The second objection to Derrida’s remark is that there is political power in explicating animal speech and voice, and in addressing the epistemic dimensions of violence inherent in viewing non-human animals as silent (chapter 4). Who speaks, who is heard, and who determines this are important questions in political interspecies interactions. As we have already seen, there is a strong connection between anthropocentrism—seeing language as exclusively human—and the borders of the political community. Viewing other animals as silent and incapable of language and speech—which is often connected to other negative stereotypes, such as seeing them as unruly, unreasonable, or just plain stupid—reinforces their status as objects that we can treat in any way we wish. Furthermore, defining language as human language and excluding other animals from it by definition leads to a situation in which there is no common language with which they can address the harms done to them,13 even though they do communicate with us and try to make themselves known (Derrida 2008; Lyotard 1988; Meijer 2016). Investigating how other animals have been silenced as social groups14 can help to clarify power relations. Animal activists often point out similarities between human and non-human animals, and stress that other animals are subjects with their own views on life. Drawing attention to their languages and bringing to light what they say to us has great potential for improving their social and political status (chapter 7). Speaking for them and letting them speak for themselves are both important, and language is an essential tool in working towards change and developing new forms of political interaction.
The third objection arises as regards the meaning of “speech” in “giving speech back to animals.” What is meant by speech—who speaks and who has been allowed to speak—has changed over time, and differs between human and non-human, Western and non-Western cultures. It will change again, under the influence of social movements, cultural changes, and, in the case of non-human animals, empirical research. Exploring the history of existing concepts can function as a tool in envisioning change. In order to move away from anthropocentrism, however, we need to begin to reconsider the meaning of these concepts with other animals.
Rethinking Language with Other Animals
Rethinking language with other animals starts from two directions. First, it is important to recognize that humans and other animals share languages, or language games, in which non-human animals exercise agency. I will discuss this in more detail in the next chapter. Second, existing human concepts are already influenced by animals of different species, because humans and other animals coexist and coevolve. Raimond Gaita (2002) argues for taking the public character of language into account in interspecies communities. He gives the example of intentions (2002, 60) and states that it is wrong to think that this is a human concept that we do, or do not, apply to other animals. Rather, the meaning of “intention” is formed by interaction with, and influenced by, the behavior of different kinds of animals; humans learn what it means by watching the intentions of other animals and humans, by reading about the intentions of others in books, and by understanding their own intentions as intentions. In this view, stating that other animals have intentions is not anthropomorphic, not because of its truth value as a judgment of the mental states of other animals, but because animal intentions are part of what gives the concept “intention” its meaning. Because the meaning of concepts comes into being and can be subject to change in interactions with other animals, communicating with them in new ways can change this meaning. Humans can experience this at an individual level; if one grows up only with humans, a concept such as love might be mostly understood as love in relation to humans, something that a close relationship with an individual of another species in later life can change. But it can also take place at a social and political level; the concept of “rights” changes meaning—the way that it does with women’s rights—when animal rights are discussed, and would change meaning again if they were to be implemented in society and were further developed in interaction with other animals (chapter 8).
Rethinking language involves more than rethinking human concepts. Other animals have their own species-specific languages, something that will be discussed in more detail in the next chapter. Using the word “language” to describe communication with and between non-human animals is, however, contentious. It is seen as problematic in animal philosophy because of the anthropocentric history of the concept of “language” (see, for example, Calarco 2008; Derrida 2008) and in other fields of study it is often seen as anthropomorphic. Humans who argue for taking other animals into account in moral and political decisions are often accused of anthropomorphism, of attributing human characteristics to non-human animals (Donaldson and Kymlicka 2013a). This usually refers back to skepticism about other animals’ minds, which is often connected to the fact that most of them do not speak in human language (chapter 3). It is argued that humans can never gain insight into the emotions and language of members of other species precisely because they belong to different species and their perception of the world is radically different. A primary problem with this view is that it is unclear why species membership is a relevant characteristic in understanding someone else; there are many differences between individuals from different groups, and while these differences may influence possibilities for understanding, meaning is always generated between different perspectives and comes into being through interaction, not by referring to a pre-given truth. Species membership matters, but so do other characteristics. Second, sharing a language is no guarantee of understanding someone; human language can, for example, also deceive, and the risk of misunderstanding is always inherent in communicating with others. A third objection is that it does not take the public character of language into account (see chapters 2 & 3). Finally, the seemingly neutral stance of denying other animals certain emotions and mental states is also value-laden, and, more specifically, a Western cultural construction (Aaltola 2013; Brooks Pribac 2013; see also chapter 3). “Anthropodenial” (De Waal 2016) is not a neutral stance, and has long colored judgments about other animals (see chapter 2 for its influence on language research).
Seeing non-human animal languages as languages and exploring what language means in the case of non-human animals and in interspecies interactions can help us to see them in a new way and better understand aspects of their behavior; it can also help us get a better grasp of what “language” can mean. Investigating how language and concepts tied to human language use such as grammar, which are thought to be solely human, can also apply to the interactions and expressions of other animals, and can, in a similar way, bring to light elements in species-specific as well as interspecies interactions that have been obscured by denying language to other animals. It offers us a new framework for thinking about them, and presents us with new tools for thinking about and building relationships, which can enable us to gain a richer understanding of the concept used. In the next chapter, I focus on non-human animal languages in order to further develop a non-anthropocentric view of language. In chapter 3, I shift the focus to the relation between language and world, and the role of language in creating common worlds with other animals.
2
Animal Languages
Gua was born in Cuba in 1930. Psychologists Luella and Winthrop Kellogg took her into their house when she was seven and a half months old. They planned to raise her alongside their son, Donald, who was ten months old at the time. Winthrop Kellogg was interested in the comparative psychology of primates, and the Kelloggs had moved to Florida to work with psychologist and primatologist Robert Yerkes of the Yerkes Primate Center. Gua was given to the center with her parents in early 1931, and soon afterwards she moved in with the Kellogg family. They used her to conduct a new type of experiment, one in which they wanted to teach her to speak in human language. The aim of the study was to investigate whether language use was a product of nature or nurture. Even though Gua was a fast learner in many respects and surpassed Donald in many practical tasks (Montreal Gazette 1954), she did not learn to speak using human words, and when Donald started to copy her sounds, the Kelloggs ended the experiment. Gua, who was sixteen months