“Effective Joint Action” in Wildlife Management: Ethos, Character and Network in Aldo Leopold’s North Central States Report

ABSTRACT

This article examines the Report on a Game Survey of the North Central States (1931), the first book written by mid-twentieth-century American forester and wildlife researcher Aldo Leopold. It argues that Leopold’s use of narrative strategies such as character narration and progression contribute to the report’s success in bridging the gaps in knowledge and perspective that separated the report’s audiences. The article also explores overlaps and differences between the terms “implied author” and “ethos” to examine Leopold’s persona as constructed by the narratives in his North Central States report and how it compares with similar scientific writings of his time.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 van der Linden, Maibach, and Leiserowitz, 1.

2 Corner, Shaw, and Clark, 5.

3 Whitmarsh and Corner.

4 Galafassi et al., 2.

5 Leopold, A Sand County.

6 Prince, 58–9.

7 Booth, 67–77.

8 Phelan, Living to Tell about It, 45, 39.

9 Aristotle, 22.

10 Hauser, 147.

11 Reynolds, 333.

12 Baumlin, xxi (emphasis in original).

13 Altes, 2–6; Phelan, Experiencing Fiction, 216–20.

14 Newton, 104.

15 Leopold, “Forestry and Game Conservation”; “The National Forests”; “Pineries and Deer on the Gila.”

16 Leopold, “Prospectus,” 11.

17 Whipple; Prentice; Lovejoy; Review, 11; Moore, 748.

18 Leopold, Leopold to Lovejoy; Leopold to Hunt.

19 Leopold, “Revised Distribution.”

20 Leopold, “Proposed Insert Slip.”

21 Leopold, Report on a Game Survey, 64–6.

22 Ibid., 65.

23 Ibid., 65–6.

24 Lejano, Ingram, and Ingram.

25 The “non-professional” category excludes subsistence hunters, particularly Native Americans, who were not considered “sport” hunters. See Warren; and Cryer, for ways Aldo Leopold served the sport hunting movement and its effects on indigenous hunters.

26 Leopold, Report on a Game Survey, 77–8.

27 Ibid., 78.

28 Ibid., 26.

29 Ibid., 28.

30 Ibid., 5.

31 Ibid., 27.

32 Ibid., 28.

33 Gross, Harmon, and Reidy, 22.

34 Ibid., 24. Killingsworth and Palmer, 118–23; Miller and Halloran; and Ceccarelli, 15–19, also provide useful discussions of types of scientific rhetoric.

35 See, for example, Baldwin and Bowen.

36 Christy, 424.

37 Gross, Harmon, and Reidy, 192–3.

38 Journet, 453.

39 Ibid., 454.

40 Wells, 60.

41 Ibid.

42 Leopold, Report on a Game Survey, 108.

43 Ibid.

44 Phelan, Living to Tell about It, ix–x.

45 Phelan, Experiencing Fiction, 3.

46 Ibid., 216.

47 Leopold, Report on a Game Survey, 125.

48 Ibid., 126.

49 Ibid., 127 (emphasis in original).

50 Ibid., 108.

51 Ibid., 272.

52 Hyde, “Introduction,” xiii.

53 Leopold, Report on a Game Survey, 5.