Representing Animals

Tag: Alice Walker

Disney’s Earth

November 4, 2014 / / 3 Comments

This video is a trailer for Disney’s movie Earth. The video begins by acknowledging the similarities between us and animals, because we both inhabit the same planet. This beginning made me feel like this video was trying to demonstrate the spiritual oneness that Alice Walker mentions in “Am I Blue?” when she states “People…daily forget, all that animals try to tell us. ‘Everything you do to us will happen to you; we are your teachers, as you are ours. We are one lesson’ ” (186).

This trailer shows various wild animals including polar bears, whales, and penguins in their natural habitats. Although there are also adult animals shown, many of the animals shown are babies. Humans are drawn to baby animals because they are cute and Disney is capitalizing on that natural appreciation for young animals. No humans are depicted in the video, although there is a human narrator. The human narrator has an objective voice and seems to be removed from the animals. There is very little text in this video and the text that is present states “Join three families on an amazing journey” which implies an interaction between the audience member and the animals. This contradicts the fact that the narrator seems  to be trying to capture the behaviors of animals without interacting with them. This reflects the oxymoronic nature of the phrase the “activity of spectatorship” (Malamud 220). By participating in spectatorship, the viewer wants to develop a relationship with the animals without disturbing them by interacting with them. However, trying to create this relationship is futile because “one cannot enter into any relationship with [an animal] which is mutual, reciprocal, or symmetrical, insofar and so long as one treats it voyeuristically” (Malamud 230). No real interaction exists between the audience of the movie and these wild animals. Rarely, if ever, are the animals shown looking into the camera which is an example of the way that “animals deflate the human gaze we conceive as so puissant, by cutting us in return – refusing to dignify or acknowledge our self-important ritual of looking” (Malamud 222).

The music in this trailer consists of two songs. The first song is fast-paced and sounds like the type of music that you would expect to find in an action movie whereas the second song is slower, more melodious, and sounds heartwarming. These two songs appeal to the audience in two different ways. The first song serves the purpose of generating excitement. In this trailer, the animals are always shown doing something that would be exciting to watch. Sharks jump out of the water to feed, elephants are running in herds, and some young animals are taking their first steps.  In the natural world, the animals may be more commonly found sleeping, relaxing, or otherwise remaining in one place. However, if animals were documented as they actually were instead of only including the most exciting parts of their lives then profits for the movie would decrease because no one would have the patience to watch an inactive animal. Most would get bored watching an animal behave the way it normally would. Due to the fact that humans want instant gratification and thus want to see the animals immediately do something compelling, the process of selectively choosing the most thrilling nature footage is what makes nature documentaries so successful. The fast-paced music accentuates the action-packed footage in order to create a distortion of reality. This editing process perpetuates “an imperial relation toward the realm of nature, and its subordination to our whims” (Malamud 228). The heartwarming song encourages viewers to empathize with the animals and to reflect on the spiritual oneness mentioned in the beginning of the trailer.

Although nature documentaries like Disney’s Earth distort reality due to the “neat editing, the musical background, the contextualizing ‘nature’ voice with its cultural biases, and the artificial concentration of action” (Malamud 234), they offer a “greater potential for people to understand how animals really exist” than most other alternatives (Malamud 234). By recognizing the oneness between humans and animals and trying to interfere in the animals’ environments and lives as little as possible, Earth advocates animal welfare and the appreciation of the intrinsic value of animals. I agree with Malamud in his essay “Zoo Spectatorship” when he states that “the benefits [of nature documentaries] outweigh the drawbacks” (234).

 

References:

Kalof, Linda, and Amy J. Fitzgerald. “Zoo Spectatorship.” The Animals Reader: The Essential Classic and Contemporary Writings. Oxford: Berg, 2007. 219-36. Print.

Nudoggy. “Earth-Official Movie Trailer [HD].” Online Video Clip. YouTube. YouTube, 31 Mar. 2009. Web. 3 Nov. 2014.

Walker, Alice. “Am I Blue?” Other Nations: Animals in Modern Literature. By Tom Regan and Andrew Linzey. Waco, TX: Baylor UP, 2010. 182-87. Print.

Happy Cow?

October 5, 2014 / / 0 Comments

sourcreamThis sour cream container has a picture of a cow grazing on it. The cow is not being anthropomorphized in any way. The cow appears to be healthy and eating fresh grass. This picture makes it seem like the cow used to make the sour cream was given plenty of grass to eat and exercise. The terms “Great Value” and “fat free” also appear on the container.

I had previously not thought about or even noticed this image on my sour cream before. However, after reading Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer I have begun to see its significance. This image is being used to manipulate the consumer in order to increase market sales. The field of  grass in this image extends around the whole container in order for the consumer to imagine that a free-range cow is being used to create this product. According to Foer, “the free-range label is bullshit” (61). The reason that this image would increase market sales is because, as Foer notes, most humans like to imagine that they are eating a “happy” cow due to the fact that most consumers care are ethical and have respect for the animals that they consume. Unfortunately, due to images like the one shown above, they are misinformed.  The most access to the outdoors and large green fields that the majority of the cows used to make sour cream get is through a window. Although we would like to think that the cow that aided in the production of the sour cream that ended up on our plates was given access to plenty of food and light, as the cow that is depicted in the picture above is, the truth is that “factory farms commonly manipulate food and light to increase productivity, often at the expense of the animals’ welfare” (Foer 59). The “Great Value” being indicated on this sour cream container points to the low cost of sour cream. However, this low cost is due to increased productivity caused by industrialized farming which Foer would argue is not a great value at all. The term “fat free” is on the container for marketing purposes because many Americans are concerned with becoming overweight.  There is a higher obesity rate in America now than ever before due to increased consumption of animal products, which tend to be full of fat. The increase in demand for fat-free foods, like the one shown in the image above, has paralleled the obesity rate. Although this container says that the sour cream is fat free, that does not mean the sour cream suddenly becomes healthy. Instead, the fat often replaced by other substances, such as artificial trans-fats, in order to make the food taste good. These synthetic trans-fats are often more unhealthy than the natural fats that the animal product possesses. Even though this kind of food is unhealthy, it is still produced because our demand for animal food products has “created a food industry whose primary concern isn’t feeding people” (Foer 209). Instead, its primary concern is making as much profit as possible even if it means sacrificing human and animal health.

The reason factory farms do not prioritize animal welfare is because they value animals only in an instrumental sense and not intrinsically. They want as much product as possible for as cheap as possible so that they can increase their profits. In his essay “Why Look at Animals?” John Berger argues that capitalism and the Industrial Revolution are to be blamed for “animals required for food [being] processed like manufactured commodities” (Berger 13).

Treating farm animals well is important because the health of what we eat directly impacts our own health. For example, the epizootic “mad cow disease” was caused by feeding meat and bone meal (MBM) to naturally herbivorous cattle. This disease was spread to humans via the ingestion of products coming from infected cows. Alice Walker comments on this human-animal connection in “Am I Blue?” when she talks about “forgetting”:  “People…daily forget, all that animals try to tell us. ‘Everything you do to us will happen to you; we are your teachers, as you are ours. We are one lesson’ ” ( Walker 186).  This is why it is important for the public to be informed of the truth about what we put into our mouths. However, truly free-range cattle would decrease profits for many food production companies so they are using images like the one above to trick consumers into thinking they are consuming a product from a free-range cow.

References:

Berger, John. “Why Look at Animals?” About Looking. New York: Pantheon, 1980. 3-28. Print.

“BSE: Disease control & eradication – Causes of BSE”.Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs. July 2009.

Foer, Jonathan Safran. Eating Animals. New York: Little, Brown, 2009. Print.

“The Truth about Low-fat Foods.” BBC Good Food. BBC, n.d. Web. 03 Oct. 2014.

Walker, Alice. “Am I Blue?” Other Nations: Animals in Modern Literature. By Tom Regan and Andrew Linzey. Waco, TX: Baylor UP, 2010. 182-87. Print.

 

 

Punishing animal cruelty

October 2, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Here’s an interesting piece from Monday’s NYT which provides an overview of some recent debates about appropriate punishment for animal cruelty.  Laws against animal cruelty vary widely, and perpetrators tend not to receive very serious sentences.  (Michael Vick is a good example–he wasn’t charged with animal cruelty, but instead with running an illegal dog fighting operation.  You can read more about the specific charges here.)

As I read this article, I was struck in particular by this image of the cat, looking straight at the viewer.  This is a portrait of an individual, and therefore harder for us to see as a “stray cat,” or as Alice Walker might say as “just an animal.”

Screen shot 2014-09-30 at 12.27.25 PM

Sources for this post

Clifford, Stephanie.  “He Kicked a Stray Cat and Activists Growled.”  NYT.  9/20/14.  Print

Nonhuman Rights Project.  Website.

Walker, Alice.  “Am I Blue?” Tom Regan and Andrew Linzey, eds.  Other Nations:  Animals in Modern Literature. Baylor UP, 2010.

 

 

No Longer Man’s Best Friend

September 15, 2014 / / 0 Comments

The Far Side

Although my time in class has not dramatically affected my attitudes and views regarding human-animal relationships, it has encouraged me to put much more time and effort into thinking about and analyzing the source of these views and their underlying components. When I came across a Far Side comic drawn by cartoonist Gary Larson, I found myself searching for details that would tell me more about what Larson was attempting to say about human-animal relationships.

The comic depicts a domestic scene with a couple eating dinner in their living room and the family dog on the floor nearby. The dog is highly anthropomorphized, standing upright on two legs and wearing an angry expression that would be more at home on a human face than a canine one. The dog is wielding a revolver pistol and aiming it directly at his owner, and the caption reads, “’Hey, bucko…I’m through begging.’” Although they are being held up by their dog over food, neither human in the image appears at all concerned. The man looks at the dog with a blank expression and his mouth full of food, while his wife seated opposite him doesn’t even give the dog any heed.

Before joining this class, I would have found the image moderately amusing and moved on to other ventures. However, now that I have spent time in class thinking in much more depth about human-animal relationships, this seems to be an exaggerated example of the impact that exploitation at the hands of humans can have on animal psyche. The dog is clearly fed up with his low-ranking position in the household and his use as a novelty as a pet. Blue, the horse in Alice Walker’s Am I Blue?, experiences the same feelings as he is left alone in his field until he is wanted for human purposes, be them riding or breeding. Even when under these circumstances, Blue is treated as an object and not as a living being since the children who ride him, “ride furiously for ten or fifteen minutes, then get off, slap Blue on the flanks, and not be seen again for a month or more.” His mate is also taken away immediately after he impregnates her, hammering home the point that Blue is simply seen as a tool by his owners. Like Gary Larson’s dog, Blue also becomes fed up with this and snaps after his mate is removed, wearing, “the look of disgust with human beings, with life; the look of hatred.” Both the Far Side comic and Am I Blue? Are making the point that when their intrinsic value is ignored in favor of their instrumental value, irreversibile damage is done to the human-animal relationship.

 

Sources for the Post:

http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/f3/e6/f8/f3e6f810211343108914aa115b1c37b4.jpg

 

Regan, Tom, and Alice Walker. “Am I Blue?” Other Nations: Animals in Modern Literature. Waco, Tex.: Baylor UP, 2010. 182-187. Print.

Horse Riding

September 13, 2014 / / 0 Comments

horseriding After reading Berger and Walker, I have begun to think of holding a horse in captivity for recreational purposes in a different light. The image that I have selected, shown above, depicts a competitive rider forcing a horse to jump over an obstacle. This image comes from the Chestnut Hill Farm website which is a farm that offers equestrian lessons. It appears that the horse is her property and that the rider is the slave-owner whereas the horse is her slave. This image glorifies the sport of competitive riding. The assumption is that the purpose of the horse is for the control of the rider. The better control the rider has of the horse, the more successful the rider is considered.  After reading Walker’s essay, I noticed the firm grip that this woman has on the reins of the horse. That is not something that I would have noticed before and I wonder if it is an indicator of the power struggle between her and the horse.

I found Walker’s analogy between animal captivity and historical slavery interesting and wondered how it could apply to this image.  After reading Walker’s work, when I look at this picture I think about what the horse may be feeling or what may be going through the horse’s mind. Previously, I would not have focused on the horse or even thought how the horse may be emotionally affected by being held captive for the purpose of being ridden. After reading Berger and Walker, I find myself viewing this image from the animal’s point of view which has raised several questions for me.

The horse has been reduced and marginalized in order to fulfill the rider’s recreational needs. This is comparable to Berger’s ideas about how we reduce and marginalize animals by keeping them in zoos for our own entertainment. This interpretation of the image is different from how I previously viewed equestrianism. I used to think that it was exciting and fun. I even considered it something that I was interested in doing because I love horses. However, after reading Berger I realized that truly loving an animal does not involve marginalizing that animal. Berger’s view that capitalism is a large cause behind the reason we view animals for their instrumental value struck me and made me wonder if that idea could be applicable to the mission of Chestnut Hill Farms. Chestnut Hill is capitalizing on the horse’s majestic nature by making the sport look beautiful and graceful in this image. The image is focusing on the instrumental value of the horse while completely ignoring its intrinsic value.

Often, we treat animals the way we treat human beings in many aspects. My interpretation of this image human-animal relationships after reading Berger and Walker caused me to think about human-human relationships in a similar context. For example, human slaves were sold as gladiators during Ancient Roman times for the entertainment of the people. Similarly, animals such as horses are being sold for recreational purposes as well. Berger and Walker have gotten me thinking about whether keeping animals (both human and non-human) captive for recreational purposes is ethical. It also raised the difficult question of whether it is possible to have an animal as a pet and still give it full life. This is a question I have begun thinking about after reading Berger and Walker but have still not come up with an answer to because I do not believe that there is one simple answer to this question. I believe that the ability to give a pet full life has to do with how the animal is treated as well as if the owner views the animal for its intrinsic or instrumental value.

References:

Chestnut Hill Farm, 2014. Web. 10 Sept. 2014.

John Berger. “About Looking”. Pantheon Books, 1980. Print.

Walker, Alice. “Am I Blue.” Human Rights Anthology. Ed. Lee Peralta. New York: Columbia U. Press, 1995. 438-445. Print.

 

Looking Deeper Into a Picture

September 12, 2014 / / 0 Comments

zookeeper

I found this picture in an advertisement website, where the advertisement is promoting “A day of being a zookeeper”. Therefore, this picture is a perfect way to represent what a great day you can have by being a zookeeper! At first glance, this picture looks as if both the zookeeper (the woman in the photo) and the serval (type of cat) are content with their situation during the moment of the picture. The zookeeper is wearing a smile on her face that runs from ear to ear, the serval and the zookeeper are both seemingly sharing a hug, and it even looks as if the serval is enjoying the hug; her ears are perked up as if it were a dog when it hears the word “walk”, and it even looks like she has a smile running through her face. This image makes the viewer assume that every person in this image (including the serval) is enjoying the moment at the zoo. But as you look deeper into the picture, you can see that there is a more critical perspective of this image.

The first part of the image that can be dissected is the background zoo. Tall grasslands, woods, savannahs, and other places associated to these types of habitats are mostly where servals are habituated. Concrete and boulders, as shown in the background, are not. Berger would say that the only reason we believe that this is a happy picture of a serval and a zookeeper is because of our nostalgia of zoo’s and how we see these types of animals as magical because of this great nostalgia of something we are not used to seeing. By remembering the way these zoo animals were in our nostalgia, we are creating in our minds the image of a serval, and by creating this image we are devaluing the actual animal for how it is because this animal will never live up the expectations our minds create.

Alice Walker would look at the way the animal actually feels, rather than where it is located. At closer look, the eyes of the serval tell its real emotions. The serval looks fiercely focused into space, which in many animal languages, is a sign of basically saying “back off”. Secondly, the “smile” can be interpreted as the serval’s hiss, also a sign of “back off”. The serval seems to be actually trying to push its self away from the zookeeper, instead of into the zookeeper.

By searching zookeeper into the internet, I knew I would be able to find an image that seems so inviting and loving towards animals, but could also be shown to have a more critical side to how we as humans are related to animals. 

Works Cited:

Berger, John. Why Look At Animals?. New York: Vintage International, 1977. Print.

Walker, Alice. “Am I Blue?”. Other Nations. Baylor University Press. 182-187. Print.

 http://www.zavvi.com/gift-experience-days/zookeeper-experience-zookeeper-for-a-day/10051858.html

http://www.servals.org/wild.htm

Alice Walker

September 7, 2014 / / 0 Comments

You may know our new author, Alice Walker, as the author of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Color Purple.  Walker was born in Georgia in 1944.  Her parents were sharecroppers and she was the youngest of 8 children.  She attended Spelman and then Sarah Lawrence college.  An activist for social justice, after college Walker worked on behalf of voter registration drives and participated in the famous 1963 march on Washington.  Her biographer in The Oxford Encyclopedia of American Literature (my source for this post) notes that Walker has written in every genre and that her writing “demonstrates a remarkable grasp of the political realities of systematic oppression.”

The title of the essay we read echoes a song, “Am I Blue?” made famous by Billie Holiday (1915-1959).  The essay invites readers to think about connections between its project, the song, and the life of Holiday.

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