Cattle: An Informal Social History [Paperback]

Laurie Winn Carlson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 2, 2002

We force them into crowded, sedentary lives. We harvest their eggs and artificially inseminate them. We fill them with hormones and antibiotics, and we feed them manufactured pellets instead of the food they were meant to eat. They are commercialized and scientized—in many ways, just like us. Laurie Winn Carlson's intriguing book examines in fascinating detail the relationship between people and domesticated cattle, a resource that has been vital to civilization but long ignored and neglected. She considers the impact of science, technology, and economics on cattle, and how they in turn have influenced human history. Drawing on a wide range of sources, she shows how cattle have been worshipped in some cultures and become a symbol of pastoral freedom in others; what links them to women and the family; how the beef and dairy industries developed in Europe and the New World; how butter influenced the Protestant Reformation; how the cattle cultures helped settle North America; how meat became industrialized and margarine appeared as the first plastic food; and how science today continues to transform the lives of cattle and their connection to human beings. "With our problematic technology," Ms. Carlson writes, "beef—and milk—is now a food that engages plenty of concern, conflict, and fear. We are absolutely dependent upon cattle. We just don't realize how imperative it is that we protect them from further genetic and biologic degradation." Her book is serious social history spiced with rich anecdotes and surprising historical facts. With developing concern world-wide about livestock disease, Cattle could not be more timely.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"Cattle have come on a long journey with us, from pastoral times to settled agriculture, from the New World to post-industrialism." So writes popular historian and children's-book author Laurie Carlson in this wide-ranging meditation on the relationship between humans and cattle throughout human history.

Though her narrative suffers from a somewhat scattered approach, Carlson has much to say about that long journey. Cattle have shaped human societies for millennia, she notes, figuring prominently in the lives and imaginations of the cave dwellers of Paleolithic Europe, the farmers of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, and 19th-century Australia, South America, and the American West, to name but a few. She stops in at each of these times and places, pondering curiosities as she does. Along the way, for instance, she writes of scandals involving tainted beef served to American field soldiers during the Spanish-American War and subsequent advances in food safety; the efforts of German scientists to reverse-breed cattle to arrive at the ancestral aurochs, extinct for nearly four centuries; the ravages of "zoonoses," or animal-borne diseases such as smallpox and cowpox; and the role of the cattle industry in the development of transcontinental railroads. She also observes that cattle husbandry has gone from an economic given to a source of controversy throughout much of the world, thanks to the rise of new bovine diseases and the effects of overgrazing on already threatened environments. --Gregory McNamee --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Carlson (A Fever in Salem; Boss of the Plains: The Hat that Won the West) offers a well-researched exploration of the symbiotic relationship between humans and cattle. Beginning with prehistoric cave drawings, she traces the history of cattle through domestication, agriculture and industrialization, which, she argues, has led to current concerns about food safety. In Europe, domesticated cattle herds led to the development of clans with social hierarchies and complex rule systems. She plumbs the link between woman and cattle: because women cared for the herd, Carlson argues that such societies were "largely female-dominated, or at least gender neutral." She examines the halcyon days of cattle ranching in the American West, exploring early conflicts between ranchers, the federal government and moneyed interests. Carlson pays particular attention to the effect American industrialization and science had on cattle and considers the ramifications of such developments as canning and refrigerated rail cars to carry meat across the country to consumers. She examines the benefits cows have brought, most notably perhaps the vaccine for smallpox, as well as concerns about mad cow disease and E. coli infections. Carlson reveals such historical footnotes as the role butter played in the Protestant reformation and makes sometimes unexpected connections, such as her ruminations on the link between selective breeding and the eugenics program in Nazi Germany.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Ivan R Dee (August 2, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566634555
• ISBN-13: 978-1566634557
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,308,775 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required reading for every cattle rancher., May 3, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Cattle: An Informed Social History (Hardcover)

For a sociology/history book, this book is amazingly readable. Although it does not hold itself out to be a treatise, it is filled with well-documented facts, and the book's endnotes and references provide a wealth of material for those seeking further academic materials. It was published before the case of Mad Cow disease was found in the United States in December 2003, but it contains a very informative discussion of BSE and discusses the outbreaks in Great Britain and Europe. It presents a balanced view of the commercial cattle industry in the U.S., addressing both its problems and benefits, without advocating positions or taking sides. I bought extra copies to give to my cattle grower friends, including those who are trying to raise grass-fed cattle to supply the growing demand for grass-fed beef and dairy products raised without growth hormones, antibiotics, or stimulants.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting reading for boviphiles, June 24, 2008

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h. prints "hoofprints" (Pennsylvania United States) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Cattle: An Informal Social History (Paperback)

As a veterinarian, amateur historian and life long boviphile i am always interested in literature about cattle. This book is a nice addition to my short shelf of books on the subject. It is part science, part history and part philosophy, in the style of Michael Pollans books The Botany of Desire or The Omnivores Dilemma. The author seems not to be a farmer or zoologist but she has done a lot of research I think and she offers some interesting philosophical insights.

10 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Carlson really needs an editor, March 5, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Cattle: An Informed Social History (Hardcover)

The history of cattle was an attractive subject for a lifelong city dweller interested in learning new things. Unfortunately, much if not most of the book is neither a history nor about cattle. Carlson takes a quirky, scattershot approach to her subject and is never able to focus her thoughts. Unfortunately, there apparently was no editor to bring some order to the book, or even to correct the numerous factual errors. The author is something of a mystic, and as such uncritically collects myths and regurgitates them. Cattle have a mystical significance for her, and this somehow seems to give her license to include her ill-informed musings on many unrelated subjects within the pages of the book. However, there was some useful information about cattle and the products made from them scattered through the book; hence the two star rating. If you have a high tolerance for irrelevance and are not a stickler for accuracy, the book may be worth reading.