I want to touch on another major component of domestication altering the body another result of domestication uh what I might do here is cut the lecture in half so that you have these smaller components which I think is a bit easier to digest um so whether I cut this in half or not this is still all you know the same lecture looking at domestic ation we tend to have this idea that domestication ended when the species were domesticated at you know 10,000 or 5,000 or 3,000 years ago or whatever but of course domestication is a process and even though we're talking about domesticated animals the results of that domestication continue even to this day as we impose new shapes and new traits on animals and then we look for new benefits and new profits for us this is the continuation of artificial selection selectively breeding animals for specific characteristics a size a shape uh more fur more fur more wool a particular texture or a particular ear shape or tail or feathers or whatever it happens to be artificial selection has led to the human creation of hundreds of breeds of domesticates including dogs there are about you know 300 breeds of dogs some say you know a bit more some say a bit less I've got a few breeds up there on that screen for you to look at there is no bird dog that's not a thing um but if you could get a bird dog right some people would probably uh jump at the opportunity why why have all of these different breeds of dogs to fulfill human desires some breeds are bred to retrieve um game like you know ducks or or geese or uh whatever some are bred to herd sheep or goats or whatever some to run fast some to dig right we talked about one at the beginning of this domestication lecture among the Clum peoples for wool some are simply bred because of a certain shape or whatever it is that somebody likes in the modern context with industrial methods of food production changes in livestock and domesticate breeds has accelerated not plateaued to produce the most meat and uh a better return for the money invested we want to grow some animals food animals fast very fast so we have and we still do inject hormones into pigs and chickens and cattle to stimulate growth to improve productivity again we talked about animals as products objects not subjects and we do the same thing for milk yield with growth hormones next is crossbreeding since the early part of the 20th century we have been accelerating that experimentation of crossbreeding breeds of livestock to create new breeds why to create domesticates that have more U you know fat composition or larger bodies and therefore more meat or whatever the desired economic you know beneficial trait happens to be we also find this in pets and in the show Industries with the creation of breeds that are considered to be unique or special or desirable to humans in one fashion or another on the screen you're looking at one breed of cattle which is not so affectionately named it's called the beff certainly by naming an entire breed directly after food and that process of production removes any individuality and this reflects us as a society our desires and how that impacts animals and of course in a more modern context we have artificial insemination we can now freeze semen and people are now selectively able to breed their animals to try to replicate the traits of particular parents maternal and paternal counterparts and there are shifting Desires in terms of what we want from our domesticates dogs were originally domesticated and bred for various types of work rated activities now there are still working dogs but more recent breeds are more for Aesthetics cats were never bred for work only for Aesthetics this is why we have partly why we have hundreds of breeds of dogs for work of of All Sorts many of them and then more recently for Aesthetics but only tens of breeds of cats um for Aesthetics now with all of these altercations especially with Aesthetics we have created not just new breeds but new health problems for the animals these are typically related to what ultimately amounts to odd body proportions that have been selected for including limb shapes and lengths and head shapes or Rostrum shapes for example hip dysplasia deafness heart disease blindness respiratory problem S as a result of of head shape are are all now fairly common in selective breeds of dogs and cats for example and of course you knew this was coming genetically modified organisms for instance pigs cows chickens they are bred mostly for one reason meat food consumption at least in this particular context in other parts of the world they may also be bred for other reasons pigs um have been genetically altered in a number of ways but one way by the biotech firm Genentech which is a us-based firm and separately by uh you know other firms such as the Chinese Academy of Sciences have found a gene marker that they can splice into the Genome of pigs that results in adults having a leaner meat because that's what the consumers demand leaner meat and a very similar but different approach was taken by the meat animal Research Center also a US firm which modified genes to create something termed double muscling increasing the muscle mass and therefore producing leaner meat both of these animals genetically modified to suit our demands the demands of a more health conscious consumer of course not only is that modifying the animals body but this comes with a variety of Health complications for the animals themselves again I'm focusing mostly on food as examples here uh partly because we'll look at food in this class and I study aspects of nutrition I am also interested in genetics and in the lab people genetically modify by animals to explore gene expression to see what happens if genes are muted or whatever in doing this actually the pet industry has also created something called the hypoallergenic cats cats that have been genetically modified why because people who suffer from cat allergies don't want to suffer from cat allergies but still want the cat and something similar to that is cloning considered the wave of the future allowing humans to maximize their control over animal bodies unsurprisingly research in this field cloning is largely driven by a particular industry the food industry but we also find some cloning in science for example cloning laboratory animals to ensure that all of the animals in the test are genetically identical which can be a very important control uh in terms of any genetic influence and again just a graphic warning a minor graphic warning because in the coming few slides I've got images of animals that are uh have gone through some surgery often to remove parts of their body that we don't want to have for various reasons uh in our and livestock Industries practices that are still very common in the United States to this day I'm going to continue on another slide because I've run out of room on that slide but another way that animals bodies have been changed and Modified by us is through surgical procedures the control of animal reproduction is a critical component of domestication domesticated animals and one way to control reproduction is through castration castration has been practiced for thousands of years to ensure that desirable traits are passed on and undesirable traits are not another way of saying that is who gets to breed and who doesn't in a modern context we spay and neuter our pets to ensure they will not reproduce and there are other forms of surgical modification that have been used for years as well particularly in livestock or purebred companion animals in the 20th century this close confinement of animals in factory farm production has resulted in a number of procedures performed on animals all of which are still performed on animals in certain contexts some of which are regularized in our very own meat industry here in this country one of those processes is called debeaking which is the amputation of course without anesthesia because that costs money but the amputation of the ventral portion of the beak of hins of course the male chickens are all killed outright but the hins are useful for laying eggs this is still done in some egg production facilities and if you heard that in the background that's uh my chicken making a lot of noise because these animals are are kept in such large numbers and in a small area they are living in very crowded conditions so if they get stressed which they are bound to do from time to time because of the conditions then they might you know harm each other or themselves with those beaks and from a purely economic perspective without any care that that is a living organism they might also damage the product which is to say eggs so the solution cut off the beak now whether not you're approaching this from an economic perspective or a biological perspective or an anthropologic perspective what's what's actually happening there you're removing living tissue in fact that's a part of the the skull of that animal now only the outer layer of that beak is a a kerene structure a sheath meaning that the beak and the bone are connected to the body there are veins and arteries and nerve tissues and Marrow and Bone Etc so it bleeds s and from a purely physiological biological perspective must be extremely painful another example of this surgery modification also from our food industry is a procedure that is becoming more common called tail docking in cows and pigs also without anesthesia because of the cost and again the tail removing the tail tail docking the tail is connected to the body via a whole series of connective tissues bone muscles cartilage veins arteries etc etc so you still have those same issues of uh you know pain but why do we cut off their tails because like the henss we keep them in close quarters crowded and animals like people if they cannot exercise or move uh if they are controlled in terms of of what they can eat and and where they can go and when they can eat and and they're removed from their social lives and they're forced to live in an artificial Factory then they get stressed and stress can not only result in animals harming other animals such as biting their tail but it can more frequently result in a series of stress related symptoms like you know high blood pressure and heart disease and diarrhea well that gets on the tail then if you're talking about feces and that's not good for meat production now what's a more appropriate way to address this problem rather than cauterizing cutting off that that tail space space would be a very you know appropriate way right our food industry tends to ask well tends to say okay here's a problem how can we stop that and keep increasing productivity without actually asking what is causing the problem and how can we prevent it and one last example we also perform surgery on our pet animals as well to make them conform to some idea of what a breed should be should look like and what we want or what we don't want from them breeds of dogs might have their tails dog or their ears cropped and we even extend surgery to cut away animal behaviors some people have their dogs vocal cords cut it's called debarking and it reduces the loudness and the frequency of barking or people want to have their cats declawed which is very similar to what we looked at in debeaking Decline it is the amputation of the front or the ventral portion of the cat's feet they're actual toes because the claw like the beak like the horn is connected to the body so it's basically like cutting off the the first digit of your fingers to prevent your nails from growing and the reason why people do these you know these things is to prevent you know sound or prevent harm to their uh Their Own Furniture society's needs and society's desires definitely shape animal bodies all right animals and people anth 274 let's stop there for this lecture on domestication I know that last part on altering the body can be quite challenging but really important and we've really only skimmed the surface so many different aspects to consider in regards to domestic and I hope that you find something in this two-part lecture engaging okay so let's wrap up this lecture on domestication by taking a look at the schedule again this week we have those two lectures the First on domestication which is a two-parter and the next on animals on display in performance and in sports going to be another engaging and in some places challenging but important lecture we have our readings which of course you can find in the weekly module and we have a new assignment this week this week we start our first discussion board so you have a essay post or critical thought post that is going to be due by Friday just as a quick reminder take a look over that assignment itself uh which you can find in the week for module and read all those guidelines you're not doing a comprehensive review of the course to date you're going to choose one or a couple of elements do a deep dive on those expand on those by pulling in some outside material providing questions critical thinking Etc really really looking forward to your critical thought posts okay I'll see you next lecture