SLÆGTSKAB MED DYR

Resumé

This article discusses the different forms of connections and relatedness between human

beings and animals under the heading: Kinship with animals. It is based on an

ethnographic study of involuntary childlessness and procreative technologies in

Denmark and takes as its starting point the multiple ways childless people make

analogies to the animal kingdom when they reflect on and recount their infertility and

childlessness. As an example infertile men and women draw analogies to animal

reproduction in order to naturalise and legitimise their wish for children, and they

compare themselves to experimental animals in order to express their experiences

with fertility treatment. Some also refer to their actual relationships with their pets

when they consider, for instance, adoption as a solution to their childlessness. The

article demonstrates that the ways childless people “think with” and relate to animals

are but particular manifestations of a more general Western inclination to integrate

pets in human kinship practices and family life. Kinship with animals, however, has

its limitation. While pets can be thought of and treated as children and family members,

they cannot reproduce personal identity and they cannot connect people in time and

ensure genealogical progression and relatedness.