Critic speak is tough, but we've got you covered.
Quote :"Human, All too Human"
[The larger question is] how the internal disciplinarity of history or literary studies or philosophy is unsettled when the animal is taken seriously not just as another topic or object of study among many but as one with unique demands.
"Internal disciplinarity"—sounds like the 'self-discipline' they taught us about in elementary school, right? What Wolfe is talking about here, though, is the way academic disciplines conduct themselves. When new theories come along—say Foucault's analyses of power, or new feminist theories—disciplines may decide that they have to change how they read and analyze texts or culture.
And that very change is what ends up changing the dang world. It's a simple case of exposure leading to change. When people start to read LGBTQ subtext into literature or movies, for example, they start to realize that there are a whole lot of LGBTQ people in the world… and this realization can end up shaping policy, leading to things like marriage equality.
Wolfe wants animal studies to be taken seriously—like Foucault, or feminist theory. Animal studies isn't just an extension of another area of study; it's not an offshoot of feminist theory, for example. It's a separate, distinct theory, and it deserves to be treated as such, dagnabbit!