Situating urban animals – a theoretical framework

Abstract

This introduction to the special issue of Contemporary Social Science: 'Urban Animals – Shifting Ecologies of Proximities', argues that the focus on urban animals is not to be treated as just another specialisation in urban ecology or biology, rather, as a perspective from where the field of urban studies at large, and the domain of social science more generally, can be re-thought in the novel and challenging ways. To do so, first, the text situates the question of urban animals within the emerging problématique of the contemporary urban condition in the context of the Anthropocene; second, it proposes six requirements which may prove valuable to widen the scope of current research; third, it introduces the papers composing the special issue.