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Paper short abstract:

This paper aims to reconsider whether the wild and the domestic are two categorical terms, based on my ethnographic research on the pigeon racing industry in Belgium and the linguist Émile Benveniste’s semantic study of domus and foris in Latin in relation to the idea of domestication.

Paper long abstract:

Based on my ethnographic research on the pigeon racing industry in Belgium, this paper offers insight into the discourse on the difference drawn by pigeon fanciers between racing pigeons and feral pigeons. A racing pigeon is a pigeon that is domesticated by humans and expected to put on a homing race, but what is believed to distinguish it from a feral pigeon is more than the match itself. Reviewing my journey as an anthropologist who was an outsider to the industry, this paper describes how I have come to learn such a distinction in the first place and how the professionals make sense of the superiority of racing pigeons during my visit to the lofts, namely, the pigeon domus. To revisit the conception of domestication, the paper follows Émile Benveniste’s semantic study (1973) of the Latin word foris (‘outside’), whose opposition to domus (domi: ‘at home’) is related to the notion of the wild as against the domestic. Noteworthily, this opposition is, as Benveniste points out, grounded on the tangible image of ‘door’. The paper thereby argues that the appearance of ‘door’ in the language of antiquity about domestication encourages us to reconsider whether the wild and the domestic are two categorical terms.

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Paper long abstract:

Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula has seen increased interest in ecotourism given the popularity of Corcovado National Park’s rainforest and the famed “wild frontier” characterizations therein. While this biodiversity “hotspot” is cherished by environmentalists, it’s also a conduit for narcotrafficking and illicit tropical hardwoods; and, in a country where tourism dominates foreign currency exchange, economic undercurrents beneath activism, science, and sustainability-minded conservation are pronounced.

This area is characterized by Costa Rican urbanites and others as “the wild west,” echoing fantasies of a wild frontier as portrayed by golden-era Hollywood. This type of “frontier” rhetoric is often used to excuse or explain (or at least stereotype) vice, informal economies, illicit activities, socio-political chaos, assumed anarchy, and other expected outputs from familiar caricatures that never grasp the complexity of the politics of everyday life. The concept of the “frontier” can be metaphorically applied to the constitution and limitations of the human; and when looking ethnographically, there’s an intriguing collision of ideas – human, animal, organized, chaotic, illicit, legitimate, natural, and social.

Based upon original ethnographic case studies and other research, I examine the “frontier” metaphor in relation to southwest Costa Rica. Here, different conceptualizations of nature appear for the campesino in contrast with the environmental activist, as for the poaching gold miner versus the park ranger, and as well for the foreign tourist or the local entrepreneur. The commodification of nature as an experience to be consumed offers anthropologists a fruitful endeavor seeking to know how the “wild” and “frontier” imaginaries are employed.

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This paper is based on an ethnographic research conducted in 2021-2022 in Yulshu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, China. Through the critique of biopower in the more-than-human worlds, I show that Tibetan yak herders are being encouraged by the state and veterinary science to ‘improve’ yaks’ productivity by breeding domestic yak with wild yaks. Such purposeful cross breeding of the domestic and the wild yaks is unprecedented in the history of yak husbandry. Moreover, as part of the state plan to industrialize yak husbandry, the rarity and charisma of wild yaks make the hybrid offspring highly marketable. In addition, 'Improving' the yak bodies is increasingly becoming part of herders' identity. This paper argues that the blurred boundary between wild yaks and domestic yaks is critical to the making of good herder and good yaks, which is shaped by state-organized yak breeding competitions, yak conferences, and state's yak modernization projects.

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Paper short abstract:

Through ethnographic research with goat shepherds in Sardinia (Italy), I propose an investigation into the opacity surronding the "wildness" often attributed to the region. Going deep in issues related to identity and labor "wildness" becomes more than an impossibility to domesticate.

Paper long abstract:

The history of domesticating Sardinia's wilderness for agro-pastoral purposes intertwines with the current tourist allure of the inland areas, which owes much to the idea of untamed nature waiting to be explored.

Nuoro is embraced by Mount Ortobene, on whose slopes the last goat herder in the area continues to domesticate a space perceived as "outside" the city. However, the surrounding countryside and Mount Ortobene itself are places with their own history of power and manipulation, spaces unable to escape a present Anthropocene evident in its waste.

Here, domesticated goats are chosen precisely for their "wildness". Their needs are met between bathtubs repurposed as feeding troughs, nets made from old mattresses serving as enclosures, and open woods, unreachable rocks, and steep slopes. From the freedom granted to these animals to be "wild," the shepherd weaves a relationship with the grazing space never entirely controllable. However, work necessities do not prevent the shepherd from contemplating the mountain; a mountain appreciated both as a "home" and a "terrible place" where daily wonder disrupts the possibilities of control over the landscape, with aesthetic appreciation linked to a profound sense of freedom.

Within this framework, wildness becomes much more than an impossibility to domesticate, intertwining with issues related to identity, social and power relations, and labor. Acknowledging the cultural construction of the concept of the wild, I propose to delve deeper into the relationship between these categories, making room for contradictions that the relationship between shepherds and goats in Sardinia may bring to light.

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Paper short abstract:

Wild horses live free in the mountains of Galicia, but are owned and managed by local community members. This paper explores the political ecology and political ontology of horse-human relations within a context of severe rural land abandonment.

Paper long abstract:

For millennia, wild horses have lived in the mountains of Galicia, a northwestern region in Spain that is currently affected by severe depopulation and rural abandonment. Although these horses range free for most part of their lives, they are nonetheless owned, their number managed, and they are occasionally looked after by local villagers, named besteiros (which in Galician language means owners of beasts, a vernacular name for these animals). Ethnographic and discourse analysis reveal the inseparable link between the work of these people, the wild lifestyle of the horses and the political ecology of "clean" mountains and lands. Despite variegation in their modes of relation, as shown by the cases of the mounts of A Groba (southern Galicia) and O Xistral (northern Galicia) presented in this paper, there is a shared political rationale behind this particular form of horse-human-land entanglement. In A Groba, having "clean" mounts is synonymous with safety and low fire risk - one of the main environmental threats in southern Galicia. In O Xistral, having them "clean" is synonymous with the economic sustainability of small livestock farms. According to the experience of these people, what is clean, is alive, is habitable, has a future. Through our analysis we reveal that wild horses, rather than "animal-others", could be seen as a kind of extended family with which besteiros maintain a relationship of affinity and reciprocity. They would be part of a political ontology that struggles against depopulation and rural land abandonment.

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Paper short abstract:

Based on fieldwork conducted in Galicia between 2021 and 2023, this presentation comparatively addresses the question of the 'good life' for animals through two cases (a small rural village and an animal sanctuary), where the categories of the wild and the domestic play a central role.

Paper long abstract:

What is a 'good life' for an animal? How can a 'good life' be achieved and maintained? These questions are relevant not only for humans but also for animals. This presentation, based on fieldwork carried out between 2021 and 2023 in Galicia, north-western Spain, comparatively explores answers through two cases, where the categories of the wild and the domestic respectively have a prominent place.

On one hand, there is a small rural village called Sabucedo, where the ancient ritual of the Rapa das Bestas (Shaving the Beasts) takes place. In this ritual, horses are gathered once a year from the mountains and brought to the village for a few days to have their manes and tails cut, in addition to receiving medical care. This event attracts thousands of tourists every year. These horses are managed throughout the year by an association of locals, aiming to keep them autonomous and free in the mountains.

On the other hand, there is the animal sanctuary 'Vacaloura', located near Santiago de Compostela, one of the first experiences of its kind in Spain. Here, animals 'rescued' from the food, entertainment, and/or companionship industries find refuge. In the sanctuary, the animals are subjected to daily routines and continuous care, with the goal of them being protected for life within it.

The presentation analyzes the meaning of the mentioned categories, considering practices, the configuration of spatialities, and the frictions they provoke in each case. A central idea of the presentation is that the categories of the wild and the domestic, as 'productions,' remain relevant for thinking about the 'good life' of animals in the present day.

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This paper, part of a research program on human-macaque relationships in Ifrane National Park, Morocco, presents the diverse and complex representations of monkeys, between anthropomorphism and wildness, questioning the wild/domestic duality and showing the inter-twos in human-animal relations.

Paper long abstract:

This paper is part of an interdisciplinary research program called COHUMAG (Understanding the spatial reaction norms of humans and Barbary macaques to engineer new solutions for sustainable coexistence - Ecology, sociology and anthropology) that focuses on humans-macaques’ relationships in the national park of Ifrane in the Middle-Atlas in Morocco. Conflicts between humans and macaques have been increasing in this region for the past ten years. The program aims to analyse these situations and contribute to some possible solutions.

This paper will present a panorama of the diverse and complex perceptions and representations of monkeys within local populations. These representations are indeed a complex combination of anthropomorphism, forms of domestication and rejection of domestication, and idealization of the “wild monkey”. Monkeys can be perceived in various ways depending on the context and the people, and diverse representations can coexist in the same individuals, for example as a former human by divine punishment in the Muslim religion, as an idealize “wild animal” who should go back to wilderness (Cronon, 1996), as a pest when they damaged agriculture, as an economic domesticated attraction in tourism, etc. These representations allow us to interrogate the concept of wilderness and the duality wild/domestic showing various forms of inter-twos.

This paper will present this ongoing research interrogating the concepts of wilderness, and the wild/domestic duality in human-animal relationships, through the analyse of the complex and diverse representations of monkeys within the local population of Ifrane National Park in Morocco.

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Paper short abstract:

The paper shows the changing relations between humans and beavers in Polish national parks near rivers. The author will present how beavers became collaborators and allies in the renaturalization processes and unruly actors shaping the wetland landscape, taking into account their own agenda.

Paper long abstract:

The paper explores the dynamic shifts in human-beaver relations within Polish national parks near rivers. Drawing on ethnographic research and archive analysis, the author examines the multiplicity of beavers' social roles, from collaborators in renaturalization processes to unruly actors shaping the wetlands by their own agenda. Beavers also function as subjects of naturalist studies, prey and protected animals. Insight into these different positions offers starting point for a new perspective on wildlife as multinatural ecology of becomings (Lorimer, 2015).

Engaging with a rich anthropological tradition of discussing beavers' work dating back to the XIX century (Morgan, 1868), the paper addresses also questions about (un)doing categories of wilderness and domestication, nature and culture, instinct and creativity. In many anthropological works (Ingold, 1990; Feeley-Harnik, 2001; Ogden, 2018) and in Polish tradition, beavers are simultaneously symbols of untamed forces of nature and engineers, inventors, acting as liminal selves mediating between the wild and the tamed. This duality challenges naturalists' and anthropologists' categorizations, introducing a fascinating complexity to common and technoscientific knowledge.

The beavers can be seen as agents challenging traditional classifications and emphasizing the limitations of dominant anthropological models in the emergent Anthropocene landscape.

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Paper short abstract:

This paper explores what happens when we grasp Aedes Aegypti mosquitoes not as 'pest' or 'invasive' but as the companion species we deserve in the Anthropocene. Self-domesticating dengue mosquitos continually trouble Singapore's efforts to create wild futures of a 'City in Nature'.

Paper long abstract:

What might the tale of Aedes Aegypti mosquitoes self-domesticating themselves to urban Singaporean homes trouble notions of wild/domestic and the promise of biodiverse cities?

Following Aedes Aegypti’s more-than-human-histories we find that, as these once wild insects moved from East to West Africa in the 16th to 17th Century, they got caught up in the violence of the triangle trade, domesticating themselves along the way to human habitats and developing a thirst for human blood on slave ships. The mega project connecting two seas, the Suez Canal, then allowed them to hitch a ride to Asia, settling in most of the tropics at the turn of the 20th century. Yet, they only really began to proliferate in Singapore in 1960s, as a result of mass urbanisation and a warming climate. As the habitats of other species were wiped, much like rats, this highly anthropophilic species moved in, preferring people's homes. Thus, beyond labels of ‘pest’ and ‘invader’ Aedes Aegypti may well be the companion species we deserve in the Anthropocene, deeply interwoven with violent human activities.

And as Singapore strives to become a 'City in Nature', efforts to create a wilder more biodiversity city are constantly troubled by the persistent presence of these domestic mosquitoes and the suite of diseases they carry with them.

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Paper short abstract:

Domestic cats pose a biodiversity threat, triggering social conflicts. This paper examines the (de)humanisation of cats in Tenerife, exploring the terms used by key social groups that navigate the boundary between the domestic, the wild, and the feral in the cat-biodiversity debate

Paper long abstract:

Tenerife, renowned for its endemic biodiversity amid tourism-driven urbanism, grapples with the intricate dynamic between domesticity, wildness, and ferality epitomized by the ubiquitous presence of cats. This study delves into the nuances of cat-human relations on the island, examining the divergent perceptions of cats as either domestic companions or wild predators. Ethnographic research unveils viewpoints from key social groups—biologists, hunters, vets, and caretakers—under five classificatory parameters (biology and law, function, property, placement, and human bonding) shaping their perceptions. The paper contends that the varied terms used by these groups reflect different moral ecologies navigating through the domestic, the wild, and the feral in the pursuit of an idealized landscape in Tenerife. Despite a shared diagnosis and goal of addressing the overpopulation of free-roaming cats, conflicting parties differ in their approaches. Biologists define outdoor cats as an invasive alien species, as animals without history, out of place, dwelling in the wild nature. Cats are then conceived in terms of ferality and, hence, killability. Conversely, animal welfare associations claim that behind every single cat there is a story, a human being, framing them in terms of domesticity and care, and advocating for the Trap-Neuter-Return method under a sacrifice zero policy. The domestic/feral divide thus plays a pivotal role in the (de)humanisation of cats and in killing or taking care of them in the face of the threat they may pose to endemic species. Within this crux, when, where, and by whom a domestic cat is considered a feral animal?