Abstract
The encounter with the non-human animal is based on the act of seeing and being seen, since the animal is a “being-to-be-seen”. Alfred Russel Wallace marvels at the morphological beauty of the birds of paradise and their courting dance. He is especially astonished by the fact that these performances take place in dark and shady woods, “with no intelligent eye to gaze on their loveliness.” Anthropocentrically, Wallace cannot help feeling shocked in front of such a waste of beauty, thus expressing an echo of the humanistic principle, very popular in the Seventeenth century, for which the world is a huge theatre built for mankind. However, in the exhibition of its own form and in its specific rules, therianthropy finds its functional principle, which always also takes visibility into account.
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- 1.
A. Portman, Animal Forms and Patterns: A Study of the Appearance of Animals, Schocken Books 1967.
- 2.
Wallace as quoted in The Birds of Paradise: Alfred Russel Wallace: a Life by William Bryant, iUniverse, 2006, p. 139.
- 3.
Portmann calls them “visual structures.” See Portmann, Animal Forms and Patterns: A Study of the Appearance of Animals.
- 4.
For “biophilia” see glossary.
- 5.
The father of socio-biology Edward Wilson speaks of the aesthesic charm of the non-human animal, which he generally defines “biophilia”. According to the author, such feeling can adjust to the phylogenetic expectations of human beings. We are talking about an a priori aesthetics, which might seem to be a risky hypothesis: it amounts to affirming the existence of an innate perceptive Gestalt as well as a taste orientation preceding any experience of the subject. However, if we consider aesthetics to be one of the many forms of selection, it might seen as part of the context of key-signals. Therefore for Wilson, just like a key-signal, the animal form can please human senses arousing stupor and admiration. See E. Wilson, Biophilia, Harvard University Press; New Ed edition, 1990.
- 6.
For “synmortphy” see glossary.
- 7.
G. Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Jason Aronson Inc., Northvale, New Jersey, London, 1987. The English anthropologist affirms that play is a feature of all mammals, representing a relational experience predisposing a meta-communication where body movements allow to convey precise information. This is a very significant process as it enables the agents involved to exchange knowledge.
- 8.
Konrad Lorenz speaks of Kindchenschema (Baby Schema) to designate the series of neotenic morphological characters of mammals, such as big eyes, round face, pronounced forehead, chubby cheeks, able to arouse interspecific epimeletic instincts. See K. Lorenz, The Foundations of Ethology, Springer 1981.
- 9.
T. Nagel, What is it Like to be a Bat?
- 10.
For “speciesism” see glossary.
- 11.
Leonardo Caffo defines these forms of humanist speciesism “crypto-speciesisms”. L. Caffo, Il maiale non fa la rivoluzione. Manifesto per un antispecismo debole, Sonda, Casale Monferrato, 2013. The productivity of these forms within the twentieth century discussion of animality is undoubted. However, we cannot call animalism a real criticism to speciesism, as it rests on speciesisms (indeed, cryptospeciesisms) hidden by the liberating intent but still invalidating in terms of marginalization and deprivation of meaning.
- 12.
As I have underlined in Il concetto di soglia, Theoria, Roma, 1996, the human/non-human threshold is for humans an issue of hospitality. In that sense, Hestia is the goddess who hosts and asks to be hosted. If we analyse the Latin etymology of the concept of hospitality we’ll see that it comes from hospitium: such term designated an institutionalized pact between the leader of a community and the hospes (the host). It is in this light that we should look at non-human otherness: nor as mere tools at our disposal but as autonomous and subjective entities full of performative power. Such acknowledgmenet of the citizenship of non-human otherness is the first step to take towards a double decentrative hospitality: a form of welcoming while being welcomed by the other-with-ourselves.
- 13.
For “reification” see glossary.
- 14.
As suggested by von Uexküll’s concept of Umwelt or Niko Tinbergen’s concept of ethogram.
- 15.
Following Wittgenstein’s statement that: “What can be said at all can be said clearly; and whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent”. L. Wittgenstein, Tractatus logico-philosophicus, project Gutenberg 2010, p. 23.
- 16.
For “biocentrism” see the glossary.
- 17.
E. Wilson, Biophilia.
- 18.
C. Lévi-Strauss, Structural Anthropology, Basic Books, 1963.
- 19.
Such expression, proposed by Lévi-Strauss, can be ascribed to his studies on totems, where the animal catalogue has always been a preferential element (a sort of compass) to orientate through nature. Animals, in this reading, are very useful tools for the processes of human symbolization (to all effects, then, elements that are “good to think”) since with the plurality of their forms they offer a rich (potentially infinite) system of differentiation, that can activate a fruitful process of classification of reality and society.
- 20.
For “anthroposphere” see the glossary.
- 21.
R. Marchesini, K. Andersen , Animal Appeal. Uno studio sul teriomorfismo, Hybris, Bologna, 2003.
- 22.
Elsewhere I have defined this process as “zoothrophy” in the sense of a typical tendency of our species to “turn to other animals” and recognize them as social counterparts, as well as choose them in anthropopoietic processes. This word indicates a clear distancing from other non- or proto-zooanthropological explicative structures, i.e. not founded on a dialogic-referential role of the heterospecific being. The theory of zootrophy operates an important epistemological shift as it considers the heterospecific being interesting not as a stimulating element—be it for its phenomenic richness, for its role as an elicited response to many reasons, or for its identifying potentialities as living and recognizable being—but as an interlocutor with referentiality that can bring about new contents through dialogic action. R. Marchesini, S. Tonutti, Manuale di zooantropologia, Meltemi, Roma, 2007.
- 23.
P. Shepard, The Others. How Animals made us Human, Island Press/Shearwater Books, 1996.
- 24.
For “zoomorpheme” see glossary.
- 25.
Paul Shepard ascribes this tendency to the hunting nature of man, i.e. to the importance of seeing the animal as a potential prey. Personally, I am convinced of the contrary. Predators are oriented towards a moving target and can better detect the object when it’s in kinetic rather than static conditions. Proof shows the opposite: there’s a perceptive electivity of static forms immersed into a complex framework, such as for instance the need of a prey.
- 26.
For “syllegy” see glossary.
- 27.
Despite the fact that, historically, there have only been a few studies on this “taboo subject”, there are many ethnographic proofs of animal adoption in human communities. These phenomena, together with parental care such as nurturing, breastfeeding, and so on, represent an example of the overcoming of species-specific boundaries isolating humans from heterospecific beings. S. Tonutti , “Il maternage, fra attenzioni parentali e utilizzazione dell’animale”, in La Ricerca Folklorica, n. 60, Grafo, Brescia, 2009, pp. 30–36.
- 28.
J. Serpell, In the Company of Animals. A Study of Human-Animal Relationships, Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1988.
- 29.
J. Bowlby, Attachment. Attachment and Loss, New York: Basic Books, 1969.
- 30.
E. Visalberghi , Etologo. Osservare il comportamento degli animali, Zanichelli, Bologna, 2006.
- 31.
M. Jousse, Anthropologie Du Geste. Paris: Les Éditions Resma, 1969.
- 32.
That language has a mimetic nature—despite originating from a vocal interpretation—is clear in Merlin Donald’s proposal, however this thesis had already been stated by Charles Darwin in his theory of the three phases of language, according to which language incipit was using human voice to imitate the animal voice. Another author who underlines the mimetic nature of language is Steven Mithen , author of The Singing Neanderthals: The Origins of Music, Language, Mind and Body, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2005. According to Mithen, the first gestural and linguistic signs are to be found in the human tendency to mimic animals.
- 33.
In fact, if Jousse studies the mimetic tendency of children, Piaget analyses the primary role of echolalia in their communication.
- 34.
E. Pulcini, Invidia. La passione triste, Mulino, Bologna, 2011.
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Marchesini, R. (2017). The Therianthropic Being as Our Neighbour. In: Over the Human. Numanities - Arts and Humanities in Progress, vol 4. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62581-2_3
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