Among the Bone Eaters: Encounters with Hyenas in Harar (Animalibus: Of Animals and Cultures)

A professor recommended this book to me as an example of a successful multispecies ethnography, as well as useful reading for my thesis project, which looks at hyena perceptions. I did not expect a work so engaging and readable (I read a lot of dry academic papers, so this was a refreshing change). I would recommend it to anyone--especially anyone interested in hyenas and/or Ethiopia.

Intriguing study of interactions between human and animal "cultures" which reminds me somewhat of "Touching The Wild" , Both describe a very different type of interface between human and other species. Good story teller quality in his writing. Worth the read to open your eyes to possibilities.

A firsthand look at hyena/human interaction in Ethiopia. If you're interested in hyenas and how they behave in a semi-domesticated state, this book is well worth your time.

A great description of the author's encounter with the people and the hyenas. However, I was hoping for more description of hyena behavior.

very interesting, I like in depth information about the lives and habits of all animal populations and this delivered. Nicely written and easily read.

Fascinating story about Hyenas and People in Harar.

Great book!

This is a wonderful book--for the right reader, that is. I recommend it highly, but be aware that it is the personal side of Baynes-Rock's time doing research for his PhD on hyenas and people, so expect a current of comment about other researchers and their findings as well as the author's own.Ethiopia is a large place--100 million people, with a very complex ethnic mix as well as Christian/Muslim populations about balanced. Baynes-Rock did his research in Harar, an old and largely Muslim city. He's Australian, but his family is multicultural--he married an Oromo woman he met in Harar (she is from Shewa, another province of the country). The book is a wonderful account of his coming to understand and be understood by both Hararis and hyenas, so it's also an account of self-discovery as well as a young anthropologist's growing understandings of his research topic and of the people and places he researches.His character sketches are simply outstanding, both of the people of Harar and the hyenas of Harar. Note that this relationship is highly unusual, that hyenas have become part of folk culture and folk stories in a fairly positive way, untypical of the rest of the country, where apparently hyenas are seen as very dangerous and unpredictable. Hyenas are formidable animals and do kill people. Some people in Harar have cashed in from tourists coming to see the hyenas being fed, so there's some vested interest in preserving the animals. Most of the book is set in the old city of Harar (that is, the late medieval walled city, not the entire city), and the agriculture around it. That agriculture consists partly of growing khat, a habit forming drug widely used. Baynes-Rock reports a number of conversations and social occasions where he joined people using the substance. Harar was once the seat of the Muslim jihadi leader Ahmad Gran (there are several spellings) whose many attacks nearly destroyed the Christian Ethiopian state (in the 1500s; he was defeated with some Portuguese help).The author's accounts of his dealings with people are often entertaining, but underlying them is a respect and affection for Harar and its people. The accounts of his dealings with the hyenas in general and specific individuals are also entertaining and in the end, with a young hyena called Willi, touching. Some of his ideas about the relationship between people and animals are intriguing, and he speculates that the efficiency of hyenas in consuming bones accounts for the rarity of fossils of human ancestors. A couple of times he brings in some philosophers' work that is relevant but far less interesting than the rest of the book. Hyenas in the "wild" are on their way out, he says, but they could survive in a mixed landscape such as in Harar.

Good book

Great read