Humans and Animals in Northern Regions

Abstract

This review weighs the importance of human–animal sociality in Northern ethnographies through an examination of key concepts such as totemism, ideas of the entitlement, and domestication. It shows how classic narratives of cultural evolution are linked to conservation discourse, whereas current theoretical conversations such as the “ontological turn” are rooted in older idioms of liberal egalitarianism. Using a broad comparative approach with literature from all parts of the circumpolar North, this review weighs the effect of older metaphors on the discipline and suggests that a focus on landscape sociality—or sentient ecology—would best represent Northern situations and stories.