As an object of anthropological inquiry, trophy hunting occupies a marginal position at best—due in part to the pronounced moral assessments it seems to provoke. Questioning this lack of attention, the present article interrogates the role that hunting, as a discursive practice, may have in what has been defined as the “species” turn in anthropology. Overall, the article argues that the type of narratives promoted under the multispecies ethos and the discursive renditions that hunters produce of their experiences share a similar semiotic mechanism in the way both genres incorporate nonhumans as active (even if tacit) coauthors of said narratives—via the works of a semiotic process defined as entextualization. In consequence, this analogous structuring allows for the recognition of a common ethical ground toward nonhumans in practices that may intuitively read as having radically divergent ethical agendas: an important lesson not only for wildlife conservation efforts, but also for the overall multispecies approach.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.