Burger’s Zoo and the Illusion of Visibility By Luna Njoku Dominguez The Royal Burger’s Zoo is a space of (in)visible encounters, both literally and symbolically. Offering an environment where visitors can experience first-hand the lives of the zoo animals they observe, the contextual space of the zoo structures the human/non-human dynamic in a number of…

By Maico Mariën The culling of surplus animals, animals which are considered to exceed the required number, is a common practice in many zoos around the world (Parker). Usually, this is a practice about which many zoos are not as forthcoming, and the killings themselves are usually not publicized about in high numbers. However, there…

By Fenna Veenstra Introduction This paper sets up an interdisciplinary dialogue on the process of the conceptual placing of wild animals, using the zoo as a case study. Connecting the fields of animal law with animal geography, it explores how animals are placed in abstract and material spaces, which creates imaginary notions of where animals…

By Kees Müller In 2014, global outrage took media by storm after employees from Copenhagen Zoo intentionally killed a juvenile giraffe named Marius by shooting him through the head. An autopsy of Marius’s carcass was performed en plein publique, and visitors—the audience consisted of children and adults alike—were free to ask questions, which in turn…

By Natalia Hernández Somarriba Surely, getting lost online, in dwellings of diverse depth and too many clicks, or playing with the little human figure to view a street in a faraway city you read about in a book, is a commonplace for many these days. Wretched internet, is the media that through different technologies for…

By Sanne Teune After the successful release of the PC videogame ZooTycoon in 2001, Microsoft Game Studios released its sequel, ZooTycoon 2, in 2004. Both games received favorable reviews, and the franchise sold several million copies in total. ZooTycoon 2 reached the top 20 best-selling computer games in the year of its release and maintained…

By Merel Hol On the 18th of May 2007, a male silverback gorilla named Bokito escaped his enclosure in the Rotterdam zoo Diergaarde Blijdorp. The event was the center of much media attention, asking how this could have happened and how it can be prevented from ever happening again. Bokito was such a phenomenon that…

By Pauw Vos During the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 many zoos were urged to close their doors in keeping with the mandates issued by their respective governments. In response to this a large number of zoos moved their activities to the virtual space of the Internet. With the help of live webcam feeds and interactive…

By Karlijn Herforth. Introduction Although it is not recognized as an official holiday, many Dutch people see the day after Ascension day as part of a long weekend. This and a particularly good weather forecast might explain why the many families, including packed strollers and grandparents tasked with keeping an eye on excited children, that…

By Marrit Meinema. Infected by the hype surrounding Pandasia on the park’s website, the new panda enclosure in Ouwehands Zoo, Karlijn and I rushed past the giraffes, lions and mandrills to see the park’s main event of the day: breakfast with Xing Ya and Wu Wen, the giant pandas. Making our way to the panda enclosure,…