1 Introduction
Concerning the generation of animals akin to [bees], as hornets and wasps, the facts in all cases are similar to a certain extent, but are devoid of the extraordinary features which characterize bees; this we should expect, for they have nothing divine about them as the bees have.3
The quote is often presented in a shortened form, further emphasizing the difference in attitudes towards wasps and bees. The quote seems to be taken as evidence of culturally long history of wasp dislike but that is a misrepresentation of Aristotleâs work. Aristotle was in fact a wasp aficionado, testified by
Another historical example reflecting wasp dislike is a fable The bee and the wasp from 1859.5 The story features a humble bee, working hard to provide for his family. One day, he comes across Mr. Wasp, a slick fellow, who manages to persuade him to go see the sights of the famed London city. Eventually, the vile wasp leaves the bee to drown in a pool of nectar,6 intrudes the beeâs home, and has the beeâs children for supper. The insect behaviors portrayed in the story are to an extent based on ecological facts â some wasp species are known to invade beehives and use bee larvae and pupae as food.7 But the moral of the story is of humans, not of insects: âWhile pleasureâs path pursuing, [â¦] has sought his undoing.â The story is anthropomorphic â assigning human qualities to the insects. Still, that it is precisely wasp that was chosen to portray the deceitful, lazy, pleasure-seeking character tells something about the wasp perceptions of the time.
While the historical examples portray wasps as âhaving nothing divineâ or as creatures of questionable morals and lifestyles, the contemporary narratives emphasize wasp aggression.8 Human-wasp relations and human fear towards wasps are centered around the possibility of a sting.9 Wasps are often perceived to sting without any apparent reason, out of sheer evilness, and they are seen to threat humansâ bodily integrity. A wasp sting is always unexpected, painful and for people allergic to wasp venom even dangerous â there is a legitimate concern embedded in human-wasp encounters. Still, it is questionable whether wasp behavior can be labeled aggressive â or what is meant by âaggressive wasps.â Wasp numbers vary yearly depending on environmental conditions.
In the long-standing juxtaposition of bees and wasps, the roles of these insects may be changing. Awareness of waspsâ ecological importance has increased in light of research. Unlike peaceful and vegetarian bees, wasps are carnivores in larval stage. However, the âaggressiveâ foraging behavior of wasps towards other insects is one of waspsâ main benefits from a human perspective. Wasps hunt insect species that are commonly considered pests, and a nest of wasps may eat as much insects as a pair of birds in a garden. The importance of pollinators for human food systems has received a lot of attention during the last decade, with a focus on bees. Managed honeybees (Apis mellifera) are crucial for crop pollination worldwide, but they may also be harmful non-native species in some places. Honeybees may transmit pathogens to native pollinator species and compete for food sources. Wasps participate also in pollination and some plant species even specialize in wasp pollination. For instance, in the case of blueberry â an important plant for humans and numerous nonhumans in the Boreal region â it has been estimated that wasps are responsible for 20% of blueberry pollination.11
When we think of bees, we think fondly of a creature that is entwined in our lives. Bees are a crucial cog in the mechanics of global agriculture. They are indispensable to the future of humanity. Without them, we would crumble. What we need is an equivalent story about wasps.13
Narrative forms may be ideal for thinking multispecies conviviality, as stories are revisable and able to incorporate complexity.14 There is plenty to draw from in the shared lifeworlds of humans and wasps. Human and wasp habitats and lifestyles overlap ubiquitously â wasps are in many ways like us.15 Wasps are flexible in choosing their nest sites and many species dwell in urban areas.16 Wasps are active from dawn till dusk and even their preferred foods â sugars and meat â overlap with common, if not so recommendable, human food choices. Environmental changes are affecting wasp phenology and are likely to increase human-wasp encounters, highlighting the need to learn to live together.
In this chapter I aim to deconstruct the narrative of âaggressive waspsâ which I find counterproductive for multispecies ethics and cohabitance. I proceed by discussing selected entomological texts that address wasp aggression. My aim is not to single out these studies as particularly problematic. They are methodologically sound within their discipline and draw extensively from previous
The talk of âaggressive waspsâ is an anthropomorphic convention, projection of human characteristics and fears onto wasps. Anthropomorphism â assigning human qualities such as behaviors, emotions or appearance to nonhuman nature or objects â is a commonly used technique for instance in marketing or in childrenâs stories. In case of insects, anthropomorphism may be problematic as insects are commonly perceived as monstrous or âthe ultimate otherâ. Furthermore, in multispecies research aiming to understand the other by engaging with their lifeworlds, anthropomorphism is avoided. I discuss the problems and opportunities with critical anthropomorphism in multispecies ethics. Finally, based on an analysis of Finnish media articles on wasps I discuss alternative, already emerging narratives that build on acknowledging shared multispecies vulnerability and care.17
2 Deconstructing Wasp Aggression
In a study from 1984, Parrish analyzed aggression between foraging wasps.18 After observing yellowjackets at standardized carbohydrate baits, they distinguished four levels of wasp aggression with increasing intensity: fly-by, close-hovering, mutual-hovering, and wrestling. While not precisely defining what aggression is, Parrish gives an idea of what can be understood as aggressive wasp behavior. From a human perspective, when the main concern is wasp sting, the described âaggressive behaviorsâ seem rather harmless. According to the study, fly-by and close-hovering were directed to a feeding wasp, apparently with the aim of making it leave the bait. The situation could escalate to mutual-hovering, with two wasps chasing each other near the bait, and finally
In Biology of the Vespine Wasps, Matsuura and Yamane characterize wasp behavior casually as weak/formidable/extraordinary/violent/extreme aggression.19 While they do not define aggression either, the book adds such behaviors as biting (between worker wasps after the loss of colony foundress) and fights between wasp queens when one attempts to colonize the otherâs nest. The book includes a chapter titled âThe Vespines and Man,â discussing ways wasps can be both beneficial and harmful to humans from an economic perspective. The authors mention how in some parts of the world people use wasp larvae as protein food, suggesting âthat humans have long been predators of vespine colonies.â They propose it could be âinteresting to survey the relationships between the predation by primates, including humans, and the evolution of the extreme aggressiveness of some vespine species,â thus suggesting the aggression of wasps might be, at least partly, outcome of human predation. At the end of the book the authors introduce 16 Vespine species living in Japan. In concluding each species description, Matsuura and Yamane give an estimate of the speciesâ aggressiveness towards humans, such as âworkers are quite aggressiveâ or âworkers are relatively non-aggressive towards humans.â What is noteworthy is that waspsâ aggression was estimated when humans approached, disturbed, or even excavated the nests. In case of Vespula flaviceps, for instance, the authors write âpeople will be stung only when they approach the nest too close.â It seems, then, that in many cases wasp âaggressionâ against humans could be substituted with âdefense.â
In a recent study, Jandt and colleagues wrote how âsocial wasps are well-known for aggressively defending their nests when these are approached, threatened, or directly attacked.â20 In their study, the authors aimed to quantify
In the study, wasp response was recorded by sight and sound, installing a camera and a microphone next to the target. In measuring the provoked aggression of the wasp colony, carbon dioxide was exhaled to the entrance of the wasp nest, and the entrance was scratched with a fork. The provocations aimed to mimic a potential predator, a curious mammal, or an unsuspecting gardener approaching the nest. To calculate aggression, the number of wasp âstrikesâ to the target was recorded, i.e., aggression equals a âstrike.â The âstrikes could be quick, strong (wasps drove themselves into the target like a battering ram), or prolonged (wasps held onto the target, buzzed, and tried to sting the plate).â21 The study found that some wasp colonies are consistently aggressive, while others âexhibit little to no aggressive response to disturbanceâ. At times in the paper, âdefenseâ seems to be used interchangeably to âaggression.â
Referring to previous studies, Jandt and colleagues discuss how wasp colony aggression is likely heritable. Within-colony individual differences in waspsâ aggression have been linked to differences in gene expression, which can be influenced by age as well as individual experience with the local and social environment. The authors discuss how the differences in colony aggression â both âaggressiveâ and non-aggressive behavioral types â can have fitness benefits in a population. While the âaggressiveâ colonies might defend their nests against predators more effectively, the less aggressive colonies âcould go unnoticed by humans and develop undisturbed.â Like Matsuura and Yamane, the study posits humans as a main wasp predator and suggests that the colony behavior may evolve in relation to that. In the Anthropocene, humans have become the main evolutionary force, driving the change of observable traits in many other species.22
Research on colony-level wasp aggression is valuable for increasing understanding of wasps. It may be that within discipline, there is a shared understanding of what is referred to with âaggression,â so much so that in any of
Researchers are not immune to common uses of language, and there are diverse motivations behind the choice of research topics and vocabulary. Sumner and colleagues discuss how unloved wasps have received less research attention than bees, but some entomologists recognize the âferal charismaâ23 of wasps, and behind the practice of nonchalantly calling wasps aggressive may be a zoomorphic wish that some of that charisma would transfer to people studying them. In the times of eco-social crises of existential dimensions, however, we should better seek recognition in becoming ambassadors of multispecies conviviality in ways that do not reflect badly on our nonhuman fellows.
After my limited review of entomological literature, the definition of wasp aggression remains in the air. The talk of wasps as aggressive is anthropocentric, highlighting the potential harm to humans. It may also be an anthropomorphic convention, a projection of human fears. If we are assigning human qualities to wasps, it is useful to have a look at what aggression is in humans. Anderson and Bushman define human aggression in short as âany behaviour directed toward another individual that is carried out with the proximate (immediate) intent to cause harm.â24 In the case of wasps, the jury is probably still out on what terms can their behavior be called intentional. In any case,
Human aggression has been explained with several domain-specific theories, including cognitive neoassociation (an unpleasant experience stimulates thoughts, memories, behavioral tendencies etc. related to previous negative experiences), social learning (forms of social behavior are acquired by direct experience or observing others), social interaction (aggression as seeking social influence, motivated by other primary goal), script (set of rehearsed associated concepts in memory involving action plans), and excitation transfer (arousal from a previous event may be misattributed to a following event) theories. Anderson and Bushman have integrated these into a so-called general aggression model (GAM), that better explains aggressive acts that are based on multiple motives. The model considers factors related to both the person (e.g., genotype) and the situation (e.g., alcohol). According to the model, various inputs affect the individualâs internal state (their affect, arousal, and cognition), which may provide bottom-up motivation for aggressive acts. Human aggression may be more complex than aggression in wasps, but understanding human aggression may help to understand the various individual and environmental factors affecting waspsâ aggressive behavior. We should consider which parts of the complex âgeneral wasp aggression modelâ apply in each context, rather than labeling wasps âaggressive.â
Wasps are not aggressive to start with. But in August they may get stressed, as the nest starts to run out of food. The workers need to find food for the larvae at any cost, and they follow the smell of food to human tables. The hungry brood waiting in the nest makes the wasps persistent. Looking for
food on plates and buzzing in front of the face may feel aggressive. But wasps cannot be described as aggressive by nature, unlike some people. Of course, waspsâ innate defense reaction is strong, and many interpret it as aggression.
The interviewed entomologist continued explaining that wasps have a keen sense of smell, unlike humans. They described wasps as misunderstood species: wasps only come to âbotherâ people when looking for food for their offspring, just as people provide for their families. Wasps approaching humans does not mean attack; there might just be an interesting smell in the human breath. In such case, the entomologist suggested holding the breath and taking a step back, and the wasp might lose interest. The entomologist emphasized that wasps do not attack humans to start with. They sting only when attacked or provoked first. Sometimes a wasp might get trapped under human clothing and sting before its presence was even detected. âIt may sting in panic.â For peaceful cohabitance, the entomologist proposed providing wasps with a âbarâ â placing overripe fruit or scraps of meat a few meters away. The entomologist was deliberately pointing to parallels in wasp and human lives, and in conflict situation named humans as culpable, turning the conventional narrative upside down. For redemption, they offered the narrative of care.
3 Critical Anthropomorphism and Precarious Vulnerability
Anthropomorphism refers to the tendency of assigning human qualities â such as behaviors or emotions â to nature, nonhuman animals and other species, or objects. Anthropomorphism is a commonly used strategy for instance in childrenâs books that treat nonhuman life. Anthropomorphism â for instance, talk of âMother Natureâ or referring to climate change as âEarth having a feverâ â may make people feel more connected to nature, and the connectedness may foster conservation behavior.26 Anthropomorphism is therefore not only semiotic and symbolic but may have effects to the well-being of nonhuman others. Geographer Jamie Lorimer has discussed how anthropomorphic nonhuman charisma affects even conservation policies. We tend to favor (mammalian) species that have a recognizable face and that communicate in ways compatible with us humans as visual animals. Species that are perceived as ugly or
In human perspective, insects have remained the ultimate unintelligible other.29 The multiplicity, âmonstrosity,â autonomy, and parasitism of insects are often experienced to threaten the idea of a bounded, individual subjectivity.30 Due to this otherness, insects are hard to anthropomorphize,31 or may be anthropomorphized negatively, portraying wasps as human-like characters with questionable morals, like in the fable The bee and the wasp, or labeling wasps aggressive when in fact they are defending themselves against provocation. To deal with insect otherness we may need to anthropomorphize them differently, but it is not necessarily beneficial to the insects. For instance, in marketing insects for human food, anthropomorphism has been used as a strategy: Western consumers are not generally willing to consume insects perceived as disgusting but anthropomorphized âcuteâ insect pictures on food packaging may make entomophagy more acceptable.32
In multispecies research attempting to speak responsibly about other species as beings with their own lifeworlds and intentions, anthropomorphism is almost a curse word.33 Anthropomorphism may be understood as inappropriately imposing human perceptions onto nonhuman beings, denying their ways of experiencing the world. In addressing the methodological challenges in attending to nonhuman others, human-animal studies scholars have been calling for a methodological âcritical anthropomorphismâ which endorses qualitative interpretations of nonhuman behavior but is complemented with species-specific knowledge from natural sciences or phenomenological
Reading beyond the scandalous headlines of aggressive wasps in Finnish news media, there are already more nuanced, critically anthropomorphic narratives. In the news article titled âFeisty wasps are now tormenting people on beaches and terracesâ36 an entomologist was interviewed on waspsâ âmisbehavior.â In response, they explained the phases of a wasp colony cycle. Only the wasp queens overwinter. When the foundress queen has produced a new generation of queens and males, she dies in the autumn. The new queens fly out to mate and find a place to spend the winter. At this point the worker wasps, whose tasks have been to maintain and defend the nest and find food for the larvae, are left with nothing to do. Sumner has described the situation as wasps being furloughed,37 Matsuura and Yamane write of colonies or nests being orphaned.38As the worker wasps have lost the meaning of their lives, they may approach humans in their search for carbohydrates and proteins.
In the interview, the entomologist called the predicament of wasps an existential crisis. The term was probably introduced half-sarcastically, as in the same article they explained how to make a wasp trap to get rid of unwanted wasps. However, the idea of wasps in an existential crisis seemed to resonate with journalists and readers of Finnish media, and it has been rehearsed several times since in writing about waspsâ autumnal mischiefs. Referring to wasps as being furloughed, in an existential crisis, or orphaned, may be interpreted as anthropomorphism â as appointing human characteristics to the insect. If read sarcastically, the narrative may alienate humans even further
Critically anthropomorphic narratives invite ecological and entomological knowledge that supports the qualitative interpretation of the situation. The narrative allows understanding better the lifeworlds of the nonhuman others and developing multispecies care via the notions of precarity and vulnerability. The narrative may become a pedagogical moment, revealing our entanglements and vulnerabilities with other species, helping to rethink our place in the world.39 Precarity has become a global, generalized condition.40 It does not refer only to human unstable incomes and material welfare; it is âembedded in unprecedented encounters between species, and in existential instability in the face of environmental disturbances on a planetary scale.â41 The existential crisis brought upon by anthropogenic environmental changes touches wasps and humans alike, and the intimacy and complexity of human-wasp relations render our shared condition precarious. We are together in this, but still, human and wasp vulnerability is asymmetrical â being entangled with us is not often beneficial for the other creatures.
Deborah Bird Rose and Thom van Dooren have asked what hope there is for unloved, less visible, less beautiful creatures that are less entangled in our culture, when even creatures who are vividly present in our imaginative lives are nonetheless on the edge of loss.42 Unloved creatures that bite or sting or seem monstruous or aggressive are awkward creatures that do not fit off-the-shelf
4 Words for Sharing Worlds
It matters what matters we use to think other matters with; it matters what stories we tell to tell other stories with; it matters what knots knot knots, what thoughts think thoughts, what descriptions describe descriptions, what ties tie ties. It matters what stories make worlds, what worlds make stories.45
The quote from Donna Haraway urges to pay attention to the words, language, and stories we use to narrate multispecies entanglements. Potawatomi scholar Robin Wall Kimmerer has called for âgrammars of animacyâ for describing ways of thinking and speaking that recognize other beings having intentions and lifeworlds. According to them, the language of animacy is close to extinction as research reduces nonhuman life to e.g., abstract species.46 Geographer Mollie Holmberg has engaged indigenous, feminist, and queer scholarship with more-than-human geographies to go beyond anthropomorphism and
Animal ethics seems to be in trouble with insects. Monsó and Osuna-Mascaró have listed several obstacles for including insects into moral considerations: an outdated view of insects as âlower beingsâ or less than animal, empirical uncertainties considering insect sentience, the cognitive and affective biases that make us view insects as annoying or disgusting, and a tendency to give more weight to scientific uncertainty that to moral risk (for example: killing wasps is not problematic since we do not have certainty of their capability to suffer). There are further obstacles stemming from insect â or more generally arthropod â biology and ecology to include insects in moral consideration and ethical treatment. From the sheer number of insects, it results that animal ethics based on individual welfare do not quite fit. While insects are often perceived as less than individuals, in some sense they are also more than individuals. Going through metamorphosis, in different stages of their lives the insectsâ needs and interests are completely different. For instance, wasp larvae need to be fed on animal protein food, whereas adult wasps feed on nectar. Hence, one individual may be considered different individuals throughout the course of its life. Also, the colonies of eusocial, âless than individualâ insects such as wasps are superorganisms that have adaptiveness and problem-solving capacity beyond an individual. As eusocial insects such as wasps put the colony welfare before their own, forcing them into an individualistic welfare-based ethics would amount to unwarranted anthropocentrism.48
French philosopher Jacques Derrida proposed to get rid of the category âanimalâ as it is overtly generalizing and hiding a vast variety of differences between species and individuals.49 Derrida proposed instead the term âanimot,â highlighting that animal is just a word, not an essentialist counterpart to human. Insects are very different from mammals, but the category of
In this chapter I aimed to deconstruct the story of wasps as aggressive and proposed narratives for wasp-human conviviality instead. There is a significant difference in perceiving wasps as being aggressive, or alternatively wasps behaving aggressively. The first one is essentialist; the latter invites to ask questions about the reasons behind seemingly aggressive behavior. The questions led to narratives where wasp âaggressionâ seems to be rather defense against provocation, or persistence in providing food for the offspring. âAggressive waspsâ is an anthropocentric construction, and it is time to let it go. There are narratives of mutual human-wasp vulnerability at the times of the Anthropocene and destruction, but we are unequal in vulnerability, which calls for multispecies care. It may be easier to extend care to wasps being aware of their ecological importance â of the âecosystem serviceâ narrative. But human-wasp encounters are always situated, and such must be our responses as well. However difficult insect ethics are it is individual wasps that we encounter. Those encounters are often awkward, they may involve violence, and even death. In the encounters wasps are more vulnerable, but human vulnerability and health concerns cannot be dismissed. Furthermore, humans are differently vulnerable to wasps, depending on the living environment or profession. For instance, a berry farmer has a higher probability of encountering wasps and, thus, a higher risk of being stung, than for instance an office worker. For the berry farmer, however, the awkwardness of living with wasps could be a familiar situation and they may be better equipped with contextual responses.
To end with, I want to propose one more set of words for more nuanced wasp-human encounters. Symbiotic ontology, building on e.g., Harawayâs
Finally, neutralism leaves both species unaffected. The symbiotic relations should not be understood as essential either â they are contextual, and human-wasp symbiosis can take any of those forms. Maybe next time when a wasp approaches us, we can take a step back and turn the question back to ourselves: âWhat am I in this situation?â Questioning the nature of the symbiotic situation, making space for the other and exercising curious observation are good strategies for awkward multispecies conviviality, to begin with.
Acknowledgments
I am thankful to the anonymous reviewers for their insightful observations and to the book editors for all their efforts and care. I wish to thank Dr Atte Komonen from the University of Jyväskylä, Finland, who invited me to the âAmpaseâ project on human-wasp cohabitance, funded by the Kone foundation, and thus got me into thinking about wasps.
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With âwaspsâ I refer here to yellowjackets and hornets, i.e. stinging social wasps. Globally, there are over 100,000 species of wasps. Most are solitary and do not come into conflict with humans. From the 33,000 stinging wasp species, approximately one thousand are social, forming colonies. In Finland, there are twelve species of social vespine wasps.
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Curiously, the fable shows that the idea of an âinsect bar,â now popular for feeding pollinators and relocating uninvited guests such as wasps, existed already in 1889. In the story it was placed âto keep wasps, flies, and ear-wigs, â a mischievous crew, â From devouring some fruit that was ripe, and in view.â In the waspâs view, the âbarâ was placed there by âa noted Wasp-lover.â
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In the 102 articles discussing wasps that I collected from Finnish news media for the period 2015â2019, there were 33 references to wasp aggression.
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Noona Bäckgren, âÃrhäkät ampiaiset piinaavat nyt rannoilla ja terasseilla,â Helsingin Sanomat, July 28, 2016, https://www.hs.fi/kotimaa/art-2000002913049.html. (Finnish quotes translated by the author.)
Janne Heliölä, Mikko Kuussaari and Juha Pöyry, Pölyttäjien tila Suomessa. Kansallista pölyttäjästrategiaa tukeva taustaselvitys, Suomen ympäristökeskuksen raportteja 34 (Helsinki: Suomen ympäristökeskus, 2021), http://urn.fi/http://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-11-5418-8.
Franklin Ginn, Uli Beisel and Maan Barua, âFlourishing with Awkward Creatures: Togetherness, Vulnerability, Killing,â Environmental Humanities 4, no. 1 (2014): 113, doi:10.1215/22011919-3614953.
Will Coldwell, âWhy We Should All Love Wasps,â The Guardian, May 22, 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/may/22/revenge-of-the-wasp-woman-dr-seirian-sumner-loves-wasps-and-advocates-for-them.
Brian McCormack, âNarrative, Meaning, and Multispecies Ethical Ontologies,â Humanimalia 11, no. 1 (2019): 64, doi:10.52537/humanimalia.9478.
Santaoja, Torniainen and Komonen, âHuman-Wasp Encountersâ.
Atte Komonen, Aleksi Nirhamo, and Jyrki Torniainen, âSocial Wasps (Vespinae) in Urban Gardens and Woods,â Annales Zoologici Fennici 57 (2020): 41, http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:jyu-202001301875.
Geographical context is important; my perspective is from the northern boreal region of Europe â in other parts of the world, vespine wasps are invasive species causing significant harm and thus the discussion of human-wasp relations is quite different.
Mark D. Parrish, âFactors Influencing Aggression between Foraging Yellowjacket Wasps, Vespula spp. (Hymenoptera: Vespidae),â Annals of the Entomological Society of America 77, no. 3 (1984): 306, doi:10.1093/aesa/77.3.306.
Matsuura and Yamane, Biology of the Vespine Wasps.
Jennifer Jandt, Mateus Detoni, Kevin J. Loope, and Davide Santoro, âVespula Wasps Show Consistent Differences in Colony-level Aggression Over Time and Across Contexts,â Insectes Sociaux 67 (2020): 367, doi:10.1007/s00040-020-00768-3.
Jandt, Detoni, Loope and Santoro, âVespula Wasps,â 372.
Chris Darimont et al., âHuman Predators Outpace Other Agents of Trait Change in the Wild,â PNAS 106, no. 3 (2009), 952, doi:10.1073/pnas.0809235106.
Jamie Lorimer, âNonhuman Charisma,â Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 25, no. 5 (2007): 911, doi:10.1068/d71j.
Craig Anderson and Brad Bushman, âHuman Aggression,â Annual Review of Psychology 53, no. 1 (2002): 27, doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.53.100901.135231.
Pihla Loula, âAmpiaisten epätoivo näkyy nyt ärhäkkyytenä,â Helsingin Sanomat, August 2, 2018, https://www.hs.fi/kotimaa/art-2000005776859.html.
Kim-Pong Tam, Sau-Lai Lee, and Melody Manchi Chao, âSaving Mr. Nature: Anthropomorphism Enhances Connectedness to and Protectiveness Toward Nature,â Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 49, no. 3 (2013): 514, doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2013.02.001.
Lorimer, âNonhuman Charisma,â 911.
Daniel Mota-Rojas et al., âAnthropomorphism and Its Adverse Effects on the Distress and Welfare of Companion Animals,â Animals 11, no. 11 (2021): 3263, doi:10.3390/ani11113263.
Hugh Raffles, Insectopedia (New York: Vintage, 2011).
James Hillman, âThe Satya Interview: Going Bugs with James Hillman,â Satya, January, 1997, http://www.satyamag.com/jan97/going.html.
Known popular culture exceptions include Disneyâs Jiminy Cricket, or the movie A Bugâs Life.
Zining Wang and Jaewoo Park, ââHuman-likeâ is Powerful: The Effect of Anthropomorphism on Psychological Closeness and Purchase Intention in Insect Food Marketing,â Food Quality and Preference 109 (2023): 104901, doi:10.1016/j.foodqual.2023.104901.
Mollie Holmberg, âBeyond Anthropomorphism: Attending to and Thinking with Other Species in Multispecies Research,â ACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies 21, no. 2 (2022): 172, https://acme-journal.org/index.php/acme/article/view/2033.
Maisie Tomlinson, âCritical Anthropomorphismâ and Multi-Species Ethnography: An Investigation of Animal Behaviour Expertise, Ph.D. thesis (Manchester: University of Manchester, 2021), https://research.manchester.ac.uk/en/studentTheses/critical-anthropomorphism-and-multi-species-ethnography-an-invest.
Gordon Burghardt, âCritical Anthropomorphism, Uncritical Anthropocentrism, and Naïve Nominalism,â Comparative Cognition & Behavior Reviews 2 (2007): 136, https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2008-07027-009.
Bäckgren, âÃrhäkät ampiaisetâ.
Seirian Sumner, âWhy wasps become so annoying at the end of summer,â The Conversation, August 27, 2020, https://theconversation.com/why-wasps-become-so-annoying-at-the-end-of-summer-145053.
Matsuura and Yamane, Biology of the Vespine Wasps, 85.
Affrica Taylor and Veronica Pacini-Ketchabaw, âLearning with Children, Ants, and Worms in the Anthropocene: Towards a Common World Pedagogy of Multispecies Vulnerability,â Pedagogy, Culture & Society 23, no. 4 (2015): 507, doi:10.1080/14681366.2015.1039050.
Anna Tsing, The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins (Princeton University Press, 2015).
Pieta Hyvärinen, âBeekeeping Expertise as Situated Knowing in Precarious Multispecies Livelihoods,â Sosiologia 56, no. 4 (2019): 365, https://journal.fi/sosiologia/article/view/124543.
Deborah Bird Rose and Thom van Dooren, âUnloved Others: Death of the Disregarded in the Time of Extinctions. Introduction,â Australian Humanities Review 50 (2011): 1, https://australianhumanitiesreview.org/2011/05/01/issue-50-may-2011/.
Ginn, Beisel and Barua, âFlourishing with Awkward Creatures,â 113.
McCormack, âMultispecies Ethical Ontologies,â 20.
Donna Haraway, Staying with the Trouble. Making Kin in the Chthulucene (Durham: Duke University Press, 2016), 12.
Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass. Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants (Minneapolis: Milkweed Editions, 2013).
Holmberg, âBeyond Anthropomorphism: Attending to and Thinking with Other Species in Multispecies Researchâ (2022): 172.
Susana Monsó and Antonio J. Osuna-Mascaró, âProblems with Basing Insect Ethics on Individualsâ Welfare,â Animal Sentience 29, no. 8 (2020).
Jacques Derrida, The Animal That Therefore I Am (New York: Fordham University Press, 2008).
Haraway, Staying with the Trouble. Making Kin in the Chthulucene (2016).