Tag: Human-Animal relations
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Cities – Far Away from Nature?
Global populations continue to urbanise at an unprecedented rate, with cities expanding into huge concentrations of concrete, steel, and glass, raising sustainability concerns. I’ve attempted to explore this issue from the standpoint of urban ecology, an interdisciplinary branch of study that looks at the complex interactions between the built environment of cities and non-human species.
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Out of Place and Out of Space – Translocation and the Urban Monkey
Aditi Dhillon This year, in June 2021, the Karnataka High Court passed a judgement according to which monkeys entering residential spaces were to be translocated and moved to their natural habitat by the state. This judgement, however, was not one of its kind. It was, in fact, along the lines of a judgement passed by…
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Disciplining Non-human Bodies in the City
Aditi Dhillon & Ajay Immanuel Gonji In his seminal essay Why Look at Animals? John Berger (2009) talks about how, in the past, people kept domestic animals because they were useful to them – as guard dogs, hunting dogs, mice-killing cats, and so on. Later, people began to keep animals regardless of their usefulness, a…
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Life in the Fastlane: Roadkill in the Anthropocene
Ajay Immanuel Gonji My first close encounter with roadkill was during fieldwork for my Master’s internship, way back in 2013. I remember seeing the bloated body of a large male nilgai, fully intact, on the footpath of the Aruna Asaf Ali Marg – a 6-lane highway bifurcating the Sanjay Van city forest and the Jawaharlal…
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The Digital Ecologies of Animal Display
Kartik Chugh The lockdown induced by the coronavirus pandemic witnessed a rather fascinating development in which wildlife cams gained unprecedented popularity. Millions of viewers tuned into the live streams of nest-cams, bird-cams, and crittercams to watch the compelling drama of animal life unfold. Zoos and aquariums also broadcasted live shows to keep the viewers gripped.…
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More-than-human Cities: On Urban Design and Nonhuman Agency
Kartik Chugh The modern cities are usually imagined as purified spaces of human existence, a humanist citadel, constructed by humans and for humans alone. The rapid urbanization fueled by capitalist development project proceeds without any regard for nonhumans. In its classical sense, urbanization transforms empty, unproductive wastelands into improved lands through a process called development…
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Animal Geographies II: A Geographical Perspective
Kartik Chugh In my previous article, I provided a brief introduction to the distinct, lively, and innovative field of Animal Geography. I portrayed how new considerations about how we imagine animals in modern society emerge when we shift the focus towards animals and think of them as subjective participants and active agents who play an…
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Animal Geographies I: A brief overview
Kartik Chugh “Coronavirus: Industrial animal farming has caused most new infectious diseases and risks more pandemics, experts warn.” – The Independent (May 2020) “From Hamsters to Baboons: The Animals Helping Scientists Understand the Coronavirus.” – Scientific American (May 2020) “The wild animals at risk in lockdown” BBC (May 2020) These three recent headlines show some…
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Entangled Spaces: Lime Swallowtail in my Urban Garden
Kartik Chugh Spending almost all the time at home in the past month and a half, I’ve learned to appreciate my surroundings better. I’m finding little joys in watching birds landing on my terrace to quench their thirst, a troop of macaques negotiating the urban infrastructure, and occasional butterflies that stop by my urban garden.…
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Animal Capital in the Automobile Industry
Kartik Chugh Introduction As the world is taking a break from its usual routine, many of us have found interesting ways to utilize our time. Of late, I have developed a keen interest in advertisements. In my free time, I’ve scrolled through hundreds of commercials in an attempt to understand how they communicate a product…