Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Here it is worth recounting another anecdote involving, again, a professional Chinese zo-
ologist and employee of the Academy of Sciences. As with most zoologists, his background
had primarily been in collecting specimens, but during my work with him no collecting was
needed or requested. We were conducting surveys, attempting to understand what species
still survived in the area, and what conservation measures might be developed to maintain
them. One evening, after the day's work, a group of children alerted us to the presence of a
snake, which we went to investigate. The children were alarmed and concerned, assuming
that any snake must be a dangerous one. Along the way, I asked the zoologist if the area
harbored poisonous snakes, and he provided the scholarly response that only one local spe-
cies was dangerous, so it was most likely that this snake was not poisonous. Upon finding
it, he expertly lifted it up, give it a cursory examination, and with a confidence that spoke
of having done this many times before, deftly flicked his wrist which quickly snapped the
snake's neck. “So it
was
a poisonous species?” I asked him. No, he responded, it was one of
the harmless species. “You have use for it as a laboratory specimen then?” I continued, not
so much morally offended by the killing as curious to know which of the many unknowns
about these species such a specimen would help to resolve. “No,” the zoologist responded,
casually tossing the dead snake to the ground, “I just don't like snakes.”
Dominionistic/Aesthetic Views
An additional attitude toward wildlife can be discerned among typical Chinese that lies
somewhere between Kellert's dominionistic and aesthetic types. Here, the notion is of
nature the beautiful, but always in its tame state, as in a symmetrically ordered garden.
Historian Edward Schafer reviewed the long history of captive rearing of animals from
a diverse array of taxonomic groups in China.
23
Throughout, the controlled environment
(e.g., zoo, garden) is seen as preferable to the natural one.
24
Some examples from translated literature
25
serve to illustrate this view of nature. From an
essay describing the same forest in which the wolf-Buddhist pilgrim incident
26
with which
I began this Chapter occurred, comes this romantic view:
The . . . Forest is often compared to a vast natural zoo and arboretum combined. It
is more than that. It is really a colorful, fantastic fairyland! It is grown with towering
spruces and Chinese pines and other groves where scores of different shrubs were
blossoming. . . . Oh, how luscious and attracting the berries are? And how gorgeous
are the azaleas in this flowering season! During the . . . journey on horseback . . . we
were always surrounded by hospitable animals. Some of them acted as our guides . . .
some as followers. . . . The small number of Kangbaren [Kham speaking people] who
live here . . . are kind at heart and never dream of harming the “residents” in the forest,
excepting, of course, vermin. This area is also a paradise for birds. Tibetan pheasants
. . . looked very much like bouquets of flowers.
27
Note that throughout, in addition to the inability of the author to resist the reference to
bad animals (“vermin”), nature is compared favorably to a garden or zoo, rather than vice
Search WWH ::
Custom Search