The leisured killers and their prey: considering the representation of human and nonhuman animal entanglements in twentieth-century New Zealand hunting

Abstract

People have power over nonhuman animals. This recognition is central to this paper, which focuses on the history of human and nonhuman animal entanglements in New Zealand between 1900 and 1932. Archival research is used to explore news photographs from this period. In doing so, the paper views how the human leisure activity of hunting was a cultural phenomenon in this place and time. Through this activity, people killed many wild nonhuman animals. The news photographs illuminate the injustices that nonhuman animals faced in early twentieth-century New Zealand due to a lack of recognition of their sentience. This was represented in the news discourse with speciesist principles that reflected the social conscience of the time and place. The paper reflects on this and considers how such a past can inform humanity about its relations with the nonhuman animal Other. It calls for a more animalcentric society in which people have better awareness, respect, and treatment for the sentient natures of nonhuman animals. Such an approach can allow humans to fulfil their obligations, as those in a position of power, to ensure dignity and justice for nonhuman animals.