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Biographies of Companionship: Living with Bovines in Tamil Country
Series: - Human-Animal Studies, Volume: 32
Author:
This book weaves together little moments of companionship—a human trying to cajole a mother cow to accept her newborn calf, a cow secretly burying biscuits in the backyard, a human biting a bull's tail, a cow kicking a human, a calf's nose being roped, humans, bulls, and cows walking together. These moments narrate the biography of companionship between humans and bovines.
Vignesh Soundararaj is an independent researcher capturing the drama in human-animal interactions. After studying Theatre and Performance Studies, and being interested in Human-Animal Studies, he published articles on human relations with bovines and elephants, including “Becoming Bovine and Being Haunted: Herder-Bovine relations in South India” in Society & Animals, 2022.
Acknowledgements
List of Figures
Introduction
1 The Shout: Bull Is Coming
2 The Companions: Portrait of Humans and Bovines
3 The Hyphen: Biographying the Improvisation
4 The Companionship: Fielding the Senses
1 Birthing Cultures
1 Imagination
2 Recognition
3 Theatricality
4 Pedagogy
4.1 Naming
4.2 Milking
4.3 Nose Roping
5 Conclusion
2 Pain and Its Correlates
1 Shifts and Turns of Pain
2 Normal and Deviant Behaviours
3 Aesthetic Immersion of Differential Bodies
4 Locus Standi
5 Conclusion
Interlude 1: Enactment and Emergence of Consent
3 Sporting the Bull
1 Selection and Grooming
2 Event and Moment
3 Animate and Articulate
4 Hugging and Falling
5 Conclusion
4 Rethinking Play
1 Transcending Realms and Immanent Meanings
2 Decontextualised Enactments
3 Subjectivity of Spectatorship
4 Conclusion
Interlude 2: Resonances of Play in Consent
5 Death and Its Milieu
1 Can an Animal Die?
2 What Is It to Be-With a Dying Bovine?
3 How to Mourn a Dead Bovine?
4 Where Does It Happen?
5 Conclusion
6 Extinction’s Doppelgänger
1 Visions of Extinction
2 Hauntings in Companionship
3 Translating Conservation
4 Conclusion
Interlude 3: Speculating Consent in the Future Worlds of Extinction
7 Professing Mundanity
1 Modern Age Animals
2 Times of the Everyday Realities
3 Liveness of Beings
4 Bodies in Walk
5 Conclusion
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
List of Figures
Introduction
1 The Shout: Bull Is Coming
2 The Companions: Portrait of Humans and Bovines
3 The Hyphen: Biographying the Improvisation
4 The Companionship: Fielding the Senses
1 Birthing Cultures
1 Imagination
2 Recognition
3 Theatricality
4 Pedagogy
4.1 Naming
4.2 Milking
4.3 Nose Roping
5 Conclusion
2 Pain and Its Correlates
1 Shifts and Turns of Pain
2 Normal and Deviant Behaviours
3 Aesthetic Immersion of Differential Bodies
4 Locus Standi
5 Conclusion
Interlude 1: Enactment and Emergence of Consent
3 Sporting the Bull
1 Selection and Grooming
2 Event and Moment
3 Animate and Articulate
4 Hugging and Falling
5 Conclusion
4 Rethinking Play
1 Transcending Realms and Immanent Meanings
2 Decontextualised Enactments
3 Subjectivity of Spectatorship
4 Conclusion
Interlude 2: Resonances of Play in Consent
5 Death and Its Milieu
1 Can an Animal Die?
2 What Is It to Be-With a Dying Bovine?
3 How to Mourn a Dead Bovine?
4 Where Does It Happen?
5 Conclusion
6 Extinction’s Doppelgänger
1 Visions of Extinction
2 Hauntings in Companionship
3 Translating Conservation
4 Conclusion
Interlude 3: Speculating Consent in the Future Worlds of Extinction
7 Professing Mundanity
1 Modern Age Animals
2 Times of the Everyday Realities
3 Liveness of Beings
4 Bodies in Walk
5 Conclusion
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index
This book is of interest to post-graduate level teachers, students and researchers in the fields of human-animal relationships and multi-species ethnography, as well as to practitioners, professionals and general readers of nomadism, agrarianism, native-breed conservation, animal-welfare and Tamil Nadu regional culture.