Entanglements—Intimacy and Nonhuman Ethics

• Published in: Society & Animals
• Main Author: Reinert, Hugo
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: Brill 2014
• Subjects: Arctic
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/15685306-12341318; https://brill.com/view/journals/soan/22/1/article-p42_4.xml; https://data.brill.com/files/journals/15685306_022_01_s004_text.pdf

Abstract Drawing on ethnographic material from the Norwegian Arctic, this article explores issues of specificity, encounter, and emplacement in human-animal relations through the lens of modernizing indigenous reindeer pastoralism in the region. In turn, the main sections of the argument examine three things: first, the changing technological context of indigenous herding practice, focusing on the impact of mechanization and the emergence of “roundup corrals” in the second half of the twentieth century; second, the distinct modalities of specificity at work in human-reindeer relations, exemplified particularly in practices of enumeration; and third, how ongoing controversies over supplementary feeding bring into view a herding ethic of “liminality” that cultivates distance as a precondition for maintaining the autonomy and independence of the “semi-domesticated” reindeer—opening up the possibility of reframing apparent neglect (at least partially) as a practice of care. In closing, some questions are raised concerning nonhuman ethics at the intersection between visibility, presence, and encounter.