Theories are living and breathing reconfigurings of the world.
Karen Barad, from “On Touching—The Inhuman that Therefore I am.”

Contemporary animal theory confronts some of the most profound issues of our time—what it means to be human in the Anthropocene, anthropocentrism and the mass extinction of species, the rights of nonhuman animals and the future of ethical thinking. Artists, writers and filmmakers explore these and related issues in works that are experimental and challenging, testifying to this time of crisis. These include Michael Cook’s human–nature studies (Civilised, 2012; Invasion, 2017), Janet Laurence’s work on extinction (After Eden, 2012), Patricia Piccinini’s exploration of the posthuman (Evolution, 2009), Sue Coe’s bearing witness to slaughterhouses (Dead Meat, 1996; Porkopolis, 2001), J.M. Coetzee’s writings on animals and ethics (Elizabeth Costello, 2003, Disgrace, 1999) and Nicolas Philibert’s indictment of zoos in his documentary, (Nénette, 2010).

Lesbians do not exist in mainstream Australian cinema. Apart from a brief sequence representing youthful lesbian desire in 'The Getting of Wisdom (1977)' and the undercurrent of adolescent homoeroticism in 'Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)' Australian cinema has remained mute - perhaps dumbstruck might be a more appropriate term - in relation to the issue of desire between women.

The cinema's ability to represent death - the act of dying, bodily transformations, decay, the corpse - in astonishing realistic terms helps to explain why film, the moving rather than the static image, has become the central depository of death narratives (ancient and modern) in contemporary culture.