Touching Trunks: Elephants, Ecology and Compassion in Three Southern African Teen Novels

Abstract

Nothing may be more crucial to the future of animals within ecology than appropriately educating our children. In this article, the author explores the question "How do we educate children about wild animals?" through an examination of three teen novels about elephants. All three novels are set in southern Africa, and so can be contextualised (indeed, contextualise themselves) tightly within quite specific socio-political, racial, economic, and ecological conditions. Two of the novels - Dale Kenmuir's The Tusks and the Talisman (1987) and John Struthers's A Boy and an Elephant (1998) - are set in Zimbabwe's Zambezi Valley. The third novel, Lauren St
John's The Elephant's Tale (2009), was written by an ex-Zimbabwean but it is set in Namibia and South Africa. While all three novels are richly grounded in ecological specifics, and evince awareness of the geo-political dimensions of the region's elephant management programmes, the relationships between children and elephants also owe something to the "fairytale" human-animal relations so often portrayed in readers for younger children. Central to such relations is the question of communication, and this article focuses on the role of communication between child and elephant as a basis for a specific mode of compassion. The stories reflect, in effect, on philosophical questions of animal "mind" and emotions - now extensively discussed in ethological, philosophical and even neurological disciplines - of the place of fiction in attitudinal education, and of the role of language and of physical embodiment. Finally, the author questions to what extent such individualised contact (what Acampora calls "corporal compassion") is sustainable - as opposed to the pursuit of more abstract ecological or "management" goals - and returns to the ambiguity of the opening question: not only how we have taught our children up to the present, but also how we ought to teach them in the face of an ecologically insecure and increasingly non-wild future.

Opsomming
Niks is noodsaakliker vir die toekomstige welsyn van diere as om ons kinders toepaslik op te voed nie. In hierdie artikel verken die outeur aan die hand van drie jeugromans oor olifante die volgende vraag: "Hoe leer ons kinders oor en van wilde diere?". Al drie romans speel af in Suider-Afrika, en kan derhalwe stewig gekontekstualiseer word binne spesifieke sosiopolitieke, ekonomiese en ekologiese omstandighede. Twee van die romans - Dale Kenmuir se The Tusks and the Talisman (1987) en John Struthers se A Boy and an Elephant (1998) - speel af in Zimbabwe se Zambezi-vallei. Die derde roman, Lauren St John se The Elephant's Tale (2009), is deur 'n voormalige Zimbabwier geskryf, maar word ruimtelik geplaas binne Namibie en Suid-Afrika. Al drie romans is ryk aan ekologiese besonderhede en vertoon 'n bewustheid vir die geopolitiese dimensies van die streek se olifant­bestuursprogramme. Die verhoudings tussen kinders en olifante in die tekste kan ook toegeskryf word aan die "sprokiesagtige" mens-dier-verhoudings wat so dikwels in jeugletterkunde uitgebeeld word. Sentraal tot sulke verhoudings is die kwessie van kommunikasie, en hierdie artikel fokus hoofsaaklik op die rol van kommunikasie tussen kind en olifant as grondslag vir 'n spesifieke vorm van deernis. Die verhale laat die leser nadink oor filosofiese vrae rondom die "verstand" en emosies van diere, wat tans breedvoerig in etologiese, filosofiese en selfs neurologiese studievelde bespreek word. Dit opper ook vrae oor die waarde van fiksie in die bepaling van houdings, asook die rol van taal en van fisiese beliggaming. Die outeur bevraagteken die omvang waartoe sulke ge"individualiseerde kontak (wat Acampora "liggaamlike/ tasbare deernis" noem) volhoubaar is - in teenstelling met die najaag van meer abstrakte ekologiese of bestuursdoelwitte. Ten slotte word daar teruggekeer na die dubbelsinnigheid van die openingsvraag: die vraag is nie slegs hoe ons ons kinders tot nou toe opgevoed het nie, maar ook hoe ons hulle behoort te leer in die lig van 'n ekologies onseker toekoms.