Zoocialization: Learning Together, Becoming Together in a Multispecies Triad

• Main Authors: Brandt-Off, K. (Author), Petitt, A. (Author)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Brill Academic Publishers 2022
• Subjects: cattle; communication; ethnography; human-horse relation; multispecies; Zoocialization
• Online Access: View Fulltext in Publisher

 Herding cattle across the landscape requires three species - horse, cattle, and human - to move together in a goal-orientated, albeit human-centered, activity. In this multispecies activity, they must synchronize through embodied communication and develop a shared understanding of moving conjointly. Together, all three species are socialized, or "zoocialized,"to learn to engage in a shared community of communication where they develop a sense of "timing"and "feel"of the others to enable their directed movement together. While not denying or downplaying the power and pain integral to cattle ranching, we explore and interpret the interspecies, multispecies communication, collaboration, and choreography. Based on a multispecies ethnographic methodology, we draw on experiences from cattle herding in the USA, Canada, and Sweden. What emerges are intricate relations of agency, shaped by meanings of species, where human and nonhuman social actors learn to meet and construct a vibrant multispecies community of communication. © 2022 by Andrea Petitt and Keri Brandt-Off.