When Animals Speak. Eva Meijer
human is similarly a cultural construction and not a universal truth (Derrida 2008), as I will discuss in more detail below. Ascribing use of language only to humans is common in the Western philosophical tradition.
Recent research into non-human animal languages supports the view that the differences between human and non-human animals with regard to language, cognition, and culture are differences of degree and not of kind (Bekoff 2002; Crane 2015; Meijer 2016; Peterson 2012; Slobodchikoff 2012; Smuts 2001; see also Darwin 1872). Developing a non-anthropocentric view of language, as well as addressing other forms of non-human animal exclusion more generally, however, means more than simply demonstrating that other animals are like humans in significant respects. It also demands a reformulation of those concepts that are defined by exclusion, such as language. In order to be able to do this, we first need to take a closer look at the history of these concepts to better understand how existing ideas about non-human animals and their languages are formed and how they are connected. This critical investigation can then function as a starting point for the building of new relations with other animals. Including non-human animal perspectives in the processes of such change is necessary, because otherwise it would once again be a matter of humans deciding what is best for other animals. In chapters 2 and 3, I focus on this positive movement, and concentrate on rethinking animal languages, ways to study them, and the building of common worlds with other animals.
In this chapter, I trace the interconnections between the concepts “language” and “animal,” to get a better understanding of how existing ideas about non-human animals and language are formed, and of how non-human animal exclusion is intertwined with our understanding of language.1 I then problematize these understandings and investigate how we can move beyond them, doing so in three steps. In the next section, I focus on the interconnections between language, reason, and “the animal” by discussing the relation between human language and non-human animal exclusion in the work of René Descartes and Martin Heidegger. These philosophers both saw a clear distinction between humans and other animals, partly due to the fact that other animals do not use human language, as well as a view of reason as exclusively human. In the writings of Descartes we find a clear example of how making the perceived rational superiority of humans—as expressed in human language—the standard by which other animals are measured constitutes a discourse in which non-human animals are not able to express themselves meaningfully; they cannot respond to what is asked of them because the questions are framed in such a way that they are excluded. In Heidegger’s view, which stems from a very different theoretical starting point than that of Descartes, humans are also separated from all other animals ontologically, again largely due to the defining of language as exclusively human. This leads to a situation in which non-human animals are seen as not having the same privileged understanding of themselves as beings in the world as do humans, which has far reaching consequences for their existence, and leads to a situation in which they cannot build meaningful common worlds with humans and vice versa. In the second section of this chapter, I turn to the work of Jacques Derrida, who provides an alternative way of thinking about non-human animals and language, one which not only complicates the stereotypical views about the animal that we find in part of the philosophical tradition, but also critically examines the construction of the human subject to which it is connected. While his critique is valuable, and offers a good starting point for rethinking relations, it provides only a negative view of non-human animals, language, and human-animal relations. This is unfortunate, because in order to adequately address anthropocentrism, we need first to redefine these concepts in and through interaction with non-human animals. In the final section of the chapter, I therefore sketch the beginnings of an alternative.
Human Language and the Animal
Defining language and reason as solely human capacities is often linked to seeing humans as fundamentally different from non-human animals, and can lead to excluding the latter from the moral and political realms. Perhaps the most extreme conclusions in these regards are found in the work of René Descartes, who introduced certain key questions about human and non-human animals (Derrida 2008; Melehy 2006). Descartes saw non-human animals as a type of machine—he called them “bêtes-machines”—because they cannot think, an idea that follows from the fact that they do not speak using human language.2 In a 1646 letter to the Marquess of Newcastle, he explains this as follows: non-human animals can react to words that are spoken by humans, which is an expression of their passions. For example, a magpie can say goodbye to “its mistress.”3 According to Descartes, the magpie does not think when doing this, but simply expresses the hope of eating. He saw a similar pattern in dogs, horses, and monkeys: what they are taught to perform is always an expression of some passion and therefore they can perform it without any thought. Because other animals can express their passions, they would also be able to express their thoughts if they had any. But they never express thoughts in words, from which we can conclude that they never have thoughts. Descartes understands that not all non-human animals can speak in human language, but the ones who cannot do so physically show no sign of attempting to use any other means to express their thoughts. Non-human animals demonstrate that they lack any language with which to express themselves because they do not respond when a human asks them a question. They might react, but they never respond; they never show humans that they understand what they are saying (Descartes [1638] 1985). In addition to the fact that other animals never respond with words or signs to what is asked of them, they do not learn to imitate humans; they do not try to be as humans are, from which, according to Descartes, we can also conclude that they do not think (ibid.).
Descartes argues that everyone who observes non-human animals sees these two things that set them apart from human actions, namely that they do not respond and do not imitate humans. Therefore no one could judge that there was in them a true sentiment or true passion (see also Derrida 2008, 83). Their passions are, in contrast, purely mechanical reactions to impulses. Descartes compares these to clocks. According to Descartes, perception is unreliable, and this view of non-human animal minds is a judgment, not a sentiment or perception. Another judgment follows from the judgment that other animals do not think: that they do not have true sentiments or passions, from which follows that they function as machines.
These ideas are not just statements about non-human animals. Descartes delineates both what is meant by “animal” and what is meant by “response”—similar to the way in which language, human, and the political community are defined in relation to each other in Aristotle’s work (Derrida 2008, 84; Melehy 2006). In one movement, Descartes draws a line between humans and other animals, and between reaction and response, in which “response” is understood as responding to questions asked by humans in such a way as to demonstrate one’s capacity to think. He does so not by providing an answer to the question of whether or not non-human animals actually think, but by rephrasing the question, which reformulates the discourse surrounding animals (Derrida 2008, 83). This becomes clear when we compare his views to those of Montaigne concerning non-human animals. Montaigne ([1595] 1958) argues that different species of animal have their own language, and that communication is possible between members of different species.4 Humans cannot see or understand the internal motions and secrets of other animals; this is, however, not a defect on the part of the animals, it is mutual, and it would be vanity for humans to think otherwise. Different species have different (complex) languages, as do different groups of humans. The fact that humans might not be able to speak with other animals as they can speak with other humans does not mean that humans are incapable of understanding what they mean, and vice versa. In response, Descartes ([1646] 1991) argues that humans cannot attribute thought or understanding to animals, because they imitate humans only in those actions that are not guided by human thoughts, thereby introducing skepticism as regards their minds, and presenting their minds as closed off from humans because they do not speak in human language. According to Descartes, humans only demonstrate that they are not machines, but have souls and think, by speaking.
The difference between Montaigne and Descartes is not simply a difference in perception or observation, but rather a difference in method and in understanding of the underlying concepts (Melehy 2006). Montaigne