Animal Companions

Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. The Material Conditions of Pet Keeping

2. Domesticating the Exotic

3. Fashioning the Pet

4. A Privilege or a Right?

5. Pets and Their People

Epilogue

Notes

Bibliography

Index

“Ingrid Tague’s well-documented and clearly written Animal Companions: Pets and Social Change in Eighteenth-Century Britain, the first systematic treatment of pet keeping in Enlightenment Britain, traces the evolution of affection toward domestic animals from the beginning of the century, when pet keeping was stigmatized as a waste of human resources and feelings, to the end of the period, when compassion for animals was seen as a necessary sign of genuine humanness. The discussion of the relation between pet keeping and racial theory during the Enlightenment is of particular interest.”

—Matthew Senior, Oberlin College