Making the Modern ‘Meat Complex’

The Co-production of Humans and Livestock in Finnish Agricultural Modernization, c. 1880s–1960s

This project at Tampere University examines the expansion of livestock production, the ‘meatification’ of society and the changing relationships between animals and humans as Finnish animal husbandry shifted from domestic self-sufficiency to commercial agribusiness, c. 1880s–1960s.

Particular attention is paid to pigs, the first farmed animals produced for the meat trade in Finland. Data includes, e.g., archival sources, farming publications, legislation, oral histories and photographs. By focusing on pigs as much as on humans, the project makes pigs visible as agents of modernization and sentient beings who have been an important part of history and co-constructors of modern society, and who therefore have historical experiences that are not the same everywhere. It also shows how local phenomena (such as the expansion of Finnish pig farming) have influenced larger-scale and planetary phenomena (such as climate change) through multiple, recursive and aleatory acts.

Photo: Pekka Kyytinen, 1930–1939. Kansatieteen kuvakokoelma. Museovirasto. Finna.fi