From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness
The article explores the link between cuteness and animality, focusing on depictions of so-called animal odd couples, with emphasis on the effects cuteness may have for manipulating and flattening the life stories of real animals and obscuring the trauma that leads to the creation of cute imagery. A...
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| Xuất bản năm: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/ejas, |
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| Tác giả chính: | |
| Định dạng: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Ngôn ngữ: | Anglais |
| Được phát hành: |
European journal of American studies
2024
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| Những chủ đề: | |
| Truy cập trực tuyến: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| id |
openedition-oai:revues.org:ejas_21339 |
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| record_format |
openedition |
| spelling |
openedition-oai:revues.org:ejas_21339 https://doi.org/10.4000/ejas.21339 urn:doi:10.4000/ejas.21339 en https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/21339 2024-02-23T01:00:00Z info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess article info:eu-repo/semantics/article urn:handle:20.500.13089/vw7t https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness European journal of American studies European Association for American Studies info:eu-repo/semantics/reference/issn/1991-9336 URI:https://journals.openedition.org/ejas Włodarczyk, Justyna animal studies cuteness oddkin odd couples James Oliver Curwood Edward Hicks The article explores the link between cuteness and animality, focusing on depictions of so-called animal odd couples, with emphasis on the effects cuteness may have for manipulating and flattening the life stories of real animals and obscuring the trauma that leads to the creation of cute imagery. After analyzing the vision of interspecies harmony in Edward Hicks’s Peaceable Kingdom, the article locates a shift away from the dominance of the sublime and toward the cute in visual depictions of peaceful interspecies encounters in American culture. Through a reading of three different versions of one narrative, James Oliver Curwood’s Nomads of the North and the novel’s two film adaptations, the article traces a genealogy of cuteness in representations of interspecies friendships and proposes a methodology called critical cuteness that makes it possible to alleviate the flattening of animals’ stories effected by the aesthetics of cuteness. The methodology is based on exposing the incongruity between the affective functions of animal imagery and their ethological interpretation and on recovering the individual animals’ life stories. Finally, the article suggests that the “cutification” of interspecies relations may be a strategy for diffusing the systematic violence meted out against wildlife during the colonization of the North American continent. |
| collection |
OpenEdition Journal |
| language |
Anglais |
| format |
Article ou chapitre numérique |
| building |
0/Bibliothèque numérique/ 1/Bibliothèque numérique/OpenEdition Journals/ |
| topic |
animal studies cuteness oddkin odd couples James Oliver Curwood Edward Hicks |
| spellingShingle |
animal studies cuteness oddkin odd couples James Oliver Curwood Edward Hicks Włodarczyk, Justyna From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness |
| description |
The article explores the link between cuteness and animality, focusing on depictions of so-called animal odd couples, with emphasis on the effects cuteness may have for manipulating and flattening the life stories of real animals and obscuring the trauma that leads to the creation of cute imagery. After analyzing the vision of interspecies harmony in Edward Hicks’s Peaceable Kingdom, the article locates a shift away from the dominance of the sublime and toward the cute in visual depictions of peaceful interspecies encounters in American culture. Through a reading of three different versions of one narrative, James Oliver Curwood’s Nomads of the North and the novel’s two film adaptations, the article traces a genealogy of cuteness in representations of interspecies friendships and proposes a methodology called critical cuteness that makes it possible to alleviate the flattening of animals’ stories effected by the aesthetics of cuteness. The methodology is based on exposing the incongruity between the affective functions of animal imagery and their ethological interpretation and on recovering the individual animals’ life stories. Finally, the article suggests that the “cutification” of interspecies relations may be a strategy for diffusing the systematic violence meted out against wildlife during the colonization of the North American continent. |
| author |
Włodarczyk, Justyna |
| author_facet |
Włodarczyk, Justyna |
| author_sort |
Włodarczyk, Justyna |
| title |
From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness |
| title_short |
From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness |
| title_full |
From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness |
| title_fullStr |
From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness |
| title_full_unstemmed |
From Animal Odd Couples to Oddkin: Probing Visual Representations of Interspecies Friendship through Critical Cuteness |
| title_sort |
from animal odd couples to oddkin: probing visual representations of interspecies friendship through critical cuteness |
| publisher |
European journal of American studies |
| publishDate |
2024 |
| container_title |
URI:https://journals.openedition.org/ejas |
| url |
https://ezproxy.univ-orleans.fr/login?url=https://doi.org/10.4000/ejas.21339 https://ezproxy.univ-orleans.fr/login?url=https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/21339 |
| _version_ |
1877292504106139648 |