How much of what we know about animals is actually just an assumption? From dominant males and passive females to stigmas around same-sex sexual behavior, ideas from our human world influence our understanding of the nonhuman one.

Ambika Kamath is a behavioral ecologist and evolutionary biologist, and Melina Packer is a scholar of race, gender and sexuality. Together they wrote the book Feminism in the Wild: How Human Biases Shape Our Understanding of Animal Behavior. They join us to unpack some long-held ideas in biology, explain why these ideas are so powerful, and imagine how we might open our eyes to animal behavior that defies our expectations.

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Credits: Threshold Conversations is produced by Sam Moore. Our music is by Todd Sickafoose. Amy Martin is our host and executive producer.

Resources and Links:

Episode transcript

Feminism in the Wild from MIT Press

The paper on female birdsong by Michelle Hall and colleagues

Amy’s Substack, Letters to Earthlings