ABSTRACT
Symbolic interaction is by its very nature limited. Symbols are only one of the many vehicles of communication that human and animal species may utilize in order to communicate. Because symbols depend on abstract associations between signifiers and signifieds, their operation is at times uncertain, controversial, or even impractical, as it is often the case when human species attempt to interact with animal species. As Keri Brandt points out in this chapter, humans and animals – in this instance female riders and horses – in fact recur to a type of communication that can be defined as iconic. Icons, such as the various somatic forms of tactile contact between horsewomen and horses, embody what they represent. Meaning, therefore, can be understood as residing within the experience of somatic perception of the symbolic presence of the other. On one hand, this observation points to the pre-reflexive carnality of communication. On the other hand, it highlights the symbolism upon which the coexistence of conscious bodies depends. Horsewomen and horses, and more generally, humans and animals, thus seem to be united in a moment of ekstasis (see Vannini and Waskul this volume) that Brandt understands to be inevitably gendered and specied.
