Role and communication: a zoosemiotic approach (original) (raw)
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Nelly Mäekivi Role and communication: a zoosemiotic perspective
The concept of role is wide-spread in social sciences. It is also used in ethology, but only to describe social structure which exists in species under observation. This paper is an attempt to utilize the concept of role in order to analyze cases of social communication in animals.
The use of the concept of sociality in mammalogical research
Zoologicheskiĭ zhurnal
The concept of sociality is discussed in terms of ecological. sociobiological and ethological approaches to studying behavior of mammals. In ecological studies sociality is mainly considered as a group-living and is associated with the clumped distribution of individuals and high degree of space and resource sharing by group members. Within the context of this paradigm the degree of sociality increases with the increase in the group size. Sociobiologists recognize sociality as a complex of phenomena associated with the subdivision of reproduction or, in a broad sense, with the reproductive skew. From the ethological viewpoint the constitutive features of sociality are complexity and personification of social bonds. The criteria for species to be social differ among these three approaches. Though the corresponding gradations of sociality are not independent, they weakly correlate and often do not match one another in comparative studies. In order to overcome this problem, the degree ...
Animal Umwelten in a Changing world: Zoosemiotic Perspectives
Animals are. A multitude of diff erent species surrounds us in our everyday doings, and infl uences our behaviour and culture. Dogs and cats develop delicate and personal relationships with the families they belong to. Swans and geese are waiting to be fed by passers-by. Th e wing-strokes of doves and jackdaws give a subtle ephemeral atmosphere to our cities. Spiders, snails and snakes are met with surprise or disgust. Beavers are blamed for reshaping the landscapes, and wolves for killing livestock. People and animals engage and interact in a number of ways: from hunting and fi shing to bird-watching, from the help provided by assistance dogs to family holidays in zoological gardens and animal parks. Children's fi rst encounters with the written word oft en take place through animal stories. And many fi ctional animal characters are known and internationally celebrated by name: Lassie, Moby Dick, Bambi, King Kong, etc. None of these interactions would be possible without semiotic processes: perception, communication and interpretation occurring between humans and animals. Sign relations or mediated relations that connect humans with other animal species are the very subject of this collective monograph. We make an inquiry into the semiotic character of diff erent species, study the ways in which humans endow animals with meaning, and analyse how animal sign exchange and communication has coped with environmental change. In this research, our core disciplinary framework is zoosemiotics, the semiotic study of animals-the paradigm that was proposed by the eminent American-Hungarian semiotician Th omas A. Sebeok in the 1960s and that recently had its fi ft ieth anniversary. Our approach is essentially semiotic and biosemiotic. At the same time, we engage in dialogues with ecocriticism, Actor-Network Th eory, posthumanism and other contemporary schools of the humanities, as well as with more practically oriented research topics in visitor studies, animal welfare studies and humananimal studies, not to forget ethology and conservation biology. Th is book is a collective eff ort. Its authors belong to the research group in zoosemiotics and human-animal relations based in the Department of Semiotics at the University of Tartu in Estonia, and at the University of Stavanger in Norway. Th e two opening chapters are written and edited collectively and present a framework of philosophical, historical, epistemological and methodological matters of zoosemiotic research. Th ese initial considerations are followed by specifi c case studies that have been conducted by individual authors. Th e specifi c chapters, however, have been cross-edited and commented on by other TIMO MARAN ET AL
Animal Research and Veterinary Science
The communication between 6 individually identified free ranging young elephants were observed for over 200 hours (1278 elephant hours) in a nature reserve in Zimbabwe. 97 different behaviours, some explicit (whose meaning is clear) and some implicit (whose meaning is hidden), were recorded. Visual signals were the most common. The meaning of the 22 most common behaviours was assessed from recipient responses. Two surprising results were that (i) many behaviours were ignored by the recipients, and (ii) reciprocity was common. Correlations between the rank orders in the 4 different behavioural categories (aggression, affiliation, avoidance and interest) did not indicate an overall "dominance order". Rather it indicated that behaviour encouraging group cohesion (showing interest and affiliation) was much more common than any related to competition in the group (that is aggression, avoiding and withdrawing). It is argued that the large number of implicit behaviours which indicate slight arousal also indicate "uncertainty". Many behaviours 'meanings were context dependent (i.e. the same behaviour used in a variety of contexts with its particular meaning only assessable from the context). To interpret the meaning of messages in this way, elephants must be aware of others intentions and desires, as well as others' knowledge and roles in the society. The implication of these results for a different understanding of elephant's social organization and mental aptitudes are discussed.
Animals, Humans and Sociability
Italian Sociological Review, 2016
This article discusses animal studies from the point of view of sociability as an “inter-subjective field of action” and as an agent and builder of society (“doing society”). In sociology, the zoological connection has availed of the theory of borders and critical realism, but, above all, of constructionism, in its interactionist and ethno-methodological sense and both focused on social micro-interaction. The construction of the identity of social actors (both human and animal) is especially evident in interaction regarding play, games, sport, daily life and work. In these spheres, analyses shed light on ambivalent and contradictory human experiences that clash with the dominant culture, while highlighting practical resistance against speciesism, which it is well worth to bring to the attention of future research, using open, mixed methodologies.
Animals Are Our Relations - Preface
Relations Beyond Anthropocentrism, 2013
Two firsts are to be celebrated. The first is the inaugural volume of this journal, Relations, and the second is The Emotional Lives of Animals, the first conference of its kind in Italy. Together, they signify the continuing emergence of Human-Animal Studies in Italy and across the world. I understand Human-Animal Studies (HAS) to mean the study of our relations with animals and their relations with us. "Our interest lies in the intersections between human lives and human cultures", writes Margo DeMello, "and those of nonhuman animals, whether real or virtual" (DeMello 2010, XI).
Facing page J. Male Three-spined Stickleback, adopting the threat posture (Photo by N. Tinbergen) 20 2. The forward threat posture of the Black-headed Gull (Photo by N. Tmbergen) 30 Head-flagging of Black-headed Gulls (Photo b)' N. Tinbergen) 3. A male Grayling courting a female of the related species Hipparchia statylinus (Photo by N. Tznbergen) 36 Singing male Natterjack (Flashlight photo by N. TlIlbergen) 4. Ruffs on lek (Photo by F. P. J. Iaoymans) 40 Unusual nest relief by a Lesser Black-backed Gull (Photo by M. G. Rutten) 2 SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR IN ANIMALS
2019
Why explain the communicative behaviours of animals by invoking the information/meaning ‘transmitted’ by signals? Why not explain communication in purely causal/functional terms? This thesis addresses active controversy regarding the nature and role of concepts of information, content and meaning in the scientific explanation of animal communication. I defend the methodology of explaining animal communication by invoking the ‘meaning’ of signals, and responds to worries raised by sceptics of this methodology in the scientific and philosophical literature. This involves: showing what facts about communication a non-informational methodology leaves unexplained; constructing a well-defined theory of content (or ‘natural meaning’) for most animal signals; and getting clearer on what cognitive capacities, if any, attributing natural meaning to signals implies for senders and receivers. Second, it weighs into comparative debates on human-nonhuman continuity, arguing that there are, in fact, different notions of meaning applicable to human communication that have different consequences for how continuous key aspects of human communication are with other species.
Introduction: A primer on information and influence in animal communication
Animal Communication Theory
What is surprising is that, despite this intensive study, the whole subject [of animal communication] is extremely confused, largely because of the definitions of the various terms that have been used. While this was already true when the first edition of this book was written, the confusions have now reached monumental proportions, with leading theorists even disagreeing as to what should properly be called 'a signal' or 'communication'. Marian Dawkins (1995, p. 72) [T]here is widespread and often unrecognized confusion about the kinds of signal that exist, the mechanism responsible for their evolution, and the terms to be used to describe them. .. So it may be that a disagreement about terminology in a particular case is not about theories, or the words used to describe them, but about what the world is like.