Living with Wolves: Affects, Feelings and Sentiments in Human-Wolf-Coexistence (Human-Animal Studies)

With their return to Germany, wolves leave their traces in personal feelings, in the atmospheres of rural landscapes and even in the sentiments and moods that govern political arenas. Thorsten Gieser explores the role of affects, emotions, moods and atmospheres in the emerging coexistence between humans and wolves. Bridging the gap between anthropology and ethology, the author literally walks in the tracks of wolves to follow their affective agency in a more-than-human society. In nuanced analyses, he shows how wolves move, irritate and excite us, offering answers to the primary question: What does it feel like to coexist with these large predators?

Thorsten Gieser is a Lecturer in Anthropology at the University of Koblenz and a Research Associate in the ERC project »Veterinarization of Europe? Hunting for Wild Boar Futures in the Time of African Swine Fever (BOAR)« at the Czech Academy of Sciences. He is an environmental anthropologist with a focus on human-wildlife-coexistence in Germany, specialising in the return of wolves and hunting as a form of human-animal relation.