Cormorant : A Cultural History of Greed and Prejudice

Cormorant is the natural and cultural history of a 'greedy' bird that is hated across the world and the object of ongoing environmental conflict. It will have strong appeal to readers interested in natural history, in the environment, in human-animal relations and in contemporary issues of racism, prejudice and xenophobia.

How does prejudice grow and mutate? What does intolerance, when transferred from human beings onto animals, do to those creatures? And what, in return, does it do to us? Cormorant is the gripping story of a 'greedy' bird hated across the world, the object of global conflict between the fishing industry on the one hand and environmental science on the other. Gordon McMullan's book reveals that cormorants have been loathed for centuries, a detestation that has metamorphosed over time. Drawing on fields which include literature, art history and zoology, and ranging from America to China and from Britain to Peru, Cormorant explores racism, xenophobia and capitalism through the remarkable story of a bird. McMullan argues that if in the present we are to recognize prejudicial attitudes towards animals and our fellow human beings, then we need to look to the past to understand how those viewpoints have taken hold.