Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo - (Environment and Society) by Daniel Vandersommers

About the Book

"Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo is a biographical study of a single historical zoo, the National Zoological Park of Washington, D.C., from 1887 to 1920. Each chapter centers animals, and each looks from a different angle at the influential science of popular zoology in order to shed new light on the complex, entangled relationships between humans and animals. Daniel Vandersommers's goal is twofold. First, through narrative, he shows how zoo animals always ran away from the zoo. This is meant literally: animals escaped frequently. Even more, though, this is meant figuratively. Living, breathing, historical zoo animals ran away from their cultural constructions, and these constructions ran away from the living bodies they were made to represent. His book shows that the resulting gaps produced by escapes - by runaway animals - contain concealed, distorted, and erased histories worthy of uncovering. Second, the book shows how the popular zoology fostered by the National Zoo shaped every aspect of American science, culture, and conservation during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. Between the 1880s and World War I, as intellectuals debated Darwinism and scientists institutionalized the laboratory, zoological parks appeared suddenly at the heart of nearly every major American city, captivating tens of millions of visitors. Vandersommers follows stories previously hidden within the historical zoo in order to help us reconsider the place of zoos and its inhabitants in the twenty-first century"--

Book Synopsis

Finalist: George Perkins Marsh Prize

Finalist, Susanne M. Glasscock Book Prize

Winner: Ohio Academy of History Junior Scholar Publication Award

Founded amid the urban commotion of Washington, DC, before the dawn of the twentieth century, the National Zoological Park opened to "preserve, teach, and conduct research about the animal world." Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo is a study of this important cultural landmark from 1887 to 1920. Centered on the animals themselves, each chapter looks from a different angle at the influential science of popular zoology in order to shed new light on the complex, entangled relationships between humans and animals.

Daniel Vandersommers's goal is twofold. First, through narrative, he shows how zoo animals always ran away from the zoo. This is meant literally--animals escaped frequently--but even more so, figuratively. Living, breathing, historical zoo animals ran away from their cultural constructions, and these constructions ran away from the living bodies they were made to represent. The author shows that the resulting gaps produced by runaway animals contain concealed, distorted, and erased histories worthy of uncovering.

Second, Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo demonstrates how the popular zoology fostered by the National Zoo shaped every aspect of American science, culture, and conservation during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. Between the 1880s and World War I, as intellectuals debated Darwinism and scientists institutionalized the laboratory, zoological parks suddenly appeared at the heart of nearly every major American city, captivating tens of millions of visitors. Vandersommers follows stories previously hidden within the National Zoo in order to help us reconsider the place of zoos and their inhabitants in the twenty-first century.

Review Quotes

"A profoundly insightful and wholly engaging contribution to the ever-expanding scholarship on animal history."--H-Net Reviews

"While this book is about one zoo, it could in many ways be about any zoo. Throughout the book Vandersommers does an excellent job of never letting us lose sight of the animals' perspectives. And while these perspectives are acutely painful, they are part of what makes this such an important book."--EcoLit Books

From the Ohio Academy of History: The 2024 Publication Award Committee is pleased to announce the Junior Scholar winner of the Ohio Academy of History Publication Award. This year's winner, Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo: Stories from the Animal Archives, by Daniel Vandersommers, is a moving and eye-opening history of the National Zoo through the lens of animal studies. By taking this approach, Vandersommers has uncovered a series of unusual and unexpected stories about science and citizen science, about activism and conservation, and about animals and the fascinating ways that zoos curate and challenge our animal encounters. His anecdotes are quite moving and for those of us who have been to the National Zoo, these stories add a richness (and perhaps a sorrow) to that place that a mere visit would never uncover. Vandersommers weaves a keen eye for detail with a sharp understanding of the history of ideas into a paradoxical story of Americans and their animals.

From the shortlisting committee, Susanne M. Glasscock Prize: "Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo is an engaging and insightful look at how the National Zoo in D.C. came into existence, from its early funding battles to how it collected animals for exhibition. Throughout the work, Vandersommers highlights the often-misguided passions of its founder and the tribulations of its animals, resulting in a work that raises questions about the ability of any zoo to bridge entertainment, education and animal welfare."

"Deeply researched, marvelously insightful, and delightfully absorbing, Entangled Encounters at the National Zoo examines the complexities and contradictions inherent in the modern zoo. Vandersommers shows how the Smithsonian Institution's National Zoological Park became a bustling site of wonder, entertainment, education, wildlife conservation, humane discourse, cultural advancement, civic pride, and the production and popularization of scientific and medical knowledge. At the same time, he reveals the darker side of this wildly popular and influential institution, which has embodied racist and nativist thinking, projected nationalism and imperial power, epitomized human dominion over non-humans, and been marred by the "violence of captivity" that permeates its very core. This outstanding book not only nicely captures the paradoxical, tangled layers of meaning associated with placing wildlife on public display, but also shows how zoos have come to occupy the gap between human expectations and the animals themselves."--Mark V. Barrow Jr., author of Nature's Ghosts: Confronting Extinction from the Age of Jefferson to the Age of Ecology