This ethnographic study of Wisconsin dairy farmers examines how emerging biotechnologies and industrial practices are changing ethical considerations. Cows are producing unprecedented amounts of milk due to infrastructural, nutritional, hormonal, and pharmaceutical interventions and these changes entail new kinds of daily interactions between farmers and their cows. While dairy farmers take pride in their expertise in cow care, the industrial logics and market pressures that pervade the dairy industry create tensions between ethics of care and drives for productivity. This empirical study will investigate these tensions through fifteen months of ethnographic research with dairy farmers, veterinarians, dairy engineers, and children's groups such as 4-H.
The broader impacts of this project include a Ph.D. dissertation and several articles, public lectures and presentations at professional conferences, the creation of networks among scholars, industry professionals, and farmers who are working on issues pertaining to animal care in dairy farming, and contributions to policy work on animal care ethics.
Caught between pressures to "feed the world" by providing abundant and inexpensive food and the daily work of caring for their cows, farmers in America’s Dairyland must negotiate tensions between goals for maximum milk productivity and desires to care for their cows. Cow care is not a stable set of practices however; it is constantly shifting as farmers and agricultural experts integrate new technologies on dairy farms. Farmers and agricultural experts are incorporating feeding, reproductive, and pharmaceutical methods toward the cultivation of higher-producing dairy cows than ever before. At the same time, farmers and many who work with cows describe emotional attachment and close relationships with their cows as well as an ethic to take the best possible care of cows. But what do these shifting technologies mean for the daily work and relationships of farmers and cows? How are farmers and agricultural experts improvising material and ethical arrangements as they negotiate a changing industry and pressures to expand farms, explore value-added options, or leave farming altogether? This dissertation research addresses these and related questions through an examination of changing meanings and practices of cow care amidst rapid technological change in the dairy worlds of Wisconsin. In order to examine emerging meanings and practices of cow care, the Co-PI conducted 18 months of ethnographic research in southern Wisconsin with dairy farmers, agricultural experts, industry specialists, and farm-oriented youth programs. The Co-PI conducted long-term research on 5 farms throughout the research period and she visited an additional 56 dairy farms in the area. In addition, the Co-PI conducted interviews and "ride alongs" with several veterinarians, animal nutritionists, siring and breeding specialists, and dairy engineers. The Co-PI also attended various dairy-related local and community events including but not limited to county and state fairs, dairy conferences, farm tours, local hay sales, livestock and farm auctions, Farm Technology Days, and World Dairy Expo. This project demonstrates Intellectual Merit by building on a burgeoning field of multispecies ethnography. Historically in anthropological inquiry, animals have entered the purview of researchers mostly as "good to think with," meaning that animals and other species offer opportunities to understand human lives and social structures. More recently, social scientists have expanded their understanding of human social life as always intimately interwoven with the livelihoods of other species. This research builds on this emerging interest through a full-scale ethnographic study that starts with the human-cow relationships that make milk production possible in southern Wisconsin. In this way, the Co-PI takes seriously the cows as much as the people that work with them. This is a complicated zone because cows and humans are navigating multiple kinds of relationships at any given moment. For example, cows move through roles as pets, commodities, workers, citizens, friends, biological machines, research objects, and more. Cows in turn may treat humans with fear, curiosity, annoyance, anger, affection and more. In addition, these relationships shape and are shaped by feeds and feeding schedules; breeding practices; milking routines and machinery; and new forms of labor on Wisconsin dairy farms such as immigrant labor and robots. By starting with the relationships between cows, humans, and technologies this study expands understandings of social relationships in work environments to include a fundamentally co-species form of work. This study has several important Broader Impacts as defined by the NSF. This research includes not only the small-scale interactions and daily work on dairies, but it also looks at how these are related to wider trends, practices, and cultural values. For instance, ethnographic research enables the Co-PI to follow lines of inquiry that reach beyond the milking parlor to make connections between cow care and wider issues such as discourses on jobs and work ethic; ideals and standards for cow bodies developed through dairy show circuits and breed associations; and discourses of genomics and genetic superiority. The ability to follow these connections has led to some unexpected but important insights such as the implications of declining farm succession for cow care on smaller and medium scale farms. This study has the potential to cultivate conversations on some of these overlooked connections and to support policies and practices that will promote viable farms and high standards of cow care. As described in this report, this funding from the National Science Foundation suppported 18 months of ethnographic research toward a dissertation to be written by the Co-PI. In addition to a dissertation, this research will make possible several conference presentations, academic articles in journals, articles in newspapers and popular press venues, and may lead to additional research on related topics that were not within the scope of the current project.
