Subject: Song: "Animal Nation" by Peter Gabriel

From: David Harris <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 30 Oct 2005 00:09:53 +0000

[email-masked], Thursday, January 13 2005

     I heard this song for the first time on the "Growing Up Live" DVD. 
Incidentally, around the time that I first heard this song, I was taking 
a class entitled "The Anthropology of Gender and Sexuality"--an 
absolutely fascinating course. One of the first pieces that we read for 
the class was an essay detailing the structure of Bonobo society. There 
are two aspects of Bonobo society that are of particular interest: First 
of all, it is seemingly matriarchal, which is very rare among the higher 
primates (humans included). Secondly, their primary method of defusing 
conflict and dampening aggression is sex. Rather than fight, as most 
other apes (again, humans included) do, they hug, kiss, etc. Anyway, 
I've always been a strong believer in animal rights (I'm a vegetarian, 
for example), and I've always been confident in the intelligence of 
those species other than our own. However, "Animal Nation" was, for me, 
a sort of an epiphany, because of the way that Peter Gabriel addresses 
the Bonobos as "Bonobo woman" and "Bonobo man". A lightbulb went on in 
my head upon hearing that. What a simple and, yet, profound way of 
addressing the members of other species! I'd always called animals 
"male" or "female", or even "boy" or "girl" (you know how you meet a dog 
for the first time, and you ask his or her human whether the dog is a 
"boy or a girl")--I'd never even thought of calling them "men" and 
"women". Well, on the final exam for that class, there was a question 
about Bonobos, and I did refer to "Bonobo men" and "Bonobo women"! My 
professor never gave my Blue Book back to me, so I've not found out her 
reaction to this. I'll have to ask her, someday. I'm curious.

Lyrics
I didn't meet you in the jungle swinging from a tree
I sat down at the piano you were playing with me
I couldn't believe all the things you could do
The apes I'd seen were in the zoo

They say we are unique with this language that we speak
But you have proved them wrong
Skinner and Chomsky how could they be so blind
With evidence this strong?

Intelligent life is all around us
Intelligent life is all around us

When you watch King Kong and the Planet of the Apes
Upon your video screen
When the animals die tears fill your eye
And you question what you've seen

Intelligent life is all around us
Intelligent life is all around us

Hey Bonobo woman, hey Bonobo man
Look in your eyes, that's where I come from
Hey Bonobo woman, hey Bonobo man
Talk to me now, I am listening

You can search the internet you can use your video phone
To call another friend
If we give you all the tools you can do whatever you want
Who knows where this will end

Intelligent life is all around us

Hey Bonobo woman, hey Bonobo man
Look in your eyes, that's where I come from
Hey Bonobo woman, hey Bonobo man
Talk to me now, I am listening

Hey Bonobo woman, hey Bonobo man
Look in your eyes, that's where we come from
Hey Bonobo woman, hey Bonobo man
Talk to us now, we are listening

Bonobo calling me now
Bonobo calling me now...

Starting to hear the things you said
Getting to know what's going on in your head
There's no humans on the line
But there'll be plenty more there in good time
Dolphins, Cats and Elephants
This is not some wild romance
Just look in their eyes and say it's not true
Look in their eyes they're checking out you

Communication with the Animal Nation
We are in communication with the Animal Nation
We are in communication with the Animal Nation
We are in communication with the Animal Nation...