Overview

While historiography is dominated by attempts that try to standardize and de-individualize the behavior of animals, history proves to be littered with records of the exceptional lives of unusual animals. This book introduces animal biography as an approach to the re-framing of animals as both objects of knowledge as well as subjects of individual lives. Taking an interdisciplinary perspective and bringing together scholars from, among others, literary, historical and cultural studies, the texts collected in this volume seek to refine animal biography as a research method and framework to studying, capturing, representing and acknowledging animal others as individuals. From Heini Hediger’s biting monitor, Hachikō and Murr to celluloid ape Caesar and the mourning of Topsy’s gruesome death, the authors discuss how animal biographies are discovered and explored through connections with humans that can be traced in archives, ethological fieldwork and novels, and probe the means ofconstructing animal biographies from taxidermy to film, literature and social media. Thus, they invite deeper conversations with socio-political and cultural contexts that allow animal biographies to provide narratives that reach beyond individual life stories, while experimenting with particular forms of animal biographies that might trigger animal activism and concerns for animal well-being, spur historical interest and enrich the literary imagination.

Full Product Details

Author:   André Krebber ,  Mieke Roscher
Publisher:   Springer Nature Switzerland AG
Imprint:   Springer Nature Switzerland AG
Edition:   Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 2018
Dimensions:   Width: 14.80cm , Height: 1.50cm , Length: 21.00cm
Weight:   0.454kg
ISBN:  

9783030074777

ISBN 10:   3030074773
Pages:   266
Publication Date:   26 January 2019
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.

Table of Contents

1.      Introduction: Biographies, Animals and Individuality André Krebber and Mieke Roscher   Explorations 2.      Living, Biting Monitors, a Morose Howler, and Other Infamous Animals: Animal Biographies in Ethology and Zoo Biology Matthew Chrulew 3.      Finding a Man and his Horse in the Archive? Hilda Kean 4.      Recovering and Reconstructing Animal Selves in Literary Autozoographies Frederike Middelhoff   Reflections 5.      A Dog’s Life: The Challenges and Promise of Animal Biography Aaron Skabelund 6.      “We Know Them All” – Does it Make Sense to Create a Collective Biography of the European Bison? Markus Krzoska 7.      Animal Life Stories; Or, the Making of Animal Subjects in Primatological Narratives of Fieldwork Mira Shah   Constructions 8.      Taxidermy's Literary Biographies Susan McHugh 9.      Caesar – The Rise and Dawn of a Humanimalistic Identity Daniel Wolf 10.  Postscript, Posthuman: Werner Herzog's “Crocodile” at the End of the World Dominic O’Key   Experiments 11.  The Elephant’s I: Looking for Abu’l Abbas Radhika Subramaniam 12.  Topsy: The Elephant We Must Never Forget Kim Stallwood 13.  Online Animal (Auto-)Biographies: What Does it Mean When We “Give Animals a Voice”? Margo DeMello

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Author Information

André Krebber is Lecturer in Theory and History of Human-Animal Relations at the University of Kassel, Germany. Mieke Roscher is Assistant Professor for Social and Cultural History and the History of Human-Animal Relations at the University of Kassel, Germany. 

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