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Books > Sport & Leisure > Natural history, country life & pets > Wild animals > General
Most livestock in the United States currently live in cramped and
unhealthy confinement, have few stable social relationships with
humans or others of their species, and finish their lives by being
transported and killed under stressful conditions. In Livestock,
Erin McKenna allows us to see this situation and presents
alternatives. She interweaves stories from visits to farms,
interviews with producers and activists, and other rich material
about the current condition of livestock. In addition, she mixes
her account with pragmatist and ecofeminist theorizing about
animals, drawing in particular on John Dewey's account of
evolutionary history, and provides substantial historical
background about individual species and about human-animal
relations. This deeply informative text reveals that the animals we
commonly see as livestock have rich evolutionary histories,
species-specific behaviors, breed tendencies, and individual
variation, just as those we respect in companion animals such as
dogs, cats, and horses. To restore a similar level of respect for
livestock, McKenna examines ways we can balance the needs of our
livestock animals with the environmental and social impacts of
raising them, and she investigates new possibilities for humans to
be in relationships with other animals. This book thus offers us a
picture of healthier, more respectful relationships with livestock.
Hal Markowitz has been an internationally popular lecturer and
consultant on environmental enrichment for four decades. Enriching
Animal Lives is chock full of recipes for enriching lives of a wide
range of animals along with a generous sprinkling of personal
experiences. This book will be of interest to those working in
zoos, aquariums, wild animal parks, and animal rehabilitation
facilities. It will also be of interest to all animal lovers,
especially those with companion animals and scientists conducting
research with captive animals. A detailed discussion concerning
what represents meaningful environmental enrichment and the need to
empower animals is provided in early chapters. The final chapter is
a brief autobiographical description of events that led the author
to pursue a career in science and teaching, and concludes with why
that has been so enriching for him.
The Annals of Imperial Rome, by historian and Roman senator
Cornelius Tacitus, chronicles the period between the reigns of
Emperors Tiberius and Nero. Divided into sixteen books, some of
which were partially or entirely lost over time, the Annals narrate
sequentially the various events and deeds of two rulers of the
Roman Empire. Long considered a valuable source, the Annals provide
insight into the workings of the Roman Empire and how its Emperors
interacted with the democratically elected Senate and other arms of
the bureaucracy. Modern scholars of antiquity hold the belief that
Tacitus, as a serving Roman Senator, had access to the Acta Senatus
- a record of lawmaking procedures - as a source for this work. As
such, the reliability of the Annals is generally thought strong
compared against other, more corrupted histories of the Roman
Empire.
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