Title: The anthropology of extinction : essays on culture and species death /
Authors: Sodikoff, Genese Marie, 1966-
Publisher: Indiana University Press,
Year: 2012
Subjects: Culture Philosophy; Anthropology Philosophy; Extinction (Biology); Extinction (Psychology); Anthropological linguistics; Language; Extinction, Biological
Abstract: "The essays in this collection examine processes of--and our understanding of--extinction across various domains. The contributors argue that extinction events can be catalysts for new cultural, social, environmental, and technological developments--that extinction processes can, paradoxically, be productive as well as destructive. The essays consider a number of widely publicized cases: island species in the Galápagos and Madagascar; the death of Native American languages; ethnic minorities under pressure to assimilate in China; cloning as a form of species regeneration; and the tiny hominid Homo floresiensis fossils ("hobbits") recently identified in Indonesia."--Publisher description.
Contents: Accumulating absence : cultural productions of the sixth extinction / Genese Marie Sodikoff -- A species apart : ideology, science, and the end of life / Janet Chernela -- From ecocide to genetic rescue : can technoscience save the wild? / Tracey Heatherington -- Totem and taboo reconsidered : endangered species and moral practice in Madagascar / Genese Marie Sodikoff -- Tortoise soup for the soul : finding a space for human history in evolution's laboratory / Jill Constantino -- Global environmentalism and the emergence of indigeneity : the politics of cultural and biological diversity in China / Michael Hathaway -- Last words, final thoughts : collateral extinctions in Maliseet language death / Bernard C. Perley -- Dying young : Pidgins, Creoles, and other contact languages as endangered languages / Paul B. Garrett -- Demise of the bet hedgers : a case study of human impacts on past and present lemurs of Madagascar / Laurie R. Godfrey and Emilienne Rasoazanabary -- Disappearing wildmen : capture, extirpation, and extinction as regular components of representations of putative hairy hominoids / Gregory Forth -- Epilogue : Prolegomenon for a new totemism / Peter M. Whiteley.