Poster 3

My contribution will focus on how the scientific and popular view of animals was formed primarily in entomology and to show how this view is related to the perception of society and our relationship with animals.

I will discuss a certain historical period; between the breakthrough of Darwinism and the work of the great names in ethology such as Niko Tinbergen and Konrad Lorenz. The context is the study of animal behaviour, and the popularization of such studies, in Swedish entomology. The use of anthropomorphism points towards a change of interest in entomology itself. Previously entomology was primarily concerned with the Linnaean categorization of insects. However at the end of the nineteenth century the entomologists were increasingly interested in the behaviour of insects. The interest in insects was both popular and learned. The likeness of humans and (social) insects also became a strategic argument for Darwinism.

Animals seem untouched by human social categories such as gender, class or race yet the descriptions of animals to a great extent reproduce the categories. Therefore the study of anthropomorphism is central. Our language is built on the notion of a relationship with the non-human through continuous comparison.

Anthropomorphism is not seriously questioned until the breakthrough of behaviourism in the early twentieth century. At the same time Darwin's anecdotal and anthropomorphic language of science is an evident point of departure. What does it say in relation to Darwinism? What do the entomologists have to say about categories such as gender, class and race? How do they relate to concepts like society, war and gender concerning insect-societies? What does this tell us about the view of humanity and our relationship with animals?