The Vegan Option including Vegetarianism: The Story So Far show

The Vegan Option including Vegetarianism: The Story So Far

Summary: In 2016-7, Ian McDonald tells one epic tale - the backstory to today's vegetarian and vegan movements. From the Ganges plain to the hills of New England, from the iron age to the present day, voices challenge the idea that other animals exist soley for humans. Discover philosopher kings, rebel poets, and forgotten heroes in this radio history of vegetarianism. Stories from vegan perspectives. Great radio that just happens to be vegan. This is The Vegan Option.

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Podcasts:

 Spillover Diseases: Covid 19 and other Zoonoses. With Jonna Mazet and Aysha Akhtar | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

How does animal exploitation increase the emergence of new diseases? With the world fighting a vicious new pandemic, Ian asks a front-line physician, an epidemiologist, a public health expert and activists about how new diseases spill over from other animals, and how factory farming and the wildlife trade raise our vulnerability. Play or download (42MB […] The post Spillover Diseases: Covid 19 and other Zoonoses. With Jonna Mazet and Aysha Akhtar first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 Spillover Diseases: Covid-19 & Zoonoses, with Jonna Mazet and Aysha Akhtar | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

How does animal exploitation increase the emergence of new diseases? With the world fighting a vicious new pandemic, Ian asks a front-line physician, an epidemiologist, a public health expert and activists about how new diseases spill over from other animals, and how factory farming and the wildlife trade raise our vulnerability. Play or download (42MB MP3 30min) (via iTunes) Contributors: Dr Aysha Akhtar (@DrAyshaAkhtar) Dr Laura-Jane Smith (King’s College Hospital) (@DrLauraJane) Prof Jonna Mazet (University of California Davis)(@JonnaMazet) Peter Kemple Hardy (World Animal Protection) Zoonoses and Vegan Activism You’ve probably heard animal activists linking the Covid-19 pandemic to human treatment of animals well before you listened to my show – part of the reason for doing this show was to give people the information to talk about the link without drifting into hyperbole. For example, “Earthling” Ed Winters famously got a roasting in the UK’s tabloid press for a viral Facebook post in which he blamed half a dozen new diseases on meat-eating. From what I’ve learnt doing the show, it was his categorical certainty that’s wrong rather than his general point (and, arguably, tone). I thought his later video on the subject was more nuanced. Has it Been Three Years?… more

 VegHist Ep 15: Liberation. Veganism, hippies, and the animal rights movement. With Sam Calvert and Maneka Gandhi; at London, Cambridge, and Bangalore | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

Radio times summary.  Episode 9: Renaissance Old medieval certainties are cracking under the combined assault of new sciences and rediscovered classics. It’s an age when “natural philosophers” combine scientific discovery with philosophical treatises, and when their Republic of Letters transcends political boundaries in the name of free thought. It’s the age of Descartes, whose mechanical philosophy […] The post VegHist Ep 15: Liberation. Veganism, hippies, and the animal rights movement. With Sam Calvert and Maneka Gandhi; at London, Cambridge, and Bangalore first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 VegHist Ep 15: Liberation. Veganism, hippies, and the animal rights movement | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

How has western vegetarianism risen, within living memory, from fringe to mainstream choice? And how has veganism gone from nowhere to everywhere? Episode 15: Liberation This final episode recounts the growth of veganism, vegetarianism, and the modern animal advocacy movement. Ian treads in the footsteps of the handful of pioneers who set up the vegan movement in the 1940s, and meets a life vegan born in 1951. He investigates the sixties counterculture that combined the philosophy of ethics, activism, and new ways of living and working, visiting one of Britain’s first vegetarian wholefood co-operatives. And as vegetarian and vegan movements increasingly link up around the world, he looks at developments in China and India. In New Delhi, he meets the vegan politician who is also the most prominent animal advocate in the world’s largest democracy. Play or download (70MB MP3 49min) (via iTunes) or read transcript. Contributors: Dr Samantha Calvert (@SamCalvert) Edwin Cluer, Wimbledon Prof Julia Twigg (University of Kent, Canterbury) Reg Taylor, founder of the precursor of Suma Wholefoods David Jarvis, Les, George, and others, Arjuna Wholefoods Cambridge Dr Vincent Goossaert (Groupe Sociétés, Religions, Laïcités), Paris Dr James Staples (University of Brunel, London) Maneka Gandhi (Parliament of India) (People… more

 VegHist Ep 14: Diet Reform. Consumerism, Lebensreform, and Gandhi | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

In the nineteenth century, in America and Germany, new forms of vegetarianism emerge – from the individualistic consumer vegetarianism of America, to the back-to-nature European “life reform” movement. Episode 14: Diet Reform As animal agriculture industrialises and meat consumption rises, the ways that food reformers respond are familiar to people today – the plant-based meat, the celebrity athletes, and the reformers who worship nature, sunshine, and fresh air. Ian goes to the shops to discover just how many vegetarian staples he owes to pioneers like John Harvey Kellogg. In Sabarmati, northwest India, he visits the Ashram of Mahatma Mohandas K Gandhi. Play or download (62MB MP3 44min) (via iTunes) or read transcript Contributors: Dr Adam Shprintzen, (Marywood University, Scranton PA) (@VegHistory) Dr Julia Twigg (University of Kent) Megha Todi (on Instagram) (Sabarmati Ashram Archives) Ramachandra Guha (ramachandraguha.in) (@Ram_Guha) (on Wikipedia) Vegetarian area at the Chicago World’s Fair Advertisement for Kellog’s “Sanitarium” Eden makes jams and fruit juices. An Edener begs socialist vegetarian intellectual Magnus Schwantje not to send books that would get them into trouble with the Nazis At Sabarmati Ashram Gandhi would read and spin here, in Sabarmati Readings Ellen White, vision, from “A Brief History of Seventh-Day Adventists”,… more

 VegHist Ep 14: Diet Reform. On consumerism, lebensreform, and Gandhi; with Ramachandra Guha; at Sabarmati Ashram, India | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

Radio times summary.  Episode 9: Renaissance Old medieval certainties are cracking under the combined assault of new sciences and rediscovered classics. It’s an age when “natural philosophers” combine scientific discovery with philosophical treatises, and when their Republic of Letters transcends political boundaries in the name of free thought. It’s the age of Descartes, whose mechanical philosophy […] The post VegHist Ep 14: Diet Reform. On consumerism, lebensreform, and Gandhi; with Ramachandra Guha; at Sabarmati Ashram, India first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 VegHist Ep 13: The Vegetarians. Abolitionism, colonialism, and Victorian reformers; with Julia Twigg and Bhaskar Chakraborty. In London | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

In the late nineteenth century, the new vegetarian movement is intertwined with other struggles – including Victorian reformers, the Indian reaction to British colonialism, and most importantly, slavery. Episode 13: The Vegetarians After their foundation in 1847 and 1850, the vegetarian societies in Britain and America rose swiftly faced new challenges. Dr Adam Shprintzen, author of […] The post VegHist Ep 13: The Vegetarians. Abolitionism, colonialism, and Victorian reformers; with Julia Twigg and Bhaskar Chakraborty. In London first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 VegHist Ep 13: The Vegetarians. Abolitionism, colonialism, and Victorian reformers; with Julia Twigg and Bhaskar Chakraborty. In London | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

In the late nineteenth century, the new vegetarian movement is intertwined with other struggles – including Victorian reformers, the Indian reaction to British colonialism, and most importantly, slavery. Episode 13: The Vegetarians After their foundation in 1847 and 1850, the vegetarian societies in Britain and America rose swiftly faced new challenges. Dr Adam Shprintzen, author of the history of US vegetarianism “Vegetarian Crusade, tells Ian how the American Vegetarian Society poured its energies into an anti-slavery vegetarian settlement in the Wild West. And how its founder, Englishman Henry Clubb, ultimately took a bullet for the union in the Civil War. Under British rule, Hindu vegetarianism faced a mix of threat and opportunity. In India, Ian meets historians DN Jha, Burton Cleetus, and Bhaskar Chakraborty, who explain how, faced with rule by distant Christians, vegetarianism became more important as a marker of caste and identity. Ian also sets off on a cycle tour of vegetarian Victorian London, and talks to the first modern academic to study vegetarian history – Dr Julia Twigg. Play or download (58MB MP3 41min) (via iTunes) or read transcript Illustration of the Central Vegetarian restaurant, where Mohandas discovered the London Vegetarians. Vegetarian meal, The Holborn Restaurant Contributors:… more

 VegHist Ep 13: Vegetarians. Colonialism, abolitionism, and Victorian reformers. With Julia Twigg and Bhaskar Chakraborty. In London | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

Radio times summary.  Episode 9: Renaissance Old medieval certainties are cracking under the combined assault of new sciences and rediscovered classics. It’s an age when “natural philosophers” combine scientific discovery with philosophical treatises, and when their Republic of Letters transcends political boundaries in the name of free thought. It’s the age of Descartes, whose mechanical philosophy […]

 VegHist Ep 12: Radicals & Romantics. Bible Christians, Grahamites, and Transcendentalists; with Adam Shprintzen and Derek Antrobus; at Deerfields, Fruitlands, and Salford | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

In the 1800s, overlapping circles of utopians, mystics, and romantics in both Europe and America develop arguments against meat until “vegetarianism” finally becomes a real movement.  Episode 12: Radicals & Romantics In the aftermath of the American and French revolutions, the sects and philosophies that embrace a “vegetable diet” multiply – from ecstatic cult to puritan crusades, to utopian […] The post VegHist Ep 12: Radicals & Romantics. Bible Christians, Grahamites, and Transcendentalists; with Adam Shprintzen and Derek Antrobus; at Deerfields, Fruitlands, and Salford first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 VegHist Ep 12: Radicals & Romantics. Bible Christians, Grahamites, and Transcendentalists | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

In the 1800s, overlapping circles of utopians, mystics, and romantics in both Europe and America develop arguments against meat until “vegetarianism” finally becomes a real movement. Episode 12: Radicals & Romantics In the aftermath of the American and French revolutions, the sects and philosophies that embrace a “vegetable diet” multiply – from ecstatic cult to puritan crusades, to utopian community to public-spirited congregation. No longer are they isolated groups – they connect with each other in books, magazines, and letters. Until a single word catches on – “vegetarianism”. In the United States of America, Ian discovers the the vegetarian sword and shoes of a 1790s “free love” vegetarian sect in a local Massachusetts museum, and visits the failed vegan commune where Louisa May “Little Women” Alcott lived as a child. And in Salford, NW England, he walks in the footsteps of a nineteenth century vegetarian church, with local historian Derek Antrobus and the vegetarian history specialist Dr Samantha Calvert. It’s a story that also takes in the French bohemian “cult of the bearded men”, the man who invented the modern idea of Robin Hood, the woman who invented Frankenstein and his creature, Sylvester Graham, and, finally, the creation of modern… more

 VegHist Ep 11: Enlightenment. Colonial India, Voltaire, Rousseau, and the French Revolution; with Partha Chatterjee, Christophe Martin, and Renan Larue; at the Black Hole of Calcutta, and Musée Rousseau Montmerency | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

The philosophers of Paris discuss reports of Indian vegetarianism, question the morality of eating animals, and inspire radicals who preach vegetarianism from the barricades of the French revolution. Episode 11: Enlightenment Ian traces a winding path of vegetarian inspiration from the personal diary of an Indian vegetarian working for the French, to the darkest corner of British imperial propaganda, […] The post VegHist Ep 11: Enlightenment. Colonial India, Voltaire, Rousseau, and the French Revolution; with Partha Chatterjee, Christophe Martin, and Renan Larue; at the Black Hole of Calcutta, and Musée Rousseau Montmerency first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 VegHist Ep 11: Enlightenment. Colonial India, Voltaire, Rousseau, and Les Bardus | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

The philosophers of Paris discuss reports of Indian vegetarianism, question the morality of eating animals, and inspire radicals who preach vegetarianism from the barricades of the French revolution. Episode 11: Enlightenment Ian traces a winding path of vegetarian inspiration from the personal diary of an Indian vegetarian working for the French, to the darkest corner of British imperial propaganda, to the Enlightenment’s favourite Paris café, to a rural retreat that inspired a social revolution, and to the squares where citizens plotted a real one. Play or download (61MB MP3 43min) (via iTunes) or read transcript There are many vegetarians in eighteenth century southern India, but only one, Ananda Ranga Pillai, who kept a diary of his daily life – whilst serving as a senior aide to the French governor. Ian meets historian Prof B. Krishnamoorthy in a temple Pillai had built in the French capital. Meanwhile, the British produced a governor of Calcutta – John Zephaniah Holwell – whose fascination for Indian culture crosses into Hindu vegetarianism. Ian meets Prof Partha Chatterjee, an expert in the incident – the Black Hole of Calcutta – that made Holwell famous. Paris was the heart of the enlightenment, where the Lumières condemn organised… more

 VegHist Ep 10: Revolution. English civil war, diet gurus, and the poetry of Sensibility; with Tristram Stuart and Anita Guerrini; at the Ahmedabad Panjrapole | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

When printing lets ordinary people access a world of ideas, including Indian vegetarianism, some European radicals and diet gurus begin to oppose meat-eating. Episode 10: Revolution In England, the 1600s are a century of revolution. The artisans and yeomanry are picking up books – and the New Model Army is picking up pikes and muskets to turn the […] The post VegHist Ep 10: Revolution. English civil war, diet gurus, and the poetry of Sensibility; with Tristram Stuart and Anita Guerrini; at the Ahmedabad Panjrapole first appeared on THE VEGAN OPTION radio show and blog.

 VegHist Ep 10: Revolution. English civil war, diet gurus, and the poetry of Sensibility | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: Unknown

When printing lets ordinary people access a world of ideas, including Indian vegetarianism, some European radicals and diet gurus begin to oppose meat-eating. Episode 10: Revolution In England, the 1600s are a century of revolution. The artisans and yeomanry are picking up books – and the New Model Army is picking up pikes and muskets to turn the world upside down. Ian meets Dr Ariel Hessayon, a lecturer in the radicals of the English Civil War at a Thameside pub that was there during the 1600s, to discover tabloid scares and firebrand sermons about people who ate only bread, and water and fruit. In Ahmedabad, India, he visits the kind of animal hospital that astounded European travellers. And he hears from author Tristram Stuart about the impact stories of India had on Europeans, and how they shook Christendom’s moral certainty. Dr Anita Guerrini researches the first vegetarian diet gurus, whose books about food and medicine interpreted the intellectuals of the Republic of Letters for everyone else. And she tells Ian about the secret religion of Sir Isaac Newton. Play or download (62MB MP3 44min) (via iTunes) or read transcript Contributors: Sherwin Everett and Giraben Shah (Jivdaya Charitable Trust, within Panjrapole… more

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