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Animal Lives
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A moving story of survival and an eye-opening introduction to an extraordinary community of chimps and people.
Fongoli chimpanzees are unique for many reasons. Their female hunters are the only apes that regularly hunt with tools, seeking out tiny bush babies with wooden spears. Unlike most other chimps, these apes fear neither water nor fire, using shallow pools to cool off in the Senegalese heat. Up to 90 percent of their home range burns annually—the result of human hunting or clearing for gold mining—and Fongoli chimpanzees have learned to predict the movement of such fires and to avoid them.
The study of Fongoli chimps is also unique. While most primate research occurs in isolated reserves, Fongoli chimpanzees live alongside humans, and as primatologist and anthropologist Jill Pruetz reports, this shared habitat creates both challenges and opportunities. The issues faced by Fongoli chimpanzees—particularly food scarcity and environmental degradation—are also issues faced by their human neighbors. This connection is one reason Pruetz, who has studied Fongoli apes for over two decades, created the nonprofit Neighbor Ape in 2008 to provide for the welfare of the humans who share their landscape with apes. It is also why Pruetz decided to write this book, the first to offer readers a view of these chimps’ lives and to explain the specific conservation efforts needed to help them. Incorporating stories from Pruetz’s time in the field, including the compelling rescue of a young chimp from poachers, Apes on the Edge opens a fascinating window into primate research, conservation, and the inner workings of a very special population of our closest nonhuman relatives.
Fongoli chimpanzees are unique for many reasons. Their female hunters are the only apes that regularly hunt with tools, seeking out tiny bush babies with wooden spears. Unlike most other chimps, these apes fear neither water nor fire, using shallow pools to cool off in the Senegalese heat. Up to 90 percent of their home range burns annually—the result of human hunting or clearing for gold mining—and Fongoli chimpanzees have learned to predict the movement of such fires and to avoid them.
The study of Fongoli chimps is also unique. While most primate research occurs in isolated reserves, Fongoli chimpanzees live alongside humans, and as primatologist and anthropologist Jill Pruetz reports, this shared habitat creates both challenges and opportunities. The issues faced by Fongoli chimpanzees—particularly food scarcity and environmental degradation—are also issues faced by their human neighbors. This connection is one reason Pruetz, who has studied Fongoli apes for over two decades, created the nonprofit Neighbor Ape in 2008 to provide for the welfare of the humans who share their landscape with apes. It is also why Pruetz decided to write this book, the first to offer readers a view of these chimps’ lives and to explain the specific conservation efforts needed to help them. Incorporating stories from Pruetz’s time in the field, including the compelling rescue of a young chimp from poachers, Apes on the Edge opens a fascinating window into primate research, conservation, and the inner workings of a very special population of our closest nonhuman relatives.
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Reconceptualizes human-animal relationships and their political significance in ancient and modern societies.
In Live Stock and Dead Things, Hannah Chazin combines zooarchaeology and anthropology to challenge familiar narratives about the role of nonhuman animals in the rise of modern societies. Conventional views of this process tend to see a mostly linear development from hunter-gatherer societies, to horticultural and pastoral ones, to large-scale agricultural ones, and then industrial ones. Along the way, traditional accounts argue that owning livestock as property, along with land and other valuable commodities, introduced social inequality and stratification. Against this, Chazin raises a provocative question: What if domestication wasn’t the origin of instrumentalizing nonhuman animals after all?
Chazin argues that these conventional narratives are inherited from conjectural histories and ignore the archaeological data. In her view, the category of “domestication” flattens the more complex dimensions of humans’ relationship to herd animals. In the book’s first half, Chazin offers a new understanding of the political possibilities of pastoralism, one that recognizes the powerful role herd animals have played in shaping human notions of power and authority. In the second half, she takes readers into her archaeological fieldwork in the South Caucasus, which sheds further light on herd animals’ transformative effect on the economy, social life, and ritual. Appealing to anthropologists and archaeologists alike, this daring book offers a reconceptualization of human-animal relationships and their political significance.
In Live Stock and Dead Things, Hannah Chazin combines zooarchaeology and anthropology to challenge familiar narratives about the role of nonhuman animals in the rise of modern societies. Conventional views of this process tend to see a mostly linear development from hunter-gatherer societies, to horticultural and pastoral ones, to large-scale agricultural ones, and then industrial ones. Along the way, traditional accounts argue that owning livestock as property, along with land and other valuable commodities, introduced social inequality and stratification. Against this, Chazin raises a provocative question: What if domestication wasn’t the origin of instrumentalizing nonhuman animals after all?
Chazin argues that these conventional narratives are inherited from conjectural histories and ignore the archaeological data. In her view, the category of “domestication” flattens the more complex dimensions of humans’ relationship to herd animals. In the book’s first half, Chazin offers a new understanding of the political possibilities of pastoralism, one that recognizes the powerful role herd animals have played in shaping human notions of power and authority. In the second half, she takes readers into her archaeological fieldwork in the South Caucasus, which sheds further light on herd animals’ transformative effect on the economy, social life, and ritual. Appealing to anthropologists and archaeologists alike, this daring book offers a reconceptualization of human-animal relationships and their political significance.
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Dogopolis presents a surprising source for urban innovation in the history of three major cities: human-canine relationships.
Stroll through any American or European city today and you probably won’t get far before seeing a dog being taken for a walk. It’s expected that these domesticated animals can easily navigate sidewalks, streets, and other foundational elements of our built environment. But what if our cities were actually shaped in response to dogs more than we ever realized?
Chris Pearson’s Dogopolis boldly and convincingly asserts that human-canine relations were a crucial factor in the formation of modern urban living. Focusing on New York, London, and Paris from the early nineteenth century into the 1930s, Pearson shows that human reactions to dogs significantly remolded them and other contemporary western cities. It’s an unalterable fact that dogs—often filthy, bellicose, and sometimes off-putting—run away, spread rabies, defecate, and breed wherever they like, so as dogs became a more and more common in nineteenth-century middle-class life, cities had to respond to people’s fear of them and revulsion at their least desirable traits. The gradual integration of dogs into city life centered on disgust at dirt, fear of crime and vagrancy, and the promotion of humanitarian sentiments. On the other hand, dogs are some people’s most beloved animal companions, and human compassion and affection for pets and strays were equally powerful forces in shaping urban modernity. Dogopolis details the complex interrelations among emotions, sentiment, and the ways we manifest our feelings toward what we love—showing that together they can actually reshape society.
Stroll through any American or European city today and you probably won’t get far before seeing a dog being taken for a walk. It’s expected that these domesticated animals can easily navigate sidewalks, streets, and other foundational elements of our built environment. But what if our cities were actually shaped in response to dogs more than we ever realized?
Chris Pearson’s Dogopolis boldly and convincingly asserts that human-canine relations were a crucial factor in the formation of modern urban living. Focusing on New York, London, and Paris from the early nineteenth century into the 1930s, Pearson shows that human reactions to dogs significantly remolded them and other contemporary western cities. It’s an unalterable fact that dogs—often filthy, bellicose, and sometimes off-putting—run away, spread rabies, defecate, and breed wherever they like, so as dogs became a more and more common in nineteenth-century middle-class life, cities had to respond to people’s fear of them and revulsion at their least desirable traits. The gradual integration of dogs into city life centered on disgust at dirt, fear of crime and vagrancy, and the promotion of humanitarian sentiments. On the other hand, dogs are some people’s most beloved animal companions, and human compassion and affection for pets and strays were equally powerful forces in shaping urban modernity. Dogopolis details the complex interrelations among emotions, sentiment, and the ways we manifest our feelings toward what we love—showing that together they can actually reshape society.
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Big cats—tigers, leopards, and lions—that make prey of humans are commonly known as “man-eaters.” Anthropologist Nayanika Mathur reconceptualizes them as cats that have gone off the straight path to become “crooked.” Building upon fifteen years of research in India, this groundbreaking work moves beyond both colonial and conservationist accounts to place crooked cats at the center of the question of how we are to comprehend a planet in crisis.
There are many theories on why and how a big cat comes to prey on humans, with the ecological collapse emerging as a central explanatory factor. Yet, uncertainty over the precise cause of crookedness persists. Crooked Cats explores in vivid detail the many lived complexities that arise from this absence of certain knowledge to offer startling new insights into both the governance of nonhuman animals and their intimate entanglements with humans. Through creative ethnographic storytelling, Crooked Cats illuminates the Anthropocene in three critical ways: as method, as a way of reframing human-nonhuman relations on the planet, and as a political tool indicating the urgency of academic engagement. Weaving together “beastly tales” spun from encounters with big cats, Mathur deepens our understanding of the causes, consequences, and conceptualization of the climate crisis.
There are many theories on why and how a big cat comes to prey on humans, with the ecological collapse emerging as a central explanatory factor. Yet, uncertainty over the precise cause of crookedness persists. Crooked Cats explores in vivid detail the many lived complexities that arise from this absence of certain knowledge to offer startling new insights into both the governance of nonhuman animals and their intimate entanglements with humans. Through creative ethnographic storytelling, Crooked Cats illuminates the Anthropocene in three critical ways: as method, as a way of reframing human-nonhuman relations on the planet, and as a political tool indicating the urgency of academic engagement. Weaving together “beastly tales” spun from encounters with big cats, Mathur deepens our understanding of the causes, consequences, and conceptualization of the climate crisis.
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From the recent spate of equine deaths on racetracks to protests demanding the removal of mounted Confederate soldier statues to the success and appeal of War Horse, there is no question that horses still play a role in our lives—though fewer and fewer of us actually interact with them. In Precarious Partners, Kari Weil takes readers back to a time in France when horses were an inescapable part of daily life. This was a time when horse ownership became an attainable dream not just for soldiers but also for middle-class children; when natural historians argued about animal intelligence; when the prevalence of horse beatings led to the first animal protection laws; and when the combined magnificence and abuse of these animals inspired artists, writers, and riders alike.
Weil traces the evolving partnerships established between French citizens and their horses through this era. She considers the newly designed “races” of workhorses who carried men from the battlefield to the hippodrome, lugged heavy loads through the boulevards, or paraded women riders, amazones, in the parks or circus halls—as well as those unfortunate horses who found their fate on a dinner plate. Moving between literature, painting, natural philosophy, popular cartoons, sports manuals, and tracts of public hygiene, Precarious Partners traces the changing social, political, and emotional relations with these charismatic creatures who straddled conceptions of pet and livestock in nineteenth-century France.
Weil traces the evolving partnerships established between French citizens and their horses through this era. She considers the newly designed “races” of workhorses who carried men from the battlefield to the hippodrome, lugged heavy loads through the boulevards, or paraded women riders, amazones, in the parks or circus halls—as well as those unfortunate horses who found their fate on a dinner plate. Moving between literature, painting, natural philosophy, popular cartoons, sports manuals, and tracts of public hygiene, Precarious Partners traces the changing social, political, and emotional relations with these charismatic creatures who straddled conceptions of pet and livestock in nineteenth-century France.
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As much as dogs, cats, or any domestic animal, horses exemplify the vast range of human-animal interactions. Horses have long been deployed to help with a variety of human activities—from racing and riding to police work, farming, warfare, and therapy—and have figured heavily in the history of natural sciences, social sciences, and the humanities. Most accounts of the equine-human relationship, however, fail to address the last few centuries of Western history, focusing instead on pre-1700 interactions. Equestrian Cultures fills in the gap, telling the story of how prominently horses continue to figure in our lives, up to the present day.
Kristen Guest and Monica Mattfeld place the modern period front and center in this collection, illuminating the largely untold story of how the horse has responded to the accelerated pace of modernity. The book’s contributors explore equine cultures across the globe, drawing from numerous interdisciplinary sources to show how horses have unexpectedly influenced such distinctively modern fields as photography, anthropology, and feminist theory. Equestrian Cultures boldly steps forward to redefine our view of the most recent developments in our long history of equine partnership and sets the course for future examinations of this still-strong bond.
Kristen Guest and Monica Mattfeld place the modern period front and center in this collection, illuminating the largely untold story of how the horse has responded to the accelerated pace of modernity. The book’s contributors explore equine cultures across the globe, drawing from numerous interdisciplinary sources to show how horses have unexpectedly influenced such distinctively modern fields as photography, anthropology, and feminist theory. Equestrian Cultures boldly steps forward to redefine our view of the most recent developments in our long history of equine partnership and sets the course for future examinations of this still-strong bond.
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In the nineteenth century, richly-drawn social fiction became one of England’s major cultural exports. At the same time, a surprising companion came to stand alongside the novel as a key embodiment of British identity: the domesticated pet. In works by authors from the Brontës to Eliot, from Dickens to Hardy, animals appeared as markers of domestic coziness and familial kindness. Yet for all their supposed significance, the animals in nineteenth-century fiction were never granted the same fullness of character or consciousness as their human masters: they remain secondary figures. Minor Creatures re-examines a slew of literary classics to show how Victorian notions of domesticity, sympathy, and individuality were shaped in response to the burgeoning pet class. The presence of beloved animals in the home led to a number of welfare-minded political movements, inspired in part by the Darwinian thought that began to sprout at the time. Nineteenth-century animals may not have been the heroes of their own lives but, as Kreilkamp shows, the history of domestic pets deeply influenced the history of the English novel.
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What does it mean to live and die in relation to other animals? Animal Intimacies posits this central question alongside the intimate—and intense—moments of care, kinship, violence, politics, indifference, and desire that occur between human and non-human animals.
Built on extensive ethnographic fieldwork in the mountain villages of India’s Central Himalayas, Radhika Govindrajan’s book explores the number of ways that human and animal interact to cultivate relationships as interconnected, related beings. Whether it is through the study of the affect and ethics of ritual animal sacrifice, analysis of the right-wing political project of cow-protection, or examination of villagers’ talk about bears who abduct women and have sex with them, Govindrajan illustrates that multispecies relatedness relies on both difference and ineffable affinity between animals. Animal Intimacies breaks substantial new ground in animal studies, and Govindrajan’s detailed portrait of the social, political and religious life of the region will be of interest to cultural anthropologists and scholars of South Asia as well.
Built on extensive ethnographic fieldwork in the mountain villages of India’s Central Himalayas, Radhika Govindrajan’s book explores the number of ways that human and animal interact to cultivate relationships as interconnected, related beings. Whether it is through the study of the affect and ethics of ritual animal sacrifice, analysis of the right-wing political project of cow-protection, or examination of villagers’ talk about bears who abduct women and have sex with them, Govindrajan illustrates that multispecies relatedness relies on both difference and ineffable affinity between animals. Animal Intimacies breaks substantial new ground in animal studies, and Govindrajan’s detailed portrait of the social, political and religious life of the region will be of interest to cultural anthropologists and scholars of South Asia as well.
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The number of ways in which humans interact with animals is almost incalculable. From beloved household pets to the steak on our dinner tables, the fur in our closets to the Babar books on our shelves, taxidermy exhibits to local zoos, humans have complex, deep, and dependent relationships with the animals in our ecosystems. In Displaying Death and Animating Life, Jane C. Desmond puts those human-animal relationships under a multidisciplinary lens, focusing on the less obvious, and revealing the individualities and subjectivities of the real animals in our everyday lives.
Desmond, a pioneer in the field of animal studies, builds the book on a number of case studies. She conducts research on-site at major museums, taxidermy conventions, pet cemeteries, and even at a professional conference for writers of obituaries. She goes behind the scenes at zoos, wildlife clinics, and meetings of pet cemetery professionals. We journey with her as she meets Kanzi, the bonobo artist, and a host of other animal-artists—all of whom are preparing their artwork for auction. Throughout, Desmond moves from a consideration of the visual display of unindividuated animals, to mourning for known animals, and finally to the marketing of artwork by individual animals. The first book in the new Animal Lives series, Displaying Death and Animating Life is a landmark study, bridging disciplines and reaching across divisions from the humanities and social sciences to chart new territories of investigation.
Desmond, a pioneer in the field of animal studies, builds the book on a number of case studies. She conducts research on-site at major museums, taxidermy conventions, pet cemeteries, and even at a professional conference for writers of obituaries. She goes behind the scenes at zoos, wildlife clinics, and meetings of pet cemetery professionals. We journey with her as she meets Kanzi, the bonobo artist, and a host of other animal-artists—all of whom are preparing their artwork for auction. Throughout, Desmond moves from a consideration of the visual display of unindividuated animals, to mourning for known animals, and finally to the marketing of artwork by individual animals. The first book in the new Animal Lives series, Displaying Death and Animating Life is a landmark study, bridging disciplines and reaching across divisions from the humanities and social sciences to chart new territories of investigation.
