Valuing Wildness in Animals: Migratory Birds

This was the second of a series of six workshops intended to foster an interdisciplinary investigation of the following question: ‘How is wildness in animals valued?’ As an inherently contested concept, wildness provides a particularly useful basis for considering the biological, topological, spatial, cultural, moral, and economic relationships between human and non-human animals. Each workshop in the series will focus on a different species, each raising a range of issues relevant to our general topic.

Prof. Jane Spencer (Department of English) and Prof. Stephen Hinchliffe (Department of Geography) talked at this second workshop on the issues raised by a consideration of swallows, martins, cranes, and Great Bustards: the necessity for a globalization of conservation methods, especially when such methods are impeded by cultural clashes (such as the shooting and eating of migratory birds passing through Malta); the threat of disease that cannot be controlled (such as avian flu); and the re-introduction of regionally extinct species. The papers were preceded by tea, coffee and cake and followed by discussion.

Steve Hinchliffe's Slides can be downloaded here.

The ‘Valuing Wildness in Animlals' project is funded through the Bridging the Gaps development fund. Details of our first seminar on 27/10/11: Elephants are available, including a copy of Dr Jamie Lorimer (KCL)'s slides.

 For more information about this project, please contact the project lead, Karen Edwards