“Accustomed to Female Domination”: Women, Mass Media, and Animal Intimacy in Interwar Britain

Abstract

This essay analyzes four visual sources that shed light on the relationship between gender and animal intimacy in interwar Britain. They are all photographs that appeared in print media, and all relate to the production of wildlife films. The first is a montage of six photographs showing a woman’s friendship with the “strange savage beasts” of the London Zoo; the second is an advertisement for a popular remedy; the third shows a director shooting a zoo film; the fourth contains shots from a documentary made in 1938. The essay focuses on three women—Gladys Callow, Mary Field, and Evelyn Spice—all former schoolteachers who became involved in the production of zoo films. By analyzing this series of images, connections between contemporary ideas about gender, animal tameness, and colonial domination are established, reflecting shifts in the depiction of animal intimacy in early twentieth-century Britain.