Papers by Silvia Mutterle
Hypothesis: the Highly Sensitive Personhood in both humans and other animals could be the missing... more Hypothesis: the Highly Sensitive Personhood in both humans and other animals could be the missing interspecies communication link because of a similar sophisticated neurological system and a complementary heightened common trait. Abstract: In an emerging post-humanist turn (Braidotti, 2009) where science is being challenged to widen its horizons over a more holistic perspective, embracing interdisciplinary methods of research (Bekoff, 2001) the patriarchal legacy that has mostly valued detached reasoning over emotions is making space for a more embodied mode of knowing (Warkentin, 2010) with a renewed valorisation of emotions (Hamington, 2008). Other-animals' vision of the world filtered through the experience and elaboration of a savant autistic in the person of Dr Grandin, has already allowed humans to gain a rare perspective on other-animals' perception of reality. The possibility analysed in this essay is that both the human and other animal Highly Sensitive Personhood (Aron, 1997) can be an effective tool in moving beyond the sole observation by establishing a mutual communication that is not only an anthropomorphic perception of the unfamiliar other but a more scientifically based insight into the other's cognitive and emotional world.
Over the past century, animal healing, channelled and mediated in the past by the longitudinally ... more Over the past century, animal healing, channelled and mediated in the past by the longitudinally found figure of the shaman (Winkelman, 2002), has manifested in a very different form through the modern medical practice of Animal Assisted Interventions, from here onwards referred to as AAI. However, evidence-based official medicine has relegated AAI to the role of complementary medicine, arguing that more effective results have been recognized in the ownership of pets, especially dogs and cats (Friedmann, Son and Tsai, 2006). The purpose of this dissertation is to analyse the impact of other animal species often underestimated in AAI and to contemplate the possibility of employing birds of prey because of their unique entanglement with humans testified throughout the history of falconry practice. Falconry refers to hunting of wild quarry by utilizing hawks and falcons purposely trained through a lengthy process, which becomes transforming and moulding for both the falconer and the falcon, as elaborated by Schroer (2015). The human–hawk co-evolution is expressed in Schroer’s concept of ‘beings-in-the-making’ (2015; p. 270) and is supported and fostered by the author’s auto-ethnographic experience of having been entangled with hawks for the past 10 years. 1 The ephemeral or even aerial entanglement of co-responsive mutual-making between human and hawk very much resonates with the post-humanist movement and Haraway’s definition of ‘significant otherness’ (2003, p.8), entangled with humans in ‘ontological choreographies’ (Thompson, 2003 p. 8) of co-shaping and consequent co-education.
GREENING THE PARANORMAL, 2019
Healing and transformation with the Wild Earth Animal Essences
Sulle tracce dei nostri avi non umani ANIMAL STUDIES Rivista italiana di antispecismo trimestrale... more Sulle tracce dei nostri avi non umani ANIMAL STUDIES Rivista italiana di antispecismo trimestrale 18 -Animali totem. Sulle tracce dei nostri avi non umani numero a cura di Roberto Marchesini Direttore responsabile ed editoriale
Hypothesis: the Highly Sensitive Personhood in both humans and other animals could be the missing... more Hypothesis: the Highly Sensitive Personhood in both humans and other animals could be the missing interspecies communication link because of a similar sophisticated neurological system and a complementary heightened common trait. Abstract: In an emerging post-humanist turn (Braidotti, 2009) where science is being challenged to widen its horizons over a more holistic perspective, embracing interdisciplinary methods of research (Bekoff, 2001) the patriarchal legacy that has mostly valued detached reasoning over emotions is making space for a more embodied mode of knowing (Warkentin, 2010) with a renewed valorisation of emotions (Hamington, 2008). Other-animals' vision of the world filtered through the experience and elaboration of a savant autistic in the person of Dr Grandin, has already allowed humans to gain a rare perspective on other-animals' perception of reality. The possibility analysed in this essay is that both the human and other animal Highly Sensitive Personhood (Aron, 1997) can be an effective tool in moving beyond the sole observation by establishing a mutual communication that is not only an anthropomorphic perception of the unfamiliar other but a more scientifically based insight into the other's cognitive and emotional world.
The human-animal rapport has been a very genuine, honest and instinctive one in early human commu... more The human-animal rapport has been a very genuine, honest and instinctive one in early human communities and in most indigenous societies (Grim, 2006;Serpell 2006; Hobgood-Oster, 2007) as much as it has evolved into a very complicated and problematic one with the growing and transforming of human culture into capitalistic industrialized societies, and this evolution has been represented and narrated in mythology and religious writings throughout human history.
“The narrative thought”, in Carrithers’s terms, “consists not merely in telling stories, but of understanding complex nets of deeds and attitudes” (Carrithers, 1990 p.189) and the expression of moral and religious dogmas through language has had a crucial role in the human cognitive and emotional approach and relation to other animals throughout human history and spirituality.
In this paper we intend to explore the role of semantics, in particular logical semantics, especially concerned with the presupposition and implication of language, as an important and sometimes crucial agent in the determination of the animal moral status in human society.
In particular we would like to analyse the dichotomy created by the use of the term animal versus the term beast and how we believe it could be indiscriminately applied to both humans and other animals, from a religious and moral point of view
Over the past century, animal healing, channelled and mediated in the past by the longitudinally ... more Over the past century, animal healing, channelled and mediated in the past by the longitudinally found figure of the shaman (Winkelman, 2002), has manifested in a very different form through the modern medical practice of Animal Assisted Interventions, from here onwards referred to as AAI.
However, evidence-based official medicine has relegated AAI to the role of complementary medicine, arguing that more effective results have been recognized in the ownership of pets, especially dogs and cats (Friedmann, Son and Tsai, 2006).
The purpose of this dissertation is to analyse the impact of other animal species often underestimated in AAI and to contemplate the possibility of employing birds of prey because of their unique entanglement with humans testified throughout the history of falconry practice.
Falconry refers to hunting of wild quarry by utilizing hawks and falcons purposely trained through a lengthy process, which becomes transforming and moulding for both the falconer and the falcon, as elaborated by Schroer (2015).
The human–hawk co-evolution is expressed in Schroer’s concept of ‘beings-in-the-making’ (2015; p. 270) and is supported and fostered by the author’s auto-ethnographic experience of having been entangled with hawks for the past 10 years. 1
The ephemeral or even aerial entanglement of co-responsive mutual-making between human and hawk very much resonates with the post-humanist movement and Haraway’s definition of ‘significant otherness’ (2003, p.8), entangled with humans in ‘ontological choreographies’ (Thompson, 2003 p. 8) of co-shaping and consequent co-education.
The purpose of this essay is to explore histories of extinction that human activity is forcefully... more The purpose of this essay is to explore histories of extinction that human activity is forcefully imposing on the planet and on all the other animals inhabiting it with equal rights to survival. The start of the era that has been defined as Antropocene (Crutzen and Steffen 2003; Boes and Marshall, 2014) sees humans, as never before in the history of the planet, as extremely active agents, who can potentially rescue and protect other life forms as much as wipe them off the face of the earth, as advocated by Kirksey and Helmreich. (2010)
The histories we are interested in are symbolic flight ways, as elaborated by Van Dooren, (2014) but with a special attention to birds that embody a very strong symbolism of respectively freedom and power and therefore evoke strong feelings and emotions in the human counterpart, with controversial and opposing reactions in different cultures.
On one hand the California condor (Gymnogyps californianus), cultural icon of freedom and the American wilderness, that risked extinction in the early 20thcentury, was later rescued through a captive breeding program and reintroduced in its natural environment in the 1980s.
A parallel story of endangerment and risk of extinction is that of the Bonelli’s eagle (Hieraaetus fasciatus) a relatively small size eagle species dwelling across the Mediterranean basin, which, together with the peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus) and numerous other migratory bird species, is the helpless victim of a trophy hunting and poaching culture evenly distributed throughout the Mediterranean countries of northern Africa and southern Italy.
We intend to analyse how human culture can be the driving agent in preserving and actually rescuing a species or in contributing to its extinction and what might be the relevance of the species symbolic meaning and representation in the proactive effort of rescuing certain species over others.
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Papers by Silvia Mutterle
“The narrative thought”, in Carrithers’s terms, “consists not merely in telling stories, but of understanding complex nets of deeds and attitudes” (Carrithers, 1990 p.189) and the expression of moral and religious dogmas through language has had a crucial role in the human cognitive and emotional approach and relation to other animals throughout human history and spirituality.
In this paper we intend to explore the role of semantics, in particular logical semantics, especially concerned with the presupposition and implication of language, as an important and sometimes crucial agent in the determination of the animal moral status in human society.
In particular we would like to analyse the dichotomy created by the use of the term animal versus the term beast and how we believe it could be indiscriminately applied to both humans and other animals, from a religious and moral point of view
However, evidence-based official medicine has relegated AAI to the role of complementary medicine, arguing that more effective results have been recognized in the ownership of pets, especially dogs and cats (Friedmann, Son and Tsai, 2006).
The purpose of this dissertation is to analyse the impact of other animal species often underestimated in AAI and to contemplate the possibility of employing birds of prey because of their unique entanglement with humans testified throughout the history of falconry practice.
Falconry refers to hunting of wild quarry by utilizing hawks and falcons purposely trained through a lengthy process, which becomes transforming and moulding for both the falconer and the falcon, as elaborated by Schroer (2015).
The human–hawk co-evolution is expressed in Schroer’s concept of ‘beings-in-the-making’ (2015; p. 270) and is supported and fostered by the author’s auto-ethnographic experience of having been entangled with hawks for the past 10 years. 1
The ephemeral or even aerial entanglement of co-responsive mutual-making between human and hawk very much resonates with the post-humanist movement and Haraway’s definition of ‘significant otherness’ (2003, p.8), entangled with humans in ‘ontological choreographies’ (Thompson, 2003 p. 8) of co-shaping and consequent co-education.
The histories we are interested in are symbolic flight ways, as elaborated by Van Dooren, (2014) but with a special attention to birds that embody a very strong symbolism of respectively freedom and power and therefore evoke strong feelings and emotions in the human counterpart, with controversial and opposing reactions in different cultures.
On one hand the California condor (Gymnogyps californianus), cultural icon of freedom and the American wilderness, that risked extinction in the early 20thcentury, was later rescued through a captive breeding program and reintroduced in its natural environment in the 1980s.
A parallel story of endangerment and risk of extinction is that of the Bonelli’s eagle (Hieraaetus fasciatus) a relatively small size eagle species dwelling across the Mediterranean basin, which, together with the peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus) and numerous other migratory bird species, is the helpless victim of a trophy hunting and poaching culture evenly distributed throughout the Mediterranean countries of northern Africa and southern Italy.
We intend to analyse how human culture can be the driving agent in preserving and actually rescuing a species or in contributing to its extinction and what might be the relevance of the species symbolic meaning and representation in the proactive effort of rescuing certain species over others.
“The narrative thought”, in Carrithers’s terms, “consists not merely in telling stories, but of understanding complex nets of deeds and attitudes” (Carrithers, 1990 p.189) and the expression of moral and religious dogmas through language has had a crucial role in the human cognitive and emotional approach and relation to other animals throughout human history and spirituality.
In this paper we intend to explore the role of semantics, in particular logical semantics, especially concerned with the presupposition and implication of language, as an important and sometimes crucial agent in the determination of the animal moral status in human society.
In particular we would like to analyse the dichotomy created by the use of the term animal versus the term beast and how we believe it could be indiscriminately applied to both humans and other animals, from a religious and moral point of view
However, evidence-based official medicine has relegated AAI to the role of complementary medicine, arguing that more effective results have been recognized in the ownership of pets, especially dogs and cats (Friedmann, Son and Tsai, 2006).
The purpose of this dissertation is to analyse the impact of other animal species often underestimated in AAI and to contemplate the possibility of employing birds of prey because of their unique entanglement with humans testified throughout the history of falconry practice.
Falconry refers to hunting of wild quarry by utilizing hawks and falcons purposely trained through a lengthy process, which becomes transforming and moulding for both the falconer and the falcon, as elaborated by Schroer (2015).
The human–hawk co-evolution is expressed in Schroer’s concept of ‘beings-in-the-making’ (2015; p. 270) and is supported and fostered by the author’s auto-ethnographic experience of having been entangled with hawks for the past 10 years. 1
The ephemeral or even aerial entanglement of co-responsive mutual-making between human and hawk very much resonates with the post-humanist movement and Haraway’s definition of ‘significant otherness’ (2003, p.8), entangled with humans in ‘ontological choreographies’ (Thompson, 2003 p. 8) of co-shaping and consequent co-education.
The histories we are interested in are symbolic flight ways, as elaborated by Van Dooren, (2014) but with a special attention to birds that embody a very strong symbolism of respectively freedom and power and therefore evoke strong feelings and emotions in the human counterpart, with controversial and opposing reactions in different cultures.
On one hand the California condor (Gymnogyps californianus), cultural icon of freedom and the American wilderness, that risked extinction in the early 20thcentury, was later rescued through a captive breeding program and reintroduced in its natural environment in the 1980s.
A parallel story of endangerment and risk of extinction is that of the Bonelli’s eagle (Hieraaetus fasciatus) a relatively small size eagle species dwelling across the Mediterranean basin, which, together with the peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus) and numerous other migratory bird species, is the helpless victim of a trophy hunting and poaching culture evenly distributed throughout the Mediterranean countries of northern Africa and southern Italy.
We intend to analyse how human culture can be the driving agent in preserving and actually rescuing a species or in contributing to its extinction and what might be the relevance of the species symbolic meaning and representation in the proactive effort of rescuing certain species over others.