Tracking Animals in a Pandemic

Abstract

The global pandemic puts a spotlight on human-animal relations and how human histories are intertwined with animal bodies. Environmental historians have demonstrated a steadily growing interest in investigating animals since the late 1980s, so thinking about animals in historical terms is nothing new.1 But our COVID-19 moment can prompt us to consider how environmental history—and, more specifically, animal history—can help us to make sense of the traces of human-animal entanglements in proliferating news reports. This article is part of a special article collection "Reflections: Environmental History in the Era of COVID-19"