Full Description
A COLLECTION OF ESSAYS PLACING THE HUMAN - WOLF RELATIONSHIP IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE International in range and chronological in organisation, this volume aims to grasp the maincurrents of thought about interactions with the wolf in modern history. It focuses on perceptions, interactions and dependencies, and includes cultural and social analyses as well as biological aspects. Wolves have been feared and admired, hunted and cared for. At the same historical moment, different cultural and social groups have upheld widely diverging ideas about the wolf. Fundamental dichotomies in modern history, between nature and culture, wilderness and civilisation and danger and security, have been portrayed in terms of wolf - human relationships. The wolf has been part of aesthetic, economic, political, psychological and cultural reasoning albeit it is nowadays mainly addressed as an object of wildlife management. There has been a major shift in perception from dangerous predator to endangered species, but the big bad fairytale wolf remains a cultural icon.
Contents
Introduction: Wolves and Humans in History. Patrick Masius and Jana Sprenger 1. War-Time, Wolf-Time. Material - Semiotic Knots in the Chronicles of the Thirty Years' War. Alexander Kling 2. The Belief in Werewolves and the Extermination of Real Wolves in Schleswig-Holstein. Martin Rheinheimer 3. The Wolf War in Sweden during the Eighteenth Century - Strategies, Measures and Leaders. Roger Bergstrom, Karin Dirke and Kjell Danell 4. The Story of a Man-eating Beast in Dauphine, France (1746 - 1756). Julien Alleau and John D.C. Linnell 5. Where is the Big Bad Wolf? Notes and Narratives on Wolves in Swedish Newspapers during the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Karin Dirke 6. Reconstructing the Extermination of Wolves in Germany. Case Studies from Brandenburg and Rhineland-Palatinate. Patrick Masius and Jana Sprenger 7. Historical Decline (and Persistence) of the Grey Wolf in Spain. Jose Maria Fernandez-Garcia 8. British Programmes for the Extermination of the Indian Wolf, c. 1870 - 1915. Steven Rodriguez 9. Writing the Wolf: Canine Tales and North American Environmental-Literary Tradition. Karen Jones 10. The Shifting Iconography of Wolves over the Twentieth Century. Linda Kalof 11. Alaska Wild? Wolves in America's Last Frontier. Lydia A. Dixon 12. Not an Easy Road to Success: The History of Exploitation and Restoration of the Wolf Population in Poland after World War Two. Robert W. Myslajek and Sabina Nowak 13. If You Wander in Winter, They Will Eat You: Local Knowledge, Wolves and Justice in Central Asia. Adam Perou Hermans 14. Hierarchy, Intrusion and the Anthropomorphism of Nature: Hunter and Rancher Discourse on North American Wolves. Jessica Bell
