The anthropology of citizenship has sought to understand citizenship beyond formal-legal definitions, including a focus on how those who are legally without citizenship rights also engage in... Show moreThe anthropology of citizenship has sought to understand citizenship beyond formal-legal definitions, including a focus on how those who are legally without citizenship rights also engage in everyday acts of political claims-making. While this emphasis on the enactment of citizenship has expanded our understanding of who counts as a political being, it has also been obviously human centered. Might we also understand animals’ acts, their presence and movements, as having the potential to constitute political constituents? This article develops a more-than-human perspective on political claims-making by connecting insights from human-animal studies to the anthropology of citizenship. We draw on research on rats in Amsterdam to propose an understanding of these animals’ interventions in the urban built environment as more-than-human “acts of denizenship.” Focusing on different forms of rat behavior, we analyze rats’ mundane interactions and relations with the city's residents, infrastructure, and other animals as forms of claims-making. We see the behavior as efforts that are partially recognized by humans and that, as such, can be understood as enacting a relation of denizenship. Such attention to how rats act in and on urban space, we suggest, can help us conceptualize political agency and the formation of political belonging in ways that extend beyond the human. Show less
My dissertation examines the sociocultural underpinnings of name-giving by speakers of Semitic languages, focusing on the component of the onomasticon derived from animal names. The study deals... Show moreMy dissertation examines the sociocultural underpinnings of name-giving by speakers of Semitic languages, focusing on the component of the onomasticon derived from animal names. The study deals with three language groups: (1) Akkadian, (2) Northwest Semitic (i.e., Amorite, Hebrew, Ugaritic, Aramaic, and Phoenician), and (3) Arabic (classical and modern sources). The main findings of this study can be summarized as follows: (1) The occurrence of animal names in every corpus points to a common Semitic background imbued with metaphoric, affective, and apotropaic aspects. There is, however, no evidence for totemism. (2) Whereas names of herbivorous animals (wild and domestic) are found in every language examined, names of venomous animals, predators, and raptors are much more attested in West Semitic, especially Arabic, than in Akkadian, and this is apparently related to the symbolic nature of names within the social ideology of a society. (3) The survival of animal names in modern Arabic practices, specifically among nomads, points to an adherence to ‘pre-Islamic’ naming methods vis-à-vis normative Islamic views. These findings contribute to the discussion about naming in general and in the context of Semitic linguistic in particular. Show less
This thesis aims at thinking through the ethical position of animals in a way that differs radically from the manner in wich this ethical position is thought within contemporary animal rights... Show moreThis thesis aims at thinking through the ethical position of animals in a way that differs radically from the manner in wich this ethical position is thought within contemporary animal rights discourse. The reason for this alternative approach is that today's animal rights discourse is characterized by a polemic on demarcation that seems both irresolvable and scientifically unwarranted for being centred on a necessarily arbitrary demarcation between the human and the animal.This cannot but lead to irresponsible demarcation decisions, which implies we must imagine other ways of thinking through the question of the animal. In my research I propose to do this by looking at how language operates within demarcation decisions between humans and animals, both in the legal, literary and popular domain. More specifically, this study demonstrates that the study of tropes in literary texts may enable us to work out modes of identification with animals other than those we typically encounter in the legal and public sphere and,hence, can help us to get beyond the issues of cruelty and consiousness that dominate contemporary animal rights debate as a result of its excessively tight focus on demarcation. Show less
Arens, R.; Hall, T. van; Burg, S.H. van der; Ossendorp, F.; Melief, C.J.M. 2013
Tropical forestry in Indonesia is facing challenges in terms of sustainability and the survival of its inhabitant, indigenous people, not least because the perception of policymakers is that, since... Show moreTropical forestry in Indonesia is facing challenges in terms of sustainability and the survival of its inhabitant, indigenous people, not least because the perception of policymakers is that, since the 1970s, forests have provided a major solution to economic development by producing timber, conversion forest land for agriculture, mining, and other non-forest land use. Consequently, the forest and its resources have been undervalued and its monetary potential has been underestimated. This has led to overexploitation and conversion, which ultimately results in the loss of biodiversity and threatens the survival of indigenous people. This study, conducted in a small forest protection area in Gunung Lumut in the Pasir District of East Kalimantan, focuses on the poor indigenous people in this region and reveals the crucial role that the forest plays in both the economic and non-economic dimensions of the lives of the indigenous people of Paser. Indeed, the forest contributes to the Paser household economy in almost all aspects of life. Forests are so much more than trees and timber, and the Gunung Lumut protection forest goes far beyond providing food and materials for construction. It is the backdrop for the Paser people’s spirits and cosmovision. This study suggests that conversion or other land use options for forest land should begin with an evaluation process, in order to reveal the ‘true’ value of the forest – economically and environmentally – for the livelihoods of indigenous people. These values must be part of the toolkit for developing policies for land and forest use. In addition, such an evaluation process boosts the negotiating capacity of the indigenous people to prevent further losses from forest conversion. This study shows that monetary valuation also benefits forest management by preventing unnecessary conversion of forest land and further loss of biodiversity in tropical forests. It provides indigenous people with a bargaining tool in the context of compensation for the loss of their resources. Show less
