| Between 2008 and 2010, Rocky Mountain gray wolves were removed from the Endangered Species List, re-listed, removed again, and relisted once more. The agonistic controversy regarding wolves' place in the Northern Rocky Mountain states of Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming is part of a larger problem regarding the balance of nature and culture. Community discourse analysis is one approach for resolving increasing conflicts between humans and the rest of the natural world. This analysis helps us to understand how we symbolically construct wolves and what these symbols reveal regarding beliefs about and actions toward nature. This study analyzed a corpus of 593 reader comments from six new sources during the two months after wolves were returned to the Endangered Species List in August 2010. Three complementary methods were to used to conduct the analysis. The first method used was Grounded Theory, whereby comments were coded and sorted into the following categories: threat, threatened, social construction, proxy, natural, unnatural. The second method of analysis used semiotics and a Greimas Square to examine the natural/unnatural dialectic. The third method of analysis used Actor Network Theory to examine actants involved in the controversy. Analysis revealed that commenters most often defined wolves as unnatural animals. A shift in beliefs about where nature and culture should intersect seemed to underlie this definition in that humans are most comfortable with controlled and domesticated nature. Animals - and by extension all of nature - that refuse control are considered unnatural. This designation justifies control and destruction of nature. |
