Contenu du sommaire : Sociabilités animales

Ethology and the study of social relationships
Research on parental (particularly maternal) care has tended to focus on the notion of attachment or on reproductive effort or investment. However, the social behaviors (i.e. parenting behaviors, marital behaviors) governing attachments can also be studied in the light of recent research on “reward circuits” in neurobiology. Recent studies have shown that social behaviors and attachments are strengthened by the activation of these circuits, which involve structures such as the ventral tegmental area and the nucleus accumbens and use dopamine as a neuromediator. There is increasing evidence to suggest that addictions are a result of these mechanisms (associated with the reinforcement of motivated behavior, such as eating, drinking, mating, or caring for one's children) being “bypassed”. Neuroimaging has shown that the results of studies on rodents may also apply to humans. Neuroimaging studies provide further evidence of the processes underlying social relationships, which have unique ramifications among many species (including humans).

The study of morality in animals
Research on human morality in the social and human sciences draws on a range of approaches and perspectives (development, gender differences, cultural differences, etc.). However, with very few exceptions, the term “morality” remains a taboo when applied to animals, despite the increasing interest in the biological foundations of human morality and the growing number of studies on altruism in various animal species. This paper argues that concepts such as sympathy, reciprocity and the sense of injustice among living beings without language can be examined scientifically without committing the fallacy of anthropomorphism. The paper discusses a number of experiments that have provided evidence of behaviors that can be interpreted in moral terms.

Clinical anthropology and animal language
The question of language remains a key issue in the debate over the continuity between man and animal. In order to provide a more accurate description of the specific properties of animal and human language, this paper presents the results of an experiment conducted by two American researchers on the acquisition of vocabulary by a Border Collie named Chaser. Without disputing the common characteristics shared by animals and humans in this area, the authors found that Chaser's performances could all be explained by perceptual skills or abilities, while human performances (including the grammatical errors made by children) were found to involve structural skills. In an attempt to foster interdisciplinary dialogue, the authors call for further research on perceptual processes that recognizes the similarities and differences between humans and animals.

The case for ethological history and historical ethology
Over the past thirty years, the history of animals has been a human history of animals largely focused on the values and strategies deployed by humans in their relationships with animals, but that sees animals as mere objects. This paper argues that the time has come to develop an animal history of animals that defines animals as subjects and as active agents influencing humans. The paper calls for a rapprochement between history (i.e. a human science, conceived as a science of living beings attached to the past rather than a science of man attached to the past) and ethology (i.e. a natural science, enriched with concepts from the social and human sciences). History can be used to study human documents that provide information about the experience of animals, while ethology can be used to understand and interpret this information. The aim is not only to write histories of animals, but to understand their “cultural” evolution. Research in this area needs to develop both an ethological history that examines this evolution over time and a historical ethology aimed at analyzing behaviors in specific periods or at comparing them to behaviors in other periods.

Animals, history and natural history
The social and human sciences have tended to see animals as actors in their own right, while seeking to avoid the fallacy of anthropomorphism. This paper argues that the prevailing conception of animals among historians is usually devoid of any reference to the “animality” of animals, i.e. to their biological potential and constraints. Against the grain of the dominant cultural approach in historiography (which fails to acknowledge the specificity of the animal sphere), the purpose of this paper is to use the resources of history and natural science in order to recognize and examine the animality of animals. Based on a case study of wolves, the paper argues that in order to address the many different facets of this issue, researchers will need to cross disciplinary boundaries and to combine the resources of different disciplines in order to develop a new epistemological framework, while combining ideas and concepts from both biology and history.

Shepherds, dogs, and ewes: a natural work group?
The use of animals for work tends to be perceived as “natural” or as a matter of coercion or conditioning. This paper is based on the premise that animals are also actors in the work process. A study was conducted on one of the most well-known groups of human-animal cooperation: shepherds, dogs and ewes. As part of a broader study of the role of working animals, and based on the theoretical framework of the sociology and psychology of work, the purpose of this paper is to explain what “working” means for dogs and ewes. A field study conducted in the PACA region of France showed that dogs carry out a range of jobs among ewes (animals that are far more intelligent than is commonly thought). The results also provide evidence of the “natureculture” of human-animal work relationships and of the importance of including working animals in the organization of work.

Animals are defined by movement. Animals are movement. As Akira Lippit remarks: “The figure of the animal has always been destined to serve as the symbol of movement itself”. Animals never stop moving, never stop moving us, never stop moving across and between the frontiers by which we set them apart. In the invigorated engagement between the social sciences and animal worlds, movement and the sharing of movement offer us the potential for original ways of knowing animals and of understanding our relationship to them. This paper explores that potential and the ontological and ethical consequences it has for living with animals.

Blondes d'Aquitaine
Participant observation was used to collect data on a herd of “Blondes d'Aquitaine” (brood cows). The aim was to study approximately twenty individuals based on an anthropological approach that recognizes “the point of view of the native” and examines communities for themselves. The author spent three months in the field studying the herd and collecting the views of farmers. Terms such as “boredom”, “curiosity” and “friendship” were found to require further conceptual analysis when applied to non-human societies. This paper argues that researchers in anthropology will need to recognize non-human individualities in order to understand hybrid “communities” and “societies”.