Pigeon trouble : bestiary biopolitics in a deindustrialized America / Hoon Song.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Song, Hoon.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Animal rights activists--Pennsylvania.

Animal rights activists.

Pigeon shooting--Moral and ethical aspects--Pennsylvania.

Pigeon shooting.

Pigeon shooting--Political aspects--Pennsylvania.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (269 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, c2010.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Pigeon Trouble chronicles a foreign-born, birdphobic anthropologist's venture into the occult craft of pigeon shooting in the depths of Pennsylvania's anthracite coal country. Though initially drawn by a widely publicized antipigeon shoot protest by animal rights activists, the author quickly finds himself traversing into a territory much stranger than clashing worldviews-an uncanny world saturated with pigeon matters, both figuratively and literally. What transpires is a sustained meditation on self-reflexivity as the author teeters at the limit of his investigation-his own fear of birds. The result is an intimate portrayal of the miners' world of conspiracy theory, anti-Semitism, and whiteness, all inscribed one way or another by pigeon matters, and seen through the anguished eyes of a birdphobe. This bestiary experiment through a phobic gaze concludes with a critique on the visual trope in anthropology's self-reflexive turn. An ethnographer with a taste for philosophy, Song writes in a distinctive descriptive and analytical style, obsessed with his locale and its inhabitants, constantly monitoring his own reactions and his impact on others, but always teasing out larger implications to his subject.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Introduction

Chapter One. Cruelty through Glassy Eyes

Chapter Two. Gloved Love

Chapter Three. Hooliganism

Chapter Four. Pests and Outcasts

Chapter Five. Mimesis and Conspiracy Theory

Chapter Six. Representationalism's Animal Other

Chapter Seven. The Line of Flight, Out of Bird Phobia

Conclusion. Self-Reflexivity and Finite Thinking

Notes

References

Index

Acknowledgments

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780812222708

0812222709

9781283891035

1283891034

9780812200096

0812200098

OCLC:

794700608