ABSTRACT
The idea that perception of an anomalous animal kind comes to us out of the nature of biological orders can be firmly laid aside. Animal anomalies are not installed in nature but emerge from particular features of classificatory schemes. In Purity and danger (1966) I thought that this was to say enough. I focused on the ‘nonfit’. Since no scheme of classification can cover the infinite variety of experience there will always be elements that do not fit. Then it is a matter of cultural idiosyncrasy as to which elements escape through the meshes of the classifications, and of cultural bias as to whether they are noticed at all, and whether, if they are noticed as anomalous, this provokes any special interest, either of approval or distaste. The programme that then seemed to lie ahead was to examine the social conditions that demand very concise and exhaustive classifications and those that encourage a lax attitude to fit and misfit. Questions about classification, rather than questions about the identification of particular anomalies or metaphors, have been the centre of my interests, starting with Natural symbols (1970) and going on to the present. The programme does not help to interpret metaphors or to recognize anomalies since it focuses only on features of classification that are sustained by practical use, so at first sight it is not easy for me to have something to say about animal symbolism. But there are many things that have to be said about the justification of interpretations of metaphors and anomalies in general that could perhaps be helpful.
