Muskox ecologies and biosocial becoming in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland: Towards an ethno-ethological approach for conservation and management

Beskrivelse

The Kangerlussuaq area in West Greenland is inhabited by the largest muskox population in Greenland. This population is the result of a conservation effort in the 1960s, when 27 individuals from East Greenland were translocated to Kangerlussuaq. Although the exact population size is uncertain, questioned, and contested, the muskoxen sustain human livelihoods through their meat (subsistence and commercial hunting), hides (used to produce wool), heads and horn (trophy hunting), and through their simple presence in the landscape (tourism). Muskoxen take part in shaping Kangerlussuaq as a place, and in turn, muskoxen are shaped by human sociality and infrastructures as much as they are by ecological and climatic conditions. Wildlife management authorities suggest that the current number of muskoxen exceeds the carrying capacity of the area, while hunters and other people living from muskoxen articulate concerns that the population is near a collapse.
This paper examines mutual shaping of humans and muskoxen in Kangerlussuaq as biosocial becoming and multiplication. I suggest that conservation and management efforts, rather than counting and managing animals as ‘living resources’ and species isolated from others, could gain from attending to muskox ecologies as hybrid communities, that is ecologies shaped by human as well as animal practices. This invites for collaborations across disciplines when it comes to understanding how animal populations and ecologies are affected by human presence and practices, and vice versa. The paper calls for and speculatively outlines an ethno-ethological approach – one that integrates anthropology, biology, and other local ways of knowing human-environment-animal relations and sociality.

Periode	27 okt. 2021
Begivenhedstitel	Anthropology and Conservation
Begivenhedstype	Konference
Placering	London, StorbritannienVis på kort
Grad af anerkendelse	International