Rudolph, Jingling Horses, and Six Geese a Laying: Six Popular Christmas Songs Analyzed by an Animal Rights Activist

This Christmas, I thought it would be fun to analyze six popular Christmas songs referencing animals-other-than-humans (mostly mammals who are forced to pull people around the snow in sleds, and then some birds, mainly fowl who are killed and eaten by humans but sometimes avians humans admire for their beauty). The songs are  Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, Run Run Rudolph, Sleigh Ride, Jingle Bells, The 12 Days of Christmas, and Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song.  In this 24-minute podcast (originally recorded Christmas 2024), I deconstruct these Christmas songs from a Critical Animal Studies perspective. In other words, as an animal rights activist who is sympathetic to the more-than-human-world and the perspectives and interests of other animal individuals and our shared habitats, I analyze these classic songs and what lessons they teach us about fellow animal species and how we could be more respectful, kind of like those Politically Correct Bedtime Story series that gives you a critical yet humorous perspective on classic tales in Western society.

My Radio Free Georgia version of this episode has the license to broadcast these popular songs, but for my podcast friends, I don’t have copyright permission to play the songs, so I linked to the youtube versions of the songs in the podcast notes here below. For the recording, I'll put a jingle bell sound in there when you can cue up the songs to play yourself if you want to. But I’ll speak the key lyrics dealing with animals that I discuss.

Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMletImQ_cs

Run Run Rudolph: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqVtqbzTdVs 

Sleigh Ride: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZTzai1H9DM

Jingle Bells: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eP3RhTbq3Ds 

The Twelve Days of Christmas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QPQI5QUs74 

The Christmas Song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKhRnZZ0cJI 

"In Tune to Nature" is a weekly hour-long radio show airing Wednesdays at 6pm Eastern Time on 89.3FM-Atlanta radio and streaming worldwide on wrfg.org (Radio Free Georgia, a nonprofit indie station). Hosted by me, Carrie Freeman, or Melody Paris. The show's website and action items can be found at https://www.facebook.com/InTunetoNature You can email me at my first name at wrfg.org.  Please support nonprofit indie media like our Radio Free Georgia station at https://wrfg.org/  Thank you!

Take care of yourself and others, including other species, like reindeer, partridges, French hens, turtle doves, bobtailed horses, and more.

Photo Credit: by Aleksei Zaitcev on Unsplash

Horse Neighing audio credit: From Duke the Palomino who has his own YouTube channel