If You Tame Me: Understanding Our Connection With Animals

by Leslie Irvine

Overview

Nearly everyone who cares about them believes that dogs and cats have a sense of self that renders them unique. Traditional science and philosophy declare such notions about our pets to be irrational and anthropomorphic. Animals, they say, have only the crudest form of thought and no sense of self at all. Leslie Irvine's If You Tame Me challenges these entrenched views by demonstrating that our experience of animals and their behavior tells a different story. Dogs and cats have been significant elements in human history and valued members of our households for centuries. Why do we regard these companions as having distinct personalities and as being irreplaceable? Leslie Irvine looks closely at how people form "connections" with dogs and cats available in adoption shelters and reflects on her own relationships with animals. If You Tame Me makes a persuasive case for the existence of a sense of self in companion animals and calls upon us to reconsider our rights and obligations regarding the non-human creatures in our lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781592137916
Publisher:	Temple University Press
Publication date:	11/20/2008
Series:	Animals Culture And Society
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	240
File size:	447 KB

About the Author

Leslie Irvine is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and the author of Codependent Forevermore: The Invention of Self in a Twelve Step Group. Marc Bekoff is Professor of Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder; his most recent books are: Minding Animals: Awareness, Emotions, and Heart and (co-authored with Jane Goodall) The Ten Trusts: What We Must Do to Care for the Animals We Love.

Table of Contents

Foreword: To Know Them Is to Be Them – Marc BekoffAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: The Fox's Wisdom1 How and Why2 Them and Us3 From Pets to Companion Animals4 Looking at Animals/Glimpses of Selves5 The Adopters: Making a Match6 Rethinking the Self: Mead's Myopia7 Self versus Other: The Core Self8 Self with Other: IntersubjectivityConclusion: Putting Theory into PracticeAppendix: MethodsNotesReferencesIndex