Reviewed By: Clinton R. Sanders

University of Connecticut

Aubrey Manning and James Serpell (Eds.)
Animals and Human Society: Changing Perspectives
New York/London: Routledge, 1994. 199 pp.

Edited collections, especially those constructed from papers presented at academic meetings, are a mixed bag, at best. Drawn from a recent conference sponsored by the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the selections in Animals and Human Society are, on the whole, far better than may be found in most similar works. The authors and editors are extensively experienced in the field of human-animal relationships and should be familiar to the readers of this journal.

Following a brief introduction by the editors, the first offering by Ingold does an excellent job in setting the stage for what follows as he discusses how the cultural movement from hunting animals to domesticating them has shaped human views of both animals and the natural world. Hunter-gatherers, he maintains, have an alliance with nature in which their relationship to animals is based on mutuality and respect. With the development of pastoralism humans move from collecting animals to defining them as products or pieces of property, a change which entails constructing a dichotomy between nature and society. While hunter-gatherers see nature as a phenomenon of which they are an integral part, herding peoples regard it as a thing to be conquered. Consequently, while hunters see their relationships with animals as grounded upon trust, herdsmen define their associations with non-human others as requiring domination.

The following two papers continue Ingold's focus on the process of domestication. Clutton-Brock offers an anthropological discussion of how controlled breeding transforms animals into cultural artifacts while Schwabe presents an historical account of the various modes of relationship with both "wild" and "tame" animals in ancient Egypt and other Old World civilizations.

Cohen continues by offering an historical discussion of the place of animals in Medieval Europe with emphasis on how animals were seen as symbolizing human qualities such as courage, pride, and gluttony. She then moves to a succinct account of the involvement of animals in public rituals during the Middle Ages and their anthropomorphized designation as appropriate subjects of legal constraint and punishment.

Next, Maehle provides a wide-ranging discussion of the philosophical groundings of human-animal relationships from the early seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth centuries. This interesting, detailed, and highly organized piece analyzes perspectives on animals' possession of souls, their ability to feel pain, and their capacity to reason. He provides numerous illustrations of the implications of defining animals as either automatons or rational beings for their legal rights, handling as experimental objects, and treatment as domesticated creatures. Ritvo continues with a rather stiffly styled presentation of the taxonomic system into which animals were placed in nineteenth-century Britain.

In the seventh selection Serpell and Paul revisit much of the ground already covered as they discuss shifting perspectives on animals in the movement from hunting and gathering to pastoral culture and views of animals popular during the nineteenth century. The authors conclude by briefly presenting their recent research with university students focused on the impact of companion animals on peoples' feelings toward animals.

The following two papers are the only discussions in the collection primarily based on empirically-derived data and present a striking illustration of the contrast between the two major general research approaches within the social sciences. Arluke uses ethnographic data to ground a rich and moving description of the means whereby animal shelter workers deal with the conflict between their personal regard for animals and their central occupational obligation to euthanize large numbers of cats and dogs. Shelter workers manage the emotions inherent in this "caring-killing" paradox, Arluke maintains, by relegating certain shelter animals into a pet-like status, emphasizing the care provided while the animals are confined or the compassion and skill with which they are eventually put to death, finding ways of postponing euthanasia, and placing blame on human companions for contributing to the oversupply of companion animals far outstripping demand, and for regarding companion animals as objects that can be disposed of with little or no remorse. Kellert's paper, in contrast, continues the research task on which he has labored for almost two decades--to categorize the attitudes and knowledge of various peoples with regard to wildlife. His conventional presentation employs survey data to compare the views of Japanese, German, and American respondents as they fit into his well-known typology of orientations (Naturalistic, Humanistic, Aesthetic, and so on).

The volume concludes with a summary discussion by Midgely. While going somewhat overboard in calling the book a "triumph," she rightly focuses on the key theme that runs through this collection. Ambivalence is central to our understanding of and importantly constrains our relationships with animals.

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