Rationale for Pride of Baghdad (original) (raw)
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Returning to Wild? Four lions' journey from circus to "sanctuary
Humanimalia - a journal of human/animal interface studies, 2019
Four lions-Skinny, Little, Sid, and Sammy-have been subjected to dramatic changes as a result of a shifting political landscape. Each experienced a life of performance in a travelling French circus until authorities seized them in Belgium after the country enacted a ban on use of wild animals in circuses in 2014. The lions then spent almost two years in temporary rescue in Belgium awaiting transport to a permanent home at a UK zoo. These lions as individuals and their movement from circus to "sanctuary," with a conception that they are being returned to a more "wild life," are the subject of this multi-species, multi-sited ethnography. The temporary rescue context is considered in terms of animal viewing, lion-human interactions, and particular physical spaces of captivity, while findings in circus and zoo sites serve as comparison and contrast. Introduction. The Minister for Animal Welfare in Belgium initiated a bill to end the use of wild animals in circus performances, which became law in 2014. While Cirque Exotique, a French travelling circus, performed in Belgium that same year, police delivered a warning to the circus owner either to leave the country or relinquish their four lion (Panthera leo) performers, Skinny, Little, Sid, and Sammy. A few months later police seized the circus-born lions and delivered them to the non-profit, Belgian Rescue. This was a temporary solution, as the rescue center searched for a permanent home for the four lions. After almost two years at Belgian Rescue, the lions were transferred to permanent captivity at a UK zoo that had been successful in rehabilitating other animals who had once been circus performers.
Paperback Tigers: Breaking the Zoo
Contemporary Literature, 2015
I n recent years, numerous highly lauded works for the global mass market in literary fiction have centered on zoo animals' escape or the destruction of zoos during wartime. When The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle's chapter "The Zoo Attack" was published in The New Yorker in 1995, it was central to the birth of Haruki Murakami's reputation in English. Yann Martel's novel Life of Pi (2001), in which a teenaged boy cohabits in a lifeboat with an abandoned zoo's last surviving tiger, won the 2002 Man Booker Prize and a Christmas 2012 film adaptation. European zoos received attention in Téa Obreht's The Tiger's Wife (2011), a finalist for the National Book Award, which likewise depicted the decrepitude of animal-centered institutions for human recreation, while Diane Ackerman's The Zookeeper's Wife (2007) offered a historical take on the Warsaw Zoo during the Second World War. The American bombing of the Baghdad Zoo in 2003, which led to the death or escape of many animals, inspired not only Brian K. Vaughan and Niko Henrichon's graphic novel Pride of Baghdad (2006) but also Rajiv Joseph's play Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, a 2010 Pulitzer finalist. Portraying the fragile lives of captive animals in recent crises, these works imagine humans and animals as sharing a milieu.
The Minoan Frescoes of lions from Tell el Dab'a, dated to he reign of Hatshepsut or Tuthmosis III, are discussed
2018
The goal of current research was to evaluate the behavioral adjustments of African lion Panthera leo in different sized enclosures. A group of African lions was observed at Lahore Zoo having one solitary lion, one breeding pair and a pair of siblings that was correlated with group of the same composition at Safari zoo Lahore. The frequency of different behavior patterns displayed by these lions was studied at both study sites for three hours once a week by instantaneous sampling method for 16 weeks, from 18th April to 8th July in 2014. The frequency of stereotypic behavior including auto mutilation, refusal of food stuff, feces licking, unnatural aggressiveness, pacing, head tossing was more periodic in lions housed at Lahore Zoo (site 1) in contrast to lions at display at Safari zoo Lahore (site 2). The frequency of natural behavior was periodic in African lions housed at Safari zoo Lahore. In the present study stereotypic behavior in lions represented here as a tool to measure the level of comfort at housing sites. This behavioral display also defines the safety of these groups of lions kept in distinct captive environment. This is evident that the quality of lodging environs and area range had solid connection with frequency of various normal and abnormal types of behavior in captive animals.
The Killing of Lions: An Iraqi War Meditation
This ongoing major work involves the reinterpretation of the Lion Hunts, the ancient Assyrian bas relief cycle of Nineveh, Iraq. Universally regarded as works of genius, strikingly modern in their formal subversion of narrative image, the cycle employs highly sophisticated anti-narrative devices that prevent “terminal” reading of form, maintaining the constant visual feed of the viewer. The Killing of Lions reinterprets this “aesthetic of violence”; the viewer’s eye is never permitted to rest, but is propelled continually across the image field. The austerity of this work was additionally inspired by the Black Thangkas of Tantric Buddhism, in which deities are depicted against the black Void of the Interior with minimal delineation and color as concentrated expressions of the sublime. The flickering life essences of the lions, the calligraphy of ego dissolution, were influenced by the incandescent auras of those wrathful deities. These paintings bridge the present with references to the “deep past” as a cross cultural commentary on the western fascination with sacrificial violence and transcendence, and are a personal homage to the genius of the ancient Iraqi artist.
Abstract In recent weeks the plight of the African Lion has been in discussion about its fast dwindling numbers, its contribution to tourism, its place as s trophy and whether it should be conserved or not. The African lion (Panthera Leo Leo) is one of the four big cats in Africa. It is renowned for its majesty and is nicknamed "the king of the jungle". The lion possesses beauty and strength and is a cunning hunter. Lions vary in colour but typically sport light yellow-brown coats. A few have white coats. Mature male lions are unique among big cats due the thick brown or black manes that encircle their necks and protect them while fighting. However, lions, as a species, are endangered and are close to extinction in many countries. The lions are admired for their beauty, majesty, hunting skills, and strength. As such, they are a major tourist attraction to the Game Reserves. They are, also, favourite characters in folklore and are wildly used in symbolisms. Lions and other large carnivores in Sub-Saharan Africa have showed a marked reduction in numbers and distribution during the past five decades. This decline can be attributed to an increased conflict with human development. The Zambian Government has lifted the hunting of the big cats after a ban of two years Zambia has lifted a ban on safari hunting after it caused financial problems for the country.The reasons were not given but the motive appears to be based on revenue collection (Kachingwe on line 20 May 2025). Lions are of great aesthetic appeal and financial value. Tourism is a growing industry in southern Africa and predators are arguably a great attraction to national parks in Sub Saharan Africa. It is therefore important to provide baseline data on ecological and population characteristics to guide long term conservation of the species Although we have no reliable data on Africa-wide lion populations prior to the late 20th century, there is agreement that numbers have been in steady decline. Over the past 50 years, wild lion numbers in Africa have decreased from over 200,000 to less than 20,000 today. Estimates based on experts’ best guesses and estimates vary from one to another and are no doubt at an all-time low; range between 16,500 and 47,000. Lions have been totally eliminated in North Africa, and only relict populations remain in West and Central Africa. Half of the remaining population is in Tanzania, and smaller viable populations remain in Kenya, South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Namibia. As with the worlds other large carnivores, the reduction in lion populations has been larr4ely due to conflict with humans over livestock. Large carnivores kill livestock and are in turn killed by livestock owners or herders. Lions also attack people, and even in the 21st Century man-eating is a serious problem in Ethiopia, Tanzania and Mozambique. The lion is a contradictory animal that is loved and hated at the same time. It is hated and feared because of its man-eating activities. They are also regarded as vermin to be exterminated on sight because of their attacks on livestock. There are many stories of revenge lion hunts found in oral traditions of many societies. Lions are a pest that is hated, hunted and has to be killed by those who want to eliminate it. There are many stories of lion hunting by European travellers, big game hunters, traders, missionaries and administrative officials. Many of these were embellished to entertain the reader and to build up the egos of the writers. Lions are seen in different ways. On one hand, they are seen as a valuable tourist attraction and a source of valuable foreign exchange and employment. The lion is one to some people and another to others. Lion populations are untenable outside designated reserves and national parks. Although the cause of the decline is not fully understood, habitat loss and conflicts with humans are currently the greatest causes of concern. Within Africa, the population is particularly endangered. This paper discusses the status and plight of the lions in Sub Saharan Africa. It looks at the status of the lions which, in one case, is highly valued as tourist attraction and on the other hand, seen as vermin which has to be exterminated on sight.. Abstract In recent weeks the plight of the African Lion has been in discussion about its fast dwindling numbers, its contribution to tourism, its place as s trophy and whether it should be conserved or not. The African lion (Panthera Leo Leo) is one of the four big cats in Africa. It is renowned for its majesty and is nicknamed "the king of the jungle". The lion possesses beauty and strength and is a cunning hunter. Lions vary in colour but typically sport light yellow-brown coats. A few have white coats. Mature male lions are unique among big cats due the thick brown or black manes that encircle their necks and protect them while fighting. However, lions, as a species, are endangered and are close to extinction in many countries. The lions are admired for their beauty, majesty, hunting skills, and strength. As such, they are a major tourist attraction to the Game Reserves. They are, also, favourite characters in folklore and are wildly used in symbolisms. Lions and other large carnivores in Sub-Saharan Africa have showed a marked reduction in numbers and distribution during the past five decades. This decline can be attributed to an increased conflict with human development. The Zambian Government has lifted the hunting of the big cats after a ban of two years Zambia has lifted a ban on safari hunting after it caused financial problems for the country.The reasons were not given but the motive appears to be based on revenue collection (Kachingwe on line 20 May 2025). Lions are of great aesthetic appeal and financial value. Tourism is a growing industry in southern Africa and predators are arguably a great attraction to national parks in Sub Saharan Africa. It is therefore important to provide baseline data on ecological and population characteristics to guide long term conservation of the species Although we have no reliable data on Africa-wide lion populations prior to the late 20th century, there is agreement that numbers have been in steady decline. Over the past 50 years, wild lion numbers in Africa have decreased from over 200,000 to less than 20,000 today. Estimates based on experts’ best guesses and estimates vary from one to another and are no doubt at an all-time low; range between 16,500 and 47,000. Lions have been totally eliminated in North Africa, and only relict populations remain in West and Central Africa. Half of the remaining population is in Tanzania, and smaller viable populations remain in Kenya, South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Namibia. As with the worlds other large carnivores, the reduction in lion populations has been larr4ely due to conflict with humans over livestock. Large carnivores kill livestock and are in turn killed by livestock owners or herders. Lions also attack people, and even in the 21st Century man-eating is a serious problem in Ethiopia, Tanzania and Mozambique. The lion is a contradictory animal that is loved and hated at the same time. It is hated and feared because of its man-eating activities. They are also regarded as vermin to be exterminated on sight because of their attacks on livestock. There are many stories of revenge lion hunts found in oral traditions of many societies. Lions are a pest that is hated, hunted and has to be killed by those who want to eliminate it. There are many stories of lion hunting by European travellers, big game hunters, traders, missionaries and administrative officials. Many of these were embellished to entertain the reader and to build up the egos of the writers. Lions are seen in different ways. On one hand, they are seen as a valuable tourist attraction and a source of valuable foreign exchange and employment. The lion is one to some people and another to others. Lion populations are untenable outside designated reserves and national parks. Although the cause of the decline is not fully understood, habitat loss and conflicts with humans are currently the greatest causes of concern. Within Africa, the population is particularly endangered. This paper discusses the status and plight of the lions in Sub Saharan Africa. It looks at the status of the lions which, in one case, is highly valued as tourist attraction and on the other hand, seen as vermin which has to be exterminated on sight..
Animal Behaviour, 1987
Factors relating to whether subadult lions, Panthera leo, left or stayed in their natal pride were examined for 122 subadults living in Serengeti National Park and Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania. The 10 variables considered were: sex, age, age-set composition and size, relations with adult males and with adult females, food availability, competition with other pride members, mating opportunities, pride size and population density. The emigration of subadults was influenced by their age and sex, but was most highly correlated with the entry of unfamiliar adult males to the pride. Subadult males always left; subadult females became peripheral or left, unless they were able to mate with the new males. Early mating by such females did not result in early parturition, and may be a sociosexual mechanism allowing them to remain with the pride after a male take-over. If no new males entered the pride, subadults tended to remain, despite increasing aggression from pride members. They did not mate with close relatives, but some left the pride either temporarily or permanently to mate with unfamiliar partners. Pride size was not correlated with subadult emigration, but high population density appeared to facilitate it.
Rajiv Joseph's Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo is among the plays which represent the Iraqi war— a prominent event in postmodern history. The play is based on a real story which happened in the Bagdad Zoo when some American soldiers killed a rare Bengal tiger. It is a documentation of this real story and it includes real names and historical places and characters, which make it qualified as a documentary play. The present paper employs the new historicist method in its attempt to show how much the play is a representation of the culture that motivates the actions, whether it is the culture of the author or that of the characters concerned, Arabs and Americans. Thus, the play could be seen both as a product of the interaction of the American culture and the Arab culture that it came in touch with. The American soldiers first saw this war as a mission of freedom, while the Iraqis saw it as ruin of their culture. However, the dramatic method reflects changes in perspectives as the characters come into contact. In this way, the present reading is a chance to understand cultural and intellectual history through literature and mutual influence of cultures.