Benjamin and animals

I have actually read bits of Walter Benjamin’s Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction in a few different classes; it is really interesting to apply his ideas to yet another context. The development of photography and film has and continues to change our perspective on animals.

One of Benjamin’s main ideas in this piece is that mechanical reproduction diminishes the aura of a piece of work. By aura he means the unique place where this piece of art exists. In this case, I see the animal itself as being the aura of a picture. The aura of a picture of a cat online is the cat itself. Video gets a little more complex, the aura is both the cat itself and the time and place where the event occurred.

Although a picture or a video cannot fully represent the complexity of any creature, its obvious that photo and especially video technology have helped us understand animals in ways we couldn’t before. For this reason I believe that these technologies have done more to enhance the aura of an animal than take away from it. Rather than rely on one person’s written interpretation of an animal’s behavior and appearance, we can see for ourselves.

Muybridge’s locomotion studies are another example of mechanical reproduction enhancing our perspective of animals. Simple questions like whether all four of a horse’s legs are off the ground at one time would not be possible without the ability to get a still perspective.

Of course, there are situations when the representation can be deceptive and damaging to the aura of the animal but we have gained so much more from these technologies.

Grizzly Man

Timothy Treadwell is a character, to say the least. From the first time he spoke, I realized this movie was about him rather than the bears. He’s extremely passionate, good hearted, recklessly brave, curious and well… a little crazy. Done by a different person, his work might be seen as profound but a personality like Treadwell’s is hard to take seriously.

One of the first things that stuck me was how he spoke to and about the animals. He called them his “friends”, and he truly believed that was their relationship. He named them pet-like names such as “Mr. Chocolate.” He talks to them, as well as his fox “friends” as if they were his pet dogs. You start to wonder if he remembers how powerful and dangerous these animals are. He projects a much less threatening image upon them than society has come to see them as.

Other scenes make it clear that these creatures amaze him. There is a scene where he stands in the spot where he has just filmed two bears fighting. He points out the the camera how the ground has shifted, the patches of bear hair he finds and then touches one of the bear’s excrement which I believe he described with a cutesy name and marveled at the fact that it was once inside the bear. His admiration of their power and strength mixed with the pet names here really sums up his perception of the situation.

As the movie progresses, you can’t help but wonder what made Treadwell this way. We learn that Treadwell was once an alcoholic. It was brought up in class that he could be described as a “dry drunk”, or someone who projects their addictions into something other than drugs or alcohol to stay clean and sober. He is obsessed with these bears. He craves the opportunity to interact with them. He makes them his whole life.

He also thought he was helping them. He made it known that he was against poachers. He refused to bring a weapon for protection, he could never hurt a bear no matter how life-threatening the situation. He hoped to change society’s perception of bears. Although I’m sure he had some impact against poachers, I agree with the park staff that his “friendship” with these animals did more harm than good. Berger’s “Why Look at Animals” discusses a disconnect between animals and humans because they cannot and will not ever be able to communicated effectively. The animals fear humans and vice versa, that’s just how it is… its natural instinct. As much as Treadwell tried, he just could not change that.

Angels and Insects

From the opening credits of the movie, the human characters were subtly compared with insects. A great example was the scene where the red ants take over the anthill of the black ants. The main goal it appeared was to take the black ant eggs and bring them back to live with the red ants. They would live their whole lives with the red ants, but they would never really be one of them. The story places the Alabasters as the red ants they are often even dressed in red and William, Matty and the servants as the black ants. Even though he married into the family, William is still not one of them. The characters are often even dressed accordingly.

Going off of the anthill idea, I can see Lady Alabaster playing the role of the queen ant relatively true to nature. Physically, queen ants are much larger than the rest of the anthill. This is obviously true of Lady Alabaster. But what really sealed it for me was what happened following her death. Earlier in the movie, the Alabasters have tried to keep ants in an artificial habitat and continue to fail until William captures a queen and introduces it to the group. They need the queen to survive. When Lady Alabaster dies, all hell breaks loose in the Alabaster household and a very unnatural secret is revealed.

It really is a tightly woven plot, but I did not see the big secret coming although I did know that something was fishy. I might actually try to watch it again to try and pick up more of the hints.

Antromorphism on Super Bowl Sunday

Today was a big day not only in sports, but also in anthromorphism. One of the best examples being Animal Planet’s juxtaposition to the Super Bowl, the Puppy Bowl in which puppies of a variety of breeds are placed in a miniature football stadium with stuffed toys. Through post-production editing and narration, the puppies are made to look like they are playing football, as seen in the following video clip:



What the puppies believe is normal playtime becomes touchdowns, defensive plays, interceptions and they even throw in a little “personality” of the pups with end zone dances. There are penalties given for roughhousing, projecting the human values of sportsmanship on the puppies as well. The Puppy Bowl experience is rounded off with a baby pig cheerleading squad, a blimp flown by hamsters, and a kitten halftime show.

Another great example of anthromorphism is found in Volkswagen’s new Beatle commercial:



After getting stuck trying to leave through his doggy door, Bolt the dog realizes that he is out of shape. The commercial shows him dieting and working out so he can lose enough weight to run out the doggy door and catch a glimpse of the neighbor’s new Volkswagen Beatle. He starts off playing a version of solo fetch on the stairs before moving on to more human weight loss exercises like running on the treadmill, doing laps in the pool and even trying out a workout tape complete with exercise ball. He is seen ignoring food dropped on the floor by a toddler to symbolize putting himself on a diet. With over 4 million views on YouTube, I’d say anthromorphism is a memorable marketing tool.

Missyplicity and cute v. "anti-cute"

One point in the McHugh article I found interesting was how Missy’s owner insisted on the term “human mother.” While that term seems a little out there to some, pet owners take care of their pets in a way similar to an infant or small child. The owner is in control of when they eat, where they go and dealing with their waste. Human mother is a more loving term as compared to owner, which implies that the pet is simply property. It was out of love that Missy’s owners chose to clone her. Missy was a mixed breed of unknown origin. But rather than calling her a mutt, she was described as a “breed apart” and became the “clone mother” of a new breed. By luck, they stumbled upon what they considered the perfect mix of features and they hoped to replicate that mixture despite her inability to reproduce due to human intrusion. Interestingly, the only way to continue with a “breed” so free of human control was to let humans genetically replicate it.

As for cute vs. anti-cute, I cannot help but think of chubby babies. Our culture stresses thinness with beauty in adults, but loves fat babies. Can you imagine what an adult with the same proportions would look like? I’m sure you have, and I’m sure you were a bit disgusted. Another cute/anti-cute situation that comes to mind is what has become known as the “duck face”, a more accurate description of the “kissy face” pose seen in many Facebook photos. This blog collects these photos and calls out their ridiculousness http://antiduckface.com/.

I have a friend who is obsessed with penguins. She has penguin stuffed animals all over her room, sleeps in penguin printed sheets and of course keeps her feet cozy in penguin slippers. Of course, not a single one of these is true to the anatomical features of a real penguin. The cute vs. anti-cute article was right; we do alter these animals into being cute. We make penguins round and fluffy, bears cubby and friendly, pigs pink, clean and cuddly, and even scrunching up our lips to the camera cute.