Birds
The Anthropocene Project. An Encyclopedia
From breadcrumb-chasing café sparrows to the avian attacks in Hitchcock’s The Birds, we know the strange feeling when animals suddenly get the upper hand. How do we see animals as actors, in relationship to ourselves, in relation to one another? Are mammals that are especially close to us, given great importance, while others, animals more foreign to us, given less? This is not the case. Birds, not mammals are the best-studied species: at least when it comes to extinction. And those that receive the most attention from humanity have especially good chances that their habitat will be protected. Animals that human beings find charismatic, beautiful, or exotic have the best chances for support in the survival struggle of the Anthropocene. This economy of attention functions also in the case of birds, in favor of those with especially lovely birdsong. In the meantime, scientists now know that bird song not only serves the goal of species preservation, but can also be musical in an aesthetic sense. And if we grant that they can create music…
More information in the media section
HKW Talk on the Anthropocene. With Ursula K. Heise, Min. 13:40
HKW Talk on the Anthropocene. With David Rothenberg and Bernd M. Scherer, Min. 17:30
External links for further reading
plus: BBC: Earth Unplugged!The Lyre Bird, BBC, Sir Richard Attenborough
