About this item
The unexpected and fascinating interspecies relationship between humans and horseshoe crabs. Horseshoe crabs are considered both a prehistoric and indicator species. They have not changed in tens of millions of years and provide useful data to scientists who monitor the health of the environment. From the pharmaceutical industry to paleontologists to the fishing industry, the horseshoe crab has made vast, but largely unknown, contributions to human life and our shared ecosystem. Catch and Release examines how these intersections steer the trajectory of both species' lives, and futures. Based on interviews with conservationists, field biologists, ecologists, and paleontologists over three years of fieldwork on urban beaches, noted ethnographer Lisa Jean Moore shows how humans literally harvest the life out of the horseshoe crabs.
About the Author
I am a feminist medical sociologist and professor at Purchase College, State University of New York. I live in Crown Heights, Brooklyn with my three daughters ages 19, 17, and 8. We also live with two dogs (shelter mixed breeds from North Shore Animal League) , a lovely cat named Pigeon, and four bee hives on our roof. My work examines human bodies, body parts and fluids in sociocultural contexts. I have written about human sperm, genital anatomy, and human breast milk.
For three years, Mary Kosut and I worked together studying urban beekeepers and bees in New York City. Buzz: Urban Beekeeping and the Power of the Bee was published in November, 2013.
My newest animal studies project is about Atlantic Horseshoe Crabs entitled Catch and Release: The Enduring, yet Vulnerable, Horseshoe Crab and is now available i from New York University Press.
