SLÆGTSKAB MED DYR

Abstract

This article discusses the different forms of connections and relatedness between human
 beings and animals under the heading: Kinship with animals. It is based on an
 ethnographic study of involuntary childlessness and procreative technologies in
 Denmark and takes as its starting point the multiple ways childless people make
 analogies to the animal kingdom when they reflect on and recount their infertility and
 childlessness. As an example infertile men and women draw analogies to animal
 reproduction in order to naturalise and legitimise their wish for children, and they
 compare themselves to experimental animals in order to express their experiences
 with fertility treatment. Some also refer to their actual relationships with their pets
 when they consider, for instance, adoption as a solution to their childlessness. The
 article demonstrates that the ways childless people “think with” and relate to animals
 are but particular manifestations of a more general Western inclination to integrate
 pets in human kinship practices and family life. Kinship with animals, however, has
 its limitation. While pets can be thought of and treated as children and family members,
 they cannot reproduce personal identity and they cannot connect people in time and
 ensure genealogical progression and relatedness.