SpaceSee, e.g., Fitzgerald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse.” 17. See,Gruen, further, “Dignity, Anderson, Captivity,”; Creatures Guenther, of Empire Dangerous; Morin, Crossings ; Morin, “Wildspace”; Struthers Montford, “Dehumanized Denizens.” 18. See, further, Carlen, A Criminological Imagination; Kim, -; Struthers Montford, “Agricultural Power.” Multiculturalism. ; Foucault, “Nietzsche, Gene alogy, History”; Foucault, “Two Lectures”; Haque,

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acquisition, cultural genocide, and nation-building—cannot then be di- vorced from regimes of punishment. The re-opening of the penitentiary agriculture must then be placed in historical context, namely the explicitly colonial purpose in which these farms were instituted and operated during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. II. Settler Colonialism, Territory, and the Prison 19 argues that a land critique should inform critical prison scholarship examining incarcera- In the “Colonialism of Incarceration,” Robert Nichols prison is an inherently colonial institution, but that in Canada, its de- ploymenttion in settler and contemporary colonial contexts. function For Nichols, supports it settler is not thecolonial case thatprojects the that must constantly reproduce and secure the settler state’s singularity of rule, deny indigenous modes of self-governance, as well as ensure the

20 - state’sstantly ongoingre-secured access and toaccessed land. For as Patrickit is “the Wolfe, foundation “territoriality of colonial is settler state- colonialism’s specific, irreducible element.” Land must21 In thereforethis perspective, be con

formation, settlement and capitalist development.” 22 The historicalthe specificity imposition of settler of animal colonialism agriculture centres was upon one “themethod disappearance in which colo of- nistsindigeneity asserted and Western the sedimentation modes of life of settler as inherent life-ways and as inevitable. normative.” Despite this supposed inevitability, in Canada and the United States, animal agriculture was not the natural result of historical progress, but was a tactical, focused, and targeted strategy of colonial governance.23 Settlers understood the practice of animal agriculture to be an impor-

to land, as well as to labour (as diligent and contributing to the wealth of thetant nation). marker24 of civility, as it entailed “proper” relationships to animals and- came a means for colonists to assert difference and superiority between white settlers Due and to Indigenous its inextricable persons. link It to also civilized allowed norms, colonists agriculture to invoke be

did not have private property relationships to land, nor used animals— withclaims whom of “terra colonists nullius.” also They claimed did privateso on the property basis that relationships Indigenous over—to nations

19. 20. 21. Coulthard,Nichols, “The Red Colonialism Skin, White of Masks Incarceration.”, 6. 22. Wolfe, “Settler Colonialism and the Elimination of the Native,” 388. 23. See Anderson, Creatures of Empire Dangerous Crossings; Struthers Belcourt, “Animal Bodies, Colonial Subjects,” 2. 24. Anderson, Creatures of Empire. ; Kim, Montford, “Agricultural Power.”

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improve the land via agriculture. Their use of the land was therefore not perceived as productive, and hence did not constitute a legal claim to terri-

thattory. allowedBy enclosing them land, to make marking a claim property to the lines, territory and having in question. farmed25 animals Animal grazeagriculture on and in transform the Canadian land, settler colonists context met theiris then own an legal institution requirements that is shaped by an anthropocentric politics of life and of space “whereby land 26 and animals be- 27 is commodifiedThe position and of animalsprivatized as forproperty animal and agriculture” resources to serve colonial comeends is “subjects not an ontological of empire.” certainty, but in the context of Canada, a colonial

- import. Indigenous scholars such as Kim TallBear (Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate, South Dakota), Billy-Ray Belcourt (Driftpile Cree First Nation, Al berta), and Margaret Robinson (Mi’kmaq scholar and member of Lennox- Island First Nation), have argued that the dualism of human/animal and Indigenousthe violent hierarchiesunderstandings mobilized of life on and this responsibility.basis are distinctly28 Indigenous colonial, unpo- derstandingslitically beneficial of animals to settler as subjectsnation-making in their projects, own right and were in conflict indexed with as

29 While settler governments uncivilized,used animal naïve, agriculture and a-cultural to acquire and land, taken the to practice be another was indicatoralso imposed that Indigenousupon Indigenous persons persons required as a colonization.way to have them attain a modicum of civility.30 In 1891, for example, Edgar Dewdney, Superintendent General of the Department of Indian Affairs, included in his annual report that the In- digenous peoples of Manitoba and Keewatin had made “satisfactory prog-

ress” in adopting private property relationships that served to “transform an Indianand the into more a white-man general substitution in sentiment”: of substantially built homes for the The personal property of these Indians, in cattle especially, is increasing;

25. Creatures of Empire; Kim, Dangerous Crossings; Struthers

26. Ibid.; Anderson, 27. Ibid.,Montford, 5 “Agricultural Power.” 28. Belcourt, “Animal Bodies, Colonial Subjects,” 5. -

29. Ibid.; Robinson, “Animal Personhood”; Robinson, “Veganism”;What We Have TallBear, Learned “An In- derson,digenous Creatures Approach”; of Empire TallBear, “BeyondDangerous the Life/Not-Life Crossings. Binary.” 30. Anderson,Truth and ReconciliationCreatures of Empire CommissionDangerous of Canada, Crossings This; AnBe- nevolent Experiment. ; Kim, ; Kim, ; Woolford,

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temporary wigwam, evinces the growth among them of an inclination for domestic life of permanent character, with its attendant comforts.31

property continues to advance settler colonial projects: “Settler colonial- ismBelcourt is invested argues in that animality the transformation and therefore ofre-makes animals animal from bodies subjects into to - rial acquisition, anthropocentrism, capitalism, white supremacy, and neoliberalcolonial subjects pluralism) to normalize that further settler displace modes and of disappear political indigenouslife (i.e., territo bod- 32 33 and iesdeaded and epistemologies.”life34—subject positions Philosophers made possible such as byLisa and Guenther mediated and by James their Stanescu have argued that farmed animals exist as de-animalized - ings, but are instead reduced to input-out machines whose entire lives are structuredproperty status. and directed Farmed basedanimals on are the not products considered they relational, will produce feeling and/or be become. Animal agriculture is itself carceral in its techniques of enclosure,

As institutions the prison and the animal farm have competing goals. Whileobjectification, the prison corporeal is meant domination, to keep those and in profit its charge extraction. alive (though this must be distinguished from quality of life), the expressed purpose of animal agriculture is the production of corpses.35 Guenther, for example, writes that, “prisoners have become risks to be managed, resistances to be eliminated, and organisms to be fed, maintained, and even prevented from 36 Writing about the location of the factory farm, Stanescu argues that, “animals are conceived here as machines that con- verttaking certain their inputsown lives.” (like feedstuffs) into certain outputs (like eggs, milk, 37 - 38 Despite these differences, the prisonflesh). and In order the farm to minimize are shaped inputs by similarwhile maximizing logics and outputs,exist on aevery carceral ele continuum.ment of the 39animal-machine is controlled.”

sites of punishment and animal exploitation, she argues that these In Karen Morin’s development of a concept of “carceral space” across 31. -

32. Dewdney quoted in Canada, “Annual Report of the Department of Indian Af 33. Guenther,fairs,” xxvi. Solitary Confinement. 34. Belcourt, “Animal Bodies, Colonial Subjects,” 9. 35. Ibid. 36. Guenther,Stanescu, “BeyondSolitary ConfinementBiopolitics.”, xvi 37. 38. Ibid., 155. 39. Stanescu, “Beyond Biopolitics.” Carceral Space.

See ibid.; Gruen, “Dignity, Captivity,”; Morin,

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locations are “connected and entangled spatial, structural, operational, - 40 This epistemic violence is related toand being embodied caged. carceral They experience practices andlimited processes” movement, that lackeffect autonomy a kind of “episto di- temic violence” against those targeted. spaces largely devoid of adherence to law and meaningful legal oversight. Therect prison their movement and the farm through also prevent these limited dignity spaces, in the andsense are that confined their ar in- chitecture is meant to render subjects hyper-visible, with little access to privacy or the ability to be out of sight/surveillance even when performing intimate bodily functions and activities usually done in privacy such as urination, defecation, and having sex.41 As such, it is appropriate to consider prisoners and farmed animals as carceral subjects. - ture the ontological violence occurring in these spaces of intensive con- Guenther argues that the vocabulary of de-humanization cannot cap

finement, such as solitary confinement and factory-farms. Instead, she- relationalurges us to thing think to about be stored, intensive exchanged, confinement or even by destroyed way of de-animalization. without regard De-animalization is “the reduction of a living, relational42 animal to a non for Guenther, is then not a violation of our humanity, but of our shared animalityfor its particular as relational ways beings of being who in develop the world.” understandings Intensive confinement,of ourselves through our relations with others, and for whom meaningful inter-corporeal relationships act as a hinge between us and our surroundings. The outright denial of animality for both human and nonhuman animals held in prolonged isolation, results in different but pathological and harmful -

observedeffects for time members and time of various again to species. demonstrate Humans symptoms kept in groupedsolitary confineas “SHU ment, and animals43 including in zoos, anxiety, laboratories, fatigue, confusion, and factory paranoia, farming depression, have been

tosyndrome,” animals, additional behaviors include: excessive grooming, scratching, derangement,hallucinations, and headaches, violence uncontrollable in that they peck, trembling, tail-bite, and and pacing. otherwise Specific at- tack those whose body parts they can reach through their cages.

40. Morin, Carceral Space. 41. 42. Guenther, Solitary Confinement, 157. 43. Gruen, “Dignity, Captivity.” reported by those held in Special Handling Units or Secure Housing Units. The “SHU syndrome” refers to common symptoms and effects experienced and the deprivation of meaningful interpersonal contact with others. conditions of confinement shaping these units is that of extreme isolation and

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It is then the experience of broken social bonds, denial of dignity, the prevention of meaningful relationships of one’s choosing, and being un- able to make sense of oneself in relation to others that aptly links multiple

is then not that the prison reduces humans to animals, but that by relying onlocations a Western of intensive colonial ideaconfinement, of the human—as regardless an of independent species membership. and autono It- mous actor who does not thrive or require meaningful embodied relationships—that we fail to comprehend the ethical and ontological violations occurring in sites of captivity.44 The prison farm then is a site through which agricultural and carceral power merges to expand the geographical reach of the prison and to solidify colonial ontologies of life. III. The Territorializing Function of Penitentiary Farms In a step to create separate justice systems for youth and adults, the Gov- ernment enacted the 1857 Act for establishing Prisons for Young Offenders, for the better government of Public Asylums, Hospitals and Prisons, and for the better construction of Common Gaols. This Act allowed farms to be attached to prisons for youth: It shall be lawful for the Governor to cause to be procured and pro-

acresvided, for surrounding each Prison, or and adjacent to cause to the each same of theto be Reformatory securely inclosed, Prisons, and a eachtract Prison of land shall fit for be agriculturalheld to include purposes all the notland exceeding contained two within hundred such inclosure.45 This legal provision provides an example of the position of agriculture relative to punishment: prisons may territorially expand pending its new land is used in a productive manner, in this instance, for agriculture. In the 1880 Annual Report of the Inspector of Penitentiaries, Minister

the Manitoba Penitentiary so that the prison could produce its own food. McDonald’sof Justice, James request McDonald for additional requested land that would additional be echoed land be the acquired following for

Allow me, in this report, as in the last, to represent the advisability and yearultimate by the Inspectoreconomy of of adding Penitentiaries, about two J.hundred G. Moylan: acres more to the Peni- - toes, and forage necessary for the use of the Penitentiary, could be annu- allytentiary produced Reserve. on theWere farm. this The done, sooner the meat,land could vegetables, be procured including the morepota

44. Guenther, Solitary Confinement. 45. MacDonald, An Act, S. XII at 30, 3.

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reasonable the terms of purchase would be, as its value becomes more and more enhanced every year.46 The prison farm, reliant on using prison labour and animal bodies, provides the conditions in which the prison could expand in an economically viable manner. Nation-making and settlement initiatives co-articulated with prison- based agriculture. In his 1899 annual report, A. G. Irvine, Warden of Manitoba Penitentiary, recommends to the Inspector of Penitentiaries that Manitoba Penitentiary be expanded and that prisoners be sent from -

Kingston Penitentiary47 To tothis cultivate end he “everystates, foot“I would of our go soil so farthat as is to fit say for thatcul tivation. . . . [P]risoners could not be put to more profitable work for the- countryoners from at large.”Kingston. To provide work for additional prisoners, Irvine sug- anothergests that wing the shouldpenitentiary be built farm to this be suppliedprison” to with house livestock the suggested and that pris the prison acquire more land to feed farmed animals: We have at present a splendid farm. Every part of it is in full view of the main building which enables the convicts to be thoroughly under super- vision. What we now require is the farm to be stocked. I would strongly recommend the purchase of thoroughbred cattle (short horned) and suf- - tions of hay land in view of the prison, the purchase of which I would recommend.ficient teams48 to carry out the work of the farm. There are certain sec This passage succinctly illustrates the expansionist logic of prison agriculture: land is transformed into a productive resource by prisoners and - ditional land that is required to provide sustenance to the farmed animals cananimals. also Becausebecome farmedprison property.animals consume Understood large as quantities perpetual of resources, food, ad farmed animals and their offspring would continue to be bred, raised, and slaughtered to become food products for the prison. Irvine’s views are consistent with dominant approaches to imprison-

- vinement also at the links time, the prosperityspecifically of that the havingnation toprisoners prison-based work agriculture:on farms was necessary for their reformation while also benefitting the institution. Ir I am strongly of the opinion that the best thing for the country, and the convicts themselves, is to keep them employed cultivating the soil, and improving the roads. The end in view is to make this a model farm, an

46. 47. Ibid., 25. 48. Ibid.Irvine, “Wardens’ Reports,” 65-19.

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object lesson to the surrounding farmers, and an attraction to prospective settlers.49

In this report, Irvine justifies prison expansion on the basis that it will benefit the nation; prospective settlers could view the prison farm as a understandard the from Government’s which they settlement could themselves scheme. transform50 “uncultivated” land intoIn a “productive”his annual report resource, from 1899,and thereby the Warden lay private of St. Vincentproperty de rights Paul Pento it-

support in the expansion of the institution’s farm: itentiary, J. A. Duchesneau, asked the Inspectorate of Penitentiaries for his Everybody agrees in the utility and advantages of farm work for convicts, who derive from it, both physically and morally, a welfare of inestimable value. I take a particular interest in that department, which I recommend to your protection in favouring the enlargement of the penitentiary farm.51 Duchesneau’s passage is demonstrative of the notion that agriculture is

being purposely instituted by the settler state as a widespread and integral methoduniversal of and settlement its benefits for undeniable. the overall Despitecountry, the52 it fact appears that agriculture that state wasand

penitentiary,prison officials apart did fromnot question the Prison its forplace Women, inside had the itsprison, own norfarm. whether At this time,it was federal reformative farms intotalled the manner 6,049 acres.they claimed. Provincial By jails 1938, and every reformatories Canadian - tury, and well into the twentieth century, penal farms often consisted of a greenhouse,typically had a their root ownhouse, farms a piggery, as well. and By could the end also of have the nineteenthcattle and dairy cen

into commodities in abattoirs located on prison grounds.53 herds, sheep, and chickens. Farmed animals were killed and processed IV. De-Animalized Subjects of Empire Despite the central place of the penitentiary farm in Canadian penology in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, farmed animals themselves remain scarcely mentioned. When they are referred to, it is in ref- erence to their labour or products they will or have become. Put another way, their property status is taken to be an ontological certainty instead

49. 50. 51. Ibid.; emphasis added. 14. 52. Struthers Montford, “Agricultural Power” 53. Duchesneau, “Wardens’ Report,” Struthers Montford, “Agricultural Power.” Archambault, “Report of the Royal Commission.”

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of a contingent legal relationship instituted by the colonial state.54 In the annual penitentiary reports submitted to the House of Commons in 1881, farmed animals and working animals, such as horses, are listed as either 55 In the account records for the farm at the same institution, the tallies for pigs and ewes“stock, sold, pigs, as etc.” well or as “horses” for the poundsalong with of pork, other and tallied gallons items. of milk sold to the hospital are listed alongside various vegetables, pulses, and grains. Carceral labour is also accounted for: 1,010 days of labour from horses are counted as an expenditure at the same rate as convict labour, which

charged at a rate of 5 cents per day.56 As such, animals, whether consid- amounted to 7,748 days in this fiscal year. Both of these line items are- aged by prison labourers. eredThe labourers Archambault or food, Commission feature as commodified provides another life (and example death) in to which be man the

- plainde-animalization that the farm of instructor farmed animals had built is explicit.additional In penstheir forrecounting the pigs usingof an materialsevent that notoccurred purchased in 1935 for atthat the reason. Dorchester Prior Penitentiary to this, there Farm, was onethey pen ex that contained more pigs than could be accommodated in that space. Due

Archambault commissioners reported that the Superintendent reacted to thisto overcrowding, measure harshly the despitepigs had the become fact that “lame” “the farmand would instructor likely had die. saved The a considerable loss of penitentiary property 57 If the farm instructor had not acted, and instead followed institutional proce- dures, “$700 worth of pigs would have sickened, by utilizing and a greatthe wire.” majority of 58 The fact that these pigs would be killed in the slaughterhouse and then served as prison food is not considered in this theminstance. would Instead, have itdied.” is that if the pigs had died in a manner other than this, their usefulness as property would be negated. The colonial notion that animals are objects of property rights worked to reinforce the penal structure being instituted during the end of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century. Animals existed at the nexus of labour, prison industry, and prison expansion. In the prison farm, animals are then non-subjects through which punishment is administered, the prison territorially expands as well as augments its economic viability. As I next show, the link between penal agriculture, rehabilitation,

54. 55. Dominion of Canada, Sessional Papers, 62. 56. Ibid.,Canada, 69. “Annual Report of the Department of Indian Affairs,” xxvi. 57. 58. Ibid. Archambault, “Report of the Royal Commission,” 31.

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and ongoing institution of animal agriculture.59 and proper citizenship was taken as certainty despite the relatively recent V. Agricultural Labour and Rehabilitation Inherent in the productive value of the prison farm was not only the production of agricultural products, but also the reformation offenders who would become necessary to the settler workforce. The form of penal labour instilled in the penitentiary farm tracked along both carceral and nation-making goals in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Individual industriousness was to be valued and inculcated in prisoners and settler immigrants—industriousness that could take the form of agri-

ofcultural Penitentiaries work to thefor benefitCanada, of states the nation. that “the For convicts example, appear in his to1881 have annual been constantlyreview of penitentiaries and usefully employedto the House all ofyear Commons, on the farm, J. G. Moylan,and at work Inspector con- 60 It is in the same report that the Inspector asks the House of Commons to purchase 200 more acres at this peniten- tiarynected for with agriculture. the Penitentiary.” 61

Following the abolition of prison contract62 While labour the programs Commissioners in 1895, of state officials and prison administrators had to grapple with the problem regimes,of “labour they difficulty did not in support the penitentiaries.” unproductive labour tasks: the 1914 Royal Commission supported the termination of contract labour leave unfortunate prisoners to hammer out their term on a stone pile, or becomeTo abolish mental the systemand physical of contract wrecks labour in the solitary in prisons idleness was justifiable; of their cells, to was a crime against humanity.63 The Commission presented two solutions to the labour problem: outside work and inside work. Outside work entailed “general farming operations,

clearing59. Anderson, land, Creatures quarrying of Empire stone, makingDangerous brick, Crossings building roads, etc.,” with

60. Dominion of Canada, Sessional; PapersKim, , 19. ; Struthers Montford 61. Contract“Agricultural labour Power.” programs, whereby private companies were able to lease prisoner labour to manufacture goods on prison grounds, were abolished in 1895. The abolition of this labour scheme was not based on concern for the exploitation of prisoners, but from the private sector who claimed that con-

Corrections in Canada. 62. tract prison labour caused undue interference with the free labour market; 63. Ibid.Ekstedt and Griffiths, Macdonnell, “Royal Commission on Penitentiaries,” 32.

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inside work including “employment in the various departments for the proper upkeep and management of the prison. Employment in the making of goods for the state 64 The problem presented by having prisoners perform physical labour to no end, such as “hammer[ing] out their terms on .” 65 whereas similar activities of quarrying stone and/or making brick suggested as a compo- anent stone of pileoutside . . . [represented] work, represented a crime proper against relations humanity” to labour in that such

land, and natural resources aligned with wider discourses and practices regardingactivities would nation-making be profitable during to thethis institution. time. Sentiments about labour, -

settlementFollowing would confederation, ensure state Canada success. was66 Yet repeatedly this successful depicted cultivation by govern de- ment officials as a “fertile and salubrious” territory whose cultivation and

pended on the institution of colonial labour norms of self-sufficiency and wouldproductive provide labour them directed with land,to the a prosperityhouse, a cow, of the and nation. agricultural For example, imple- mentsJohn A. so MacDonald that they could devised cultivate a scheme land. for His attracting plan relied Irish on “theimmigrants assumption that that the emigrents [sic energy and ability to take care of themselves, after getting the fair start ] sent67 This out proposed are fit for immigration agricultural andwork, settlement and have pol the- icy demonstrates the values that the settler government sought to facili- thus provided for them.” industriousness. tateIn and a Speechexpected from of itsthe citizens: Throne madeproperty, in 1901, individual the Speaker responsibility, opined thatand Government initiatives had been successful in attracting the proper sort of immigrant settlers: During my journey [through Canada], I was, from personal observation, much impressed with the great activity displayed in the development of the mining and agricultural industries of the country, and with the sub- stantial increase in its population. The thrift, energy, and law-abiding character of the immigrants are a subject of much congratulation and afford ample proof of the usefulness as citizens of the Dominion.68 Here, state representatives positioned labour as productive in that it posi- tively shaped the character of the labourer and furthered the State’s goal

64. 65. Ibid. 66. Ibid.; emphasis added.

67. Canada, “Speech from the Throne,” 1883, 27; Canada, “Speech from the 68. Throne,” 1878. MacDonald, “(Confidential Memorandum),” 83. Canada, “Speech from the Throne,” 1901, 23; emphasis added.

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of settlement. Such an approach to labour is also evident in the penitentiary and tracks along colonial norms of humanity, labour, and land—no- tions that coalesce in discourses about the rehabilitative potential of penal agriculture. - habilitative. Agricultural labour was positioned as a means and an end Politicians and prison officials lauded prison farms as uniquely re the Commission stated that “old mother nature is a kind nurse to the fel- lowof proper who is citizenship. at all disposed In the to 1914get back Royal to Commissionhis better self. on Hence, Penitentiaries, farming 69 On their review of provincial institutions,70 the Archambault Commission de- scribedoperations that of most any includedkind make large ideal farms work where for improvablea large number prisoners.” of prisoners worked for the duration of their sentence. According to the Commission, this meant that prisoners could:

such institutions have thus some opportunity to better themselves, both mentallyBecome acquainted and physically, with and agricultural when their methods. sentences Prisoners have been incarcerated completed, in they are better equipped to obtain employment and find a place for themselves in the social system.71 Penal agricultural labour was positioned as a benevolent means to make - mer prisoners could continue to participate in agricultural work. The sup- posedproper certainty Canadian of citizens. agriculture Proponents as the proper assumed manner that towhen produce released, food andfor relate to land and animals likely resulted in the unquestioned institution of prison farming and the acceptance of its rehabilitative potential (and outcomes). Prison-based agriculture is then a form of ‘rehabilitation’ that tracks along settler ontologies whereby land and animals exist as com- 72

modifiedVI. resources Civilized to bePunishment/Profitable directed to human ends. Incarceration

andAs the commissioners farms became believedmore established, that penitentiary concerns overfarms efficiency could be tied better into broader questions about its role in sustaining the prison. State officials 69. 70. Provincial prison farms were also not inevitable. In Ontario, for example, farmsMacdonnell, were positioned “Royal Commission as a solution on Penitentiaries,” to surplus labour 3. following the termination of prison labour/manufacturing contracts in the early 1900s, see Hanna,

71. 72. “The Prison Labour Question.” Archambault, “Report of the Royal Commission,” 17. Belcourt, “Animal Bodies, Colonial Subjects”; Robinson, “Veganism”; Struthers Montford, “Agricultural Power.”

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managed. In their 1938 report, the Archambault Commission compared federal prison farms to those on provincial jail and reformatory grounds.

do not consider that the operation of the penitentiary farms compares favourablyThe Commission with the concluded farms operated that the in federal connection farms with were the inefficient: provincial “[W]e jails 73 In terms of production, the penitentiary farms in- 74 The Com- missionand reformatories.” attributed this to a lack of leadership and restrictive release conditionscurred annual that losses prevented due to a a large“lack numberof proper of management.” prisoners from working on the farms located outside the prison walls. The Commission recommended the following: In view of the fact that there are seven large farms operated by the Peni-

required to devote his entire time to the management of this important parttentiary of the Branch penitentiary throughout service Canada,.75 a highly qualified official should be This recommendation highlights the integral position prison farms held in the administration of federal sentences. The Commission reasoned that

76 Other recommendations includedif such an the official implementation was appointed of “thecanning expense and vegetableincurred will storage be more facilities than sojustified that crop by greateryields could efficiency supply in the production.” prisons. The Archambault Commission also explicitly recommended that “dairy herds should be established at all penitentiaries for the purpose of 77 This is not a recommendation made during the initial implementation of penitentiary farms, but is explicitly supplying their dairy requirements.” - tionssuggested were with made a viewin a context to improving in which the provincial fiscal viability and reformatoryof farm operations farms wereby decreasing manufacturing overall productsoperating thatcosts. not Penitentiary-specific only sustained their recommenda institution, but supplied other state facilities. In their assessment of provincial institutions, the Archambault Commission lauded agricultural programming as a marker of proper prison administration: “In other provinces, where reformatories and prison farms have been established, the prisoners 78 The

serve their sentences under much more satisfactory conditions.” 73. 74. Ibid., 137. 75. Archambault, “Report of the Royal Commission,” 136. 76. Ibid. 77. Ibid.Ibid.,138; emphasis added. 78. Ibid., 17.

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Commission further noted that well-run prison farms used most of their

- acres for farming; the Ontario Reformatory used79 most The Torontoof their Municipal945 acres in this way: “[T]here is a fine herd of dairy cattle, and the institution sup pliesof 940 beef acres to .other . . attached reformatories, to this institution, hospitals, on etc.” which there is a dairy herd Farm for men serving short term sentences was reported to have “a80 farm The Commission therefore recommended that excess amounts of penitentiary-producedthat supplies milk agricultural to different products institutions be used in tothe supply city of other Toronto.” prisons or be sold.81 Unpaid or low-paying prison labour coupled with the commodi-

avoided paying market-value for its food supply. Penal agriculture was fication of animals in agriculture was a means by which the prison service animal agriculture was not only consistent with settler nation-making en- also supported for its potential to generate profit for the prison. As such,-

and/ordeavours, unpaid but—couched labour force. in a rhetoric of prisoner therapy and fiscal ef ficiency—suppliedThe logic of the other prison state farm institutions then, is tethered using a tocaptive the sustainability and underpaid of the prison itself as an economically viable institution. Considered in its historical context, the prison farm is a location in which offenders can become proper Canadian subjects through agricultural training. Materi- ally and symbolically, it was also a method of settler territorialisation that

productive resource. Similar sentiments structured the protests against theexpanded 2010 closurethe prison of the via penitentiary the transformation farms, andof “uncultivated” recent community land into feed a- back about how prison farms ought to be re-instituted. Contemporary penal agriculture continues to be an issue marrying national identity, Ca- nadian penology, labour, economy, and property. VII. Public Support for Farming: ‘Heartfelt Beliefs,’ Unquestioned ‘Truths’ - tario, area campaigned on promises of re-establishing the penitentiary During the 2015 federal election, Liberal candidates in the Kingston, On pressured their elected representatives to re-open the farms.82 farms. Following the election of the liberal government, local residents- From June to August of 2016, CSC ran a two-month online consultation on “in 79.stitutional Ibid., 20. agribusiness.” CSC also held a town hall in Kingston to garner 80. Ibid. 81. Ibid., 139. 82.

CSC, “Report on the Town Hall Meeting.”

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participatedfeedback and in advice the online on the consultationfeasibility of re-openingand about farms300 people at both attended the Joy ceville and Collins Bay federal men’s penitentiaries. Close to 6,000 people reveal that themes historically supporting penal agriculture continue to shapethe town support hall meeting. for its return. Reports Dominant based on themes the results include of “thethese need two toevents help the rehabilitation of inmates, and the positive impact it could have in com- 83 Other supporters suggested that food produced using penal agriculture could supply penitentiaries and local munitiesfoodbanks. and84 in the use of land.” participants “were opinions, based on personal observation and heartfelt beliefs and not Both upon reports any rigorous stress the analysis fact that of the the actual statements impact made of peni by- tentiary farm programs on either rehabilitation or employability post 85 In fact, empirical evidence showing the rehabilitative potential of penal agriculture is lacking.86 Instead, it seems that because of the pur- release.”portedly universal and natural place that animal agriculture holds in Can-

support this position. ada, it is taken as normatively beneficial despite an absence of evidence to VII.a. Carceral Land Most respondents (82 percent) in the online consultation believed that land formerly used for penal agriculture “must - cultural purposes. This approach to land use dovetails with ideals of rehabilitation, with supporters stating that “this land” again is meant be used for for helping agri 87 Tellingly, others married national identity to farming, and “other views shared by many respondents were that people through CSC programs.” 88 Participants

Canada83. needs to keep its farmlands or should have more.” 84. 85. CSC, “Online Consultation,” 2. 86. Ibid. and CSC, “Report on the Town Hall Meeting.” - CSC, “Report on the Town Hall Meeting,” 3. Project SOIL has claimed that penal agriculture programs can serve a rehabilitative potentialpurpose. Theyof prison-based do so by relying therapeutic on a 2006 animal article programs by Gennifer such as Furst, dog “Prison-Based Animal Programs.” This article, however, evaluates the reha a service dog versus the raising and slaughtering animals in agriculture, her resultstraining. are Furst not applicableis adamant to that penal given animal the differencesagriculture betweenprograms. the training of 87. 88. Ibid. Other suggestions for the use of this land included real estate develop- CSC, “Online Consultation” 9. these suggestions were not put forward on the basis of their relation to Cana- dianment, identity, urban protected as was agriculture. greenspaces, reforestation, and sports fields. However,

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in the town hall meeting linked land and animal agriculture in such a way that presumed its naturalness. In other words, animal agriculture was positioned as a priori the way in which land is to be used: “You have the land. You have the barns. All you are missing is the cows. And we have just what 89 Others claimed that re-instated prison farms would serve a pedagogical function. A supporter of prison-based dairy operations, foryou example, need.” stated that such a program would “educate the community 90 This sentiment is consistent with that expressed by Warden Irvine in 1900 about the potential of the penitentiary farm to serveabout asdairy a model products.” for prospective settlers. In both instances the farms and the animals within them are meant to impart and instill norms related to land, animals, and food. Support for penal agriculture continues to pivot on state ownership of land, the farming of animals upon said land, and a belief in the rehabilitative potential of agricultural labour unmatched by other initiatives. VII.b. Empathetic Rehabilitation Participants in both consultation events stressed that they believed penal agriculture to impart skills that cannot be learned in other institutional employment programs. Skills attributed to penal agriculture include that it: Encourages general life skills such as patience, empathy and responsi-

rebuilds skills related to work relationships (i.e., employee/employer bility; helps inmates to develop a work ethic, punctuality, setting goals; interpersonal communication skills.91 not inmate to guard); creates team building opportunities and develops life upon release, regardless of where they might become employed. A par- ticipantRespondents at the also town positioned hall stated, penal “what agriculture one learns as preparingworking on prisoners a farm one for 92

aspectlearns forof penallife, the agribusiness, skills are immeasurably much in the same transferable.” way described Respondents by Mac- donnellexpressed in that1914. working Unlike outsideearly debates and in about a physical penal manner agriculture, is a beneficial however, through which empathy can be cultivated. Current participants believed that interacting with animals can animalsuniquely now cultivate figure empathy as those and can thus lead prisoners to redemption.

89. 90. 91. CSC “Report on the Town Hall Meeting” 7. 92. Ibid.CSC “Online Consultation” 6. CSC “Report on the Town Hall Meeting” 7.

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While demographic information pertaining to those who attended the Town Hall meeting is not available, former prisoners were grouped as

included prisoners’ relatives, professionals working in agriculture, reha- “other” in the online town hall. At 15 percent, “other” participants also- oner explained that “the cows taught me so many skills and they taught mebilitation, patience, or compassion.fields related The to theskills criminal I learned justice while system. milking A the former cows pris and

93 In this sense, animals be- comemaking the them means well. by . .which . Lots ofprisoners people couldcan heal, be damaged yet animals now are because not neces they- sarilydon’t havesubjects a chance themselves to work whose with interests animals.” are addressed in ways that are politically meaningful—they remain killable property pending they serve as means to human end.94 of prisoners interacting with animals in pastures and barns in which the animal-empathy connection Furthermore, is made. it is the scenarios and imagery The scenarios of factory-farming conditions and/or of prisoners working in animal slaughtering and butchering, both in onsite and offsite abattoirs, is not presented as that which is healing and empathetic. In fact, these aspects of animal agriculture rarely feature in the discourse of those seeking to reinstate penal agribusiness. Instead, it is those opposed to the reinstatement of penal agriculture who feature the opposing perspectives of former prisoners—many of whom detail dangerous and denigrating

violence against animals.95 In fact, of the 143 prisoners in federal peniten- workingtiaries who conditions, participated as well in a assurvey, trauma 72 relatedpercent toindicated inflicting that or theywitnessing would prefer to care for farmed animals in a sanctuary setting and/or participate

dairying.96 97 in plant-based agriculture; 28 percent indicated a preference for animal- ers were tasked Many withwrote managing “no slaughter” other oncarceral their surveysubjects, response including forms. tens of Prior to the termination of CORCAN agribusiness programs, prison and working in slaughterhouses to kill and dismember the animals.98 At itsthousands worst, slaughterhouseof hens confined work in battery is dangerous, cages, running workers “dairy often operations,” lose their

93. Ibid. 94. Derrida, The Animal That Therefore I Am. 95. 96. Ibid. 97. https://www.plantbasednews.org/post/controversy-as-canada-invests-Evolve Our Prison Farms. 4-3-million-in-prisoner-staffed-animal-agriculture. 98. -

Fitzgerald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse,”; Goodman and Dawe, “Prison ers, Cows and Abattoirs”; “Project SOIL”; Neufield, “The Herd at the Pen.”

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limbs in meat grinders, or are crushed by falling animal carcasses.99 At its minimum, slaughterhouse work “has injury and illness rates three times 100 - ple, workers sustain repetitive strain injuries exacerbated by performing the average of the rates of other manufacturing industries.” For exam

marketablerepetitive tasks skills coupled for prisoners with ever-increasing once released, kill slaughterhouse floor speeds. Inwork stark is opposition to CORCAN’s stated objectives regarding the development of- cent a year.101 low-paying, commonly non-unionized, and has a turnover rate of 200 per work has also been shown to increase crime rates among the communities Inwhere comparison they operate, to other including “manufacturing sexual assaults, industries,” domestic slaughterhouse abuse, and family violence.102 This form of work is not only precarious and physically dangerous, but psychologically damaging as it requires employees to

103 Slaughterhouse work requires workers “inflict harm upon living beings while rationalizing their behaviour and suppressing their compassion.” notionto engage that in agriculturalbehaviour that labour would cultivates be criminalized empathy if mightdone tobe humans in stark or op to- positionsome animals, to the suchrealities as ‘pets,’ of this not form legally of work. categorized It instead as food.might As be such, the case the that penal agribusiness has provided a cost-effective supply of labour for

to claim that prior to their closure, the farms were economic drivers for local farmers. For example, proponents of the penitentiary farms continue - roundingthe communities area.104 in which they were housed; for example, prisoners from KingstonParticipants institutions in the “processed” recent feasibility animals forumsfor over also 300 claimedfarms in that the surthis approach to prison employment was feasible because of a shortage of

temporary foreign workers who are paid a low wage and receive few to noagricultural occupational labour health in Canada—positions and safety protections. typically105 Given filled the by realities migrant of and agricultural work both in terms of working conditions and job security, it is surprising that this form of employment is used to justify the re-opening

99. Taylor, Beasts of Burden. 100. 101. Ibid. 102. Fitzgerald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse” 22. 103. 104. Fitzgerald, Kalof, and Dietz, “Slaughterhouses and Increased Crime Rates.” 105. Fitzgerald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse,” 14. Citizen- ship“Project and SOIL.”Precarious Labour. Fitzgerald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse”; Otero and Preibisch,

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- ships with nonhuman others is better cultivated in scenarios where they of penitentiary farms. Furthermore, the constitution of empathic relation not required to slaughter the animals they are simultaneously expected to bondare not with desubjectified as a component nor commodified, of their rehabilitation. and where carceral labourers are VIII. Conclusion: Contemporary Farm Politics and Speculative Futures

penal regimes premised on the moral reformation of prisoners.106 Despite Labourthe centrality has been of labour central in the to administration an ‘enlightened’ of punishment and modern, the approach prevailing to rationality of the prison continues to position ‘work’ as benevolent and redemptive. Such a perspective is contrary to recent research on the political economy of penal labour that positions it as exploitative and racially discriminatory.107 In the U.S. context, prison-based agriculture has been 108 In the Canadian context, I have shown that this form of ‘benevolent’ rehabilita- criticizedtion functioned for incorporating as a means through and reproducing which the theprison logic expanded of slavery. its geogra-

is thereby a site where colonialism, race, labour, species, and punishment phy and trained prisoners to be proper settler citizens. Penal agriculture

prisonintersect. and Like state. other109 practices and locations of punishment, prison farms are “landscapesSome scholars generated of U.S. penalby and labour for convict have labour”noted a to shift the benefitfrom a ofpenal the welfarist approach centered on the rehabilitation of prisoners through labour, to that administered for commercial purposes under a penal state.110 The example of Canadian penal agriculture, however shows that such approaches do not replace each other but come together in a broader context

evident in that the re-opened farms will operate goat and cow dairies of racial capitalism with multi-national production flows. This is especially 106. Discipline and Punish Punishment and Modern Society Punishment and Archambault,Welfare “Report of the Royal Commission”; Foucault, Punishment in Disguise; Garland, ; Garland, ; Hanna, “The Prison LabourHard Question”; Time Hannah-Moffat,Worse than Slavery ; Hatton, “WhenPunishment Work Is Punishment”; and Social Hawkins,Structure “Prison Labor and Prison Industries”; McCoy, ; Oshinsky, ; 107. Rusche and Kirchheimer, ; Tuffin et al., 108. “LandscapesOshinsky, Worse of Production than Slavery and. Punishment.” 109. Scherrer and Shah, “The Political Economy of Prison Labour.” 110. Tuffin et al., “Landscapes of Production and Punishment” 56. Scherrer and Shah, “The Political Economy of Prison Labour.”

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that will supply China-based infant formula manufacturers. Discourses of moral reform and the economic role of penal agribusiness continue to shape support for the re-opening of penitentiary farms. Agribusiness programs will also resume ‘vocational training’ in the form of slaughterhouse and butchering labour. Consistent with the historical logics structuring the original implementation of penitentiary farms during the last half of the nineteenth century, prisoners and animals remain targeted by agricultural and carceral power whose biological capacities are manipulated

in support of the prison. For pro-penitentiary farm advocates, prisoners margins,and animals local appear businesses, as flattened and andnow de-animalized international subjectscorporations. whose Despite labour the(and enduring lives), via claim prison that farms, agribusiness will be again is an used effective to benefit method CORCAN’s of rehabilita profit- tion, evidence supporting this claim remains absent.111 Those in favour of the prison farms have argued that the farms were - proach to penality (an approach premised on rehabilitative ideals, whereas other“national jurisdictions community had icons”taken a and more represented punitive turn). a uniquely112 While Canadian it is accurate ap that these farms are symbolic and material representations of Canadiana,

it is not because they are rehabilitative. Rather, prison farms represent a specific apparatus of settler colonial territorialisation that expands the footprint of the prison, naturalizes private property relationships to land itsand colonial to animals, function and teaches becomes prisoners apparent “civilized” as do the relationships socio-economic to labour. struc If- tureswe consider shaping the who colonial will be and streamed racialized into implications such programs—programs of penal agribusiness, that -

ishave often historically precarious, endeavoured exploitative, to and ‘civilize’ performed workers by vulnerable through the and installa racial- tion of labour norms bound-up in whiteness. Because agricultural work- nerable segments of the prison population—those with lower educational ized workers, it is likely that inside, the most hyper-criminalized and vul prisoners—will be assigned to agribusiness programming, and that such assignmentslevels and unstable will be employment positioned as histories, benevolent. including As such Indigenous it is likely and that Black ra-

amongst the most unstable, exploitative, dangerous, and psychologically damaging.cialized persons113 will be streamed into agricultural labour fields which are

111. Rather, initiatives suggested by Evolve our Prison Farms such-

112. Fitzgerald, “Doing Time in a Slaughterhouse”; Goodman and Dawe, “Prison 113. ers, Cows and Abattoirs.” Goodman and Dawe, “Prisoners, Cows and Abattoirs,” 801. Office of the Correctional Investigator, “Annual Report.”

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as plant-based agriculture and/or animal sanctuary would resist colonial

and exploitative labour practices. Sanctuary initiatives are also premised onrelationships the notion ofthat property animals and are de-animalizationsubjects in their own inherent right in and agriculture, could af- - tunities for the cultivation of multi-species relationships of empathy and healing,ford them sanctuary meaningful programs intercorporeal are also relationships.consistent with By requests providing made oppor by those incarcerated to have access to programs that are meaningful and that lessen, rather than augment, the trauma of incarceration.

Acknowledgements This research was supported by funding from the Killam Trusts. Earlier versions - - of this paper were presented at the annual meetings of the Law & Society Asso Iciation am grateful and the to Association those who ofprovided Women’s feedback and Gender during Studies these et meetings, Recherches as wellFémin as istes, as well as at the Jackman Humanities Animals and the Law working group. whose insight strengthened the article. I am also grateful to the anonymous re- viewersto Chloë for Taylor, their Kellydiligent Hannah-Moffat, reading and helpful Jenna-Lynn advice. Simpson, and Darren Chang,

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