From the insects that pollinate our crops to the great beasts that stalk our stories and myths, humans depend on other creatures. And we’re not making it easy for them. A 2019 United Nations study found that up to one million plant and animal species face imminent extinction due to human impacts, with climate change and habitat destruction the leading threats.
Parks and other protected areas can provide strongholds for wildlife. But preserving biodiversity may also require a change in our attitudes and behaviors.
Anthropologist Adam Johnson has studied what that change can look like, with an iconic Texas creature as the case study. On October 20th, UT Press will publish his findings in “Living with Javelinas: Multispecies Conviviality in Texas.”
“So much of the research that comes out is like, ‘When do we get it wrong? When does human-wildlife conflict come up?’” Johnson said. “But I'm like, "Sometimes we do get it right, and I think that needs a voice too. Let's figure out in Texas when we get it right.’"
Texan attitudes about javelinas vary. Some see them as dangerous – though there’s no evidence javelinas have killed anyone here, and almost all attacks are triggered by a dog.
And in their hardy self-reliance, javelinas embody Texas ideals. Their group solidarity is moving. In quiet moments, javelinas cuddle and purr with one another. They’re known to linger over their dead, guarding fallen compatriots from scavenging coyotes.
Johnson studied javelina hunters, and found a frank respect for the animals. But for “conviviality,” he looked to a Hill Country resident named Roger Gray, and to Far West Texas.
At the Rio Grande Village campground, in Big Bend National Park, he found a relative equilibrium between javelinas and people. Javelinas ignore campers, as the herd forages among mesquites. Park visitors may not know what a javelina is. But they know the rules: Admire the creatures, but don’t feed them – this is their home.
While javelinas are unfazed by campers here, that’s not the case outside park boundaries.
“Now it's the same population of javelinas,” Johnson said, “but it's not the same individual javelinas, right? So they're just learning. These groups are learning different ways to interact with humans based on the human context in which they're operating.”
And even within the park, the same javelinas will bolt when they see a person in the outback. It’s evidence that javelinas “construct” the place in which they live – different areas have different meanings.
That was the case at Roger Gray’s property. Gray made water and food available in his yard, and javelinas came to be at ease with Gray’s presence there, even napping at his feet. But on the nearby hilltop where the animals slept and mated, they barked or fled at the sight of a person.
At one point, the herd on Gray’s land began ostracizing one of its members. Because he flew solo, Gray named the javelina “Lindbergh.” As among many mammals, young males are ejected from javelina groups, to seek out their own territory.
Until Lindbergh departed, taking two females with him, the herd’s behavior was volatile; the established patterns in Gray’s yard were upended. It’s a reminder that wild creatures have their own social dramas, ones we only dimly understand.
Johnson said living “convivially” with wildlife means patient attention to such dynamics. It requires a constant negotiation of what’s acceptable to all parties – a “multi-species politics.”
If our fellow creatures are to endure, we need to engage that politics more intentionally, Johnson said.
“I think if we want to take conservation seriously, we can't just rely on these natural areas anymore,” he said. “We have to think about human spaces as being more-than-human spaces too.”
Johnson was recently named director of the Center for Big Bend Studies, and he plans to expand the Alpine organization’s research beyond archeology, to include other aspects of anthropology.
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