Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
graduates, Béatrice Mpako, became assistant administrator of the Boende district (including Djolu
and other territories), showing the power of education to change a woman's status even in such a
patriarchal society.
The theme, of course, is inclusion, that conservation will create the means for the Congolese
to become their own conservationists, to have their own experts. The most successful conservation
scenarios appear to be those in which the inclusivity works both ways—in which the Congolese are
integral to the vision just as the foreign conservationists participate in the local culture.
Even in Kinshasa, during a dinner at Evelyn Samu's home, when BCI's employees and partners
gathered, the feeling was strikingly familial. At one point they stood in a circle to welcome new
members. Giving Bonobo names is a BCI tradition, both playful and serious, and is deemed an hon-
or. Mwanza, Mpaka Bonobo (Grandfather Bonobo), must approve all names, being the elder. That
night, Evelyn Samu became Mokambi Bonobo (Leader Bonobo), and Richard, the new accountant,
was promised the title of Mbongo Bonobo (Money Bonobo) once he'd settled in. Michael explained
to me that they did something similar in Kokolopori, creating a title of
chevalier de la forêt
“knight
of the forest,” and celebrating Léonard's skill as a tracker with feasts and dances and songs.
But to engage consciously with a foreign culture requires patience and care, and conservation
projects are more likely to become self-replicating when their ideas connect with the values of the
local people. The process is less like planting than grafting, connecting foreign conservation prac-
tices to the customs that are already in place, since the Bongandu have long recognized the import-
ance of bonobos and acknowledged their human qualities. However, in order for conservation to
succeed completely, it also requires support from the general public in the West, the people who
donate to conservation causes and who vote for leaders who support them—people who understand
that the bonobos are worth saving. But westerners are only beginning to recognize the emotional
and mental complexity of great apes.
In 1871, the British anthropologist Sir Edward Burnett Tylor offered what would become the
modern definition of culture: “that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals,
law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.” But
culture remains a tricky concept, often considered exclusive to humans though studies have shown
repeatedly that animals, especially great apes, have cultures as well. The question might remain
academic were it not so crucial in determining our judgments regarding which creatures deserve
protection and which ones can be eaten or have their habitats destroyed. If we feel that culture is
a purely human construct, and that animals, as Descartes asserted over two centuries ago, are ma-
chines whose brain movements can be influenced through external training, we quickly come to
conclusions resembling those of his student, Malebranche, who, when his neighbor asked why he
was thrashing his dog, declared that animals are “inanimate machines”—“Do you protest if I beat a
drum?” If we believe, even on a subconscious level, that we are dealing with machines, or simply
with meat, then arguing for an animal's protection becomes difficult unless it provides benefits to
us, material, scientific, scenic, or otherwise.
Increasingly, however, the research of primatologists points not only to highly developed ape
cultures in the wild, but to the creation of cultures among captive apes as well as between apes and
humans. Dale Peterson and Richard Wrangham write: “Apes are caught between two worlds, of hu-
man and nonhuman consciousness. Ape observers are caught between two parallel worlds, between
being convinced of apes' mental complexities and finding them hard to prove.” They are right that
the scientific mind will want harder proof than variations of bonobo culture observed in captivity,
