The Afterlives of Animals: A Museum Menagerie

摘要

Christian humanitarians of the nineteenth century vigorously debated the question of whether animals had immortal souls. Would Fido faithfully await his master in Heaven as he had in life, or did his existence begin and end in this vale of tears? Present-day activists mostly eschew theological speculation, but as the prevalence of practices of animal mourning and memorialization suggests, animal lovers of the twenty-first century are no less concerned with making meaning out of the deaths of creatures increasingly viewed as members of families and communities.