ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses how the collective movement of dogs and the people in urban space can be conceptualized as a trans-species urban crowd, threatening a certain public order. It investigates the phenomenon of so-called animal hoarding, the construction of deviance, and the effect of stigmatization processes—the strengthening of norms—by examining the explanations and management of urban animal hoarding. The chapter looks at how cat ladies are portrayed in international popular culture and within urban management. It brings out is a kind of wonder concerning the connectedness of the specific human/animal encounters, using a much broader ontology of modernity, purification, taxonomies, and identity politics. The chapter also suggests and embraces an analytical kinship to seemingly different urban phenomena: the handling of feces and other waste through urban metabolism, subcultural formations such as graffiti writing, along with public manifestations and social movements.
