Ifzal Hussain
asked
Nicole Galland:
if we read about past centuries, people use to have more aggressive pets, and they use to treat them like Gladiators but, now people shear more emotional attachment towards their pets. Do you think, the relationship between human and his pets( can be a little golden fish too) have evolved with the timeline of history?
Nicole Galland
Hello Ifzal,
Good question. First of all, we can't really make sweeping generalizations about all of history and all historical cultures. There are many eras and many regions, as well as class structures and cultural norms and taboos, and there's no single truism that can be applied everywhere equally.
That said, there are some generalizations that can be safely asserted about "the western world" over the past few centuries. One of these is the rise of pets-qua-pets. In other words, today people are more likely than in the past to own a domesticated animal purely the purpose of companionship and pleasure. Dogs, cats, goldfish, lizards, horses, goats, rabbits, chickens, etc in days of yore would have been chiefly valued for being (a) useful/practical, (b) tasty, and/or (c) implying high status or wealth for their owner in some way. Now they just have to be cute. the domino effect: we often treat the animals differently, which conditions them to behave differently, which further encourages us to treat them differently (i.e. value them for their cuteness), etc. But that's not a universal truth. My Irish husband and I STILL disagree about our collective relationship with our dog - even after I wrote a book about the three of us!
Good question. First of all, we can't really make sweeping generalizations about all of history and all historical cultures. There are many eras and many regions, as well as class structures and cultural norms and taboos, and there's no single truism that can be applied everywhere equally.
That said, there are some generalizations that can be safely asserted about "the western world" over the past few centuries. One of these is the rise of pets-qua-pets. In other words, today people are more likely than in the past to own a domesticated animal purely the purpose of companionship and pleasure. Dogs, cats, goldfish, lizards, horses, goats, rabbits, chickens, etc in days of yore would have been chiefly valued for being (a) useful/practical, (b) tasty, and/or (c) implying high status or wealth for their owner in some way. Now they just have to be cute. the domino effect: we often treat the animals differently, which conditions them to behave differently, which further encourages us to treat them differently (i.e. value them for their cuteness), etc. But that's not a universal truth. My Irish husband and I STILL disagree about our collective relationship with our dog - even after I wrote a book about the three of us!
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