Book Review: Undrowned

 

Image: The cover of the book is a teal background. In a short red rectangle at the top, center, in white capitalized letters, it says "emergent strategy series." Across the top, 1/3 of the way down the cover is the title of the book in capital yellow letters with a 3D texture where the front of the letter is stylized with thin black lines. The text is underlined with illustrated waves. Below that is a stencil in dark blue of three dolphins circling one another. Below that, in white letters is the second part of the title, "black feminist lessons from marine mammals" in white letters also underlined by waves. Across the bottom in yellow letters is the author's name: Alexis Pauline Gumbs.

My immediate impression upon beginning to read Alexis Pauling Gumbs', "Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals," was that I could tell that the author is a poet. I have read a lot of books which focus on the intersections or overlaps with human experiences and that of other animals. Most of these come from a scientific or critical theory standpoint, which is a very different place than where this book comes from. Gumbs' poetic and abstract approach to discussions of human and marine mammal experiences is one I had not encountered before. I like that she mentions not being objective in the introduction as it is true that nothing humans ever do is completely objective. I share her criticisms of how scientists use "language of deviance and denigration" in studies of other animals as a good example of this. While scientific approaches take a great many measures to promote a more objective approach and this should definitely never be ignored, these things are often filtered through a subjective lens- one in which many human scientists- especially those invested in captive animal exploitation/research- create a narrative which reinforces human supremacy over other species. Don't let my paragraph here fool you, though. This is not really a book about science or why animal liberation is important. It is a book of meditations that are inspired by facts the author has learned about marine mammals. I admit, I didn't fully realize just what a woo woo sort of book this was going to be. It's clear in the blurb that it's a meditation, not a science or theory book though, so that's on me. 

Although I have read and enjoyed Gumbs' writings in a variety of books and places, I did not fully realize just how much she has been involved in creating. She is, "a founding member of UBUNTU... a member leader of Southerners on New Ground, member of the founding vision circle of Kindred Healing Justice, a founding member of... Warrior Healers Organizing Trust, and a member of SpiritHouse," and other projects and initiatives. Having followed some of these and learning more about others, this is quite the impressive resume.

Undrowned is divided into different chapters, each of which is its own meditation. While the author claims to have written the book so that the reader can read non-linearly or skip around, I decided to read it cover to cover. The experience was interesting and I imagine someone choosing to take more time with it or use it as a meditation-a-day/week/etc text would have a different experience. So there's a bit of versatility there. 

Gumbs refers to herself as a "marine mammal apprentice" and admits to being a beginner regarding the topic. This will show at times to those of us who have read a bit about these animals already. But, as a result, it simultaneously makes the book accessible to a much wider audience rather than limiting it to PhDs as some books focused on certain topics do. Gumbs also uses fairly accessible language in this book which also makes it able to be read more widely. I will admit, a lot of this book was not really my thing. I am not a spiritual person, I don't do meditations, etc but there was also a lot in this book that appealed to me- particularly the "End Capitalism" chapter and others with a more praxis sort of focus.

My criticism of Gumbs work would be that she tends to create a hierarchy of animals in a way that I don't think she intended. She refers to "advanced marine mammals" in the beginning of the book, but never really defines what this means. Many of the lessons that she urges the reader to learn from marine mammals can also be taught by a great many fish species which make up a far larger portion of marine life than mammals. (I recommend the book "What a Fish Knows" if you want a better understanding of this.) But, fishes are treated- likely unintentionally- as disposable objects in some parts of the book. The book's focus is marine mammals, so I am not saying that the book should have focused on fishes. I'm saying that it falls into the same trap many humans' love of other animals falls into- it becomes limited to or more focused on animals humans (incorrectly) think are more like us and animals not traditionally used for food in the west. For instance, in discussing the commercial fishing industry and why it must end along with capitalism, the reasoning is mostly based on how it accidentally kills marine mammals and how it affects the environment for humans and marine mammals. The prime victims of the fishing industry- fishes by the trillion plus every year- are a side note if that. Even from the perspective of only caring about marine mammals and humans, destroying the fishes destroys both of those people and we're already looking at saltwater fish extinction by 2048 if we keep going the way we are going. There is also a bit of a noble savage trope where she positively discusses the owner of one of the largest commercial fishing operations in their country being Maori and their taking a couple welfare steps for marine mammals. This comes across a bit as if Maori people are monolithic and that saving a few dolphins somehow vastly separates this capitalist venture from that of other commercial fishing operations- even if said commercial fishing is harming the most marginalized of Maori people. She does mention her conflict in this and struggling to know when to give credit, so I get what she was trying to do there. But, I really hoped for a more nuanced look at marine life rather than the same old anthropocentric binary of the minority of "advanced" marine life vs everyone else.

So, all of that criticism is to say that this is definitely not an animal liberation book or a scientific book. I am not saying Alexis Pauline Gumbs is not for animal liberation personally, (I actually think she might be ethically vegan, but I am not sure.) I am just saying that this book is a meditation book for humans inspired by, and is sometimes a brief ode to, marine mammals. The focus is on the reader. Nonetheless, I am glad to have read this book. It tackled these topics in new ways I have not seen before and that is always a good thing. I think fans of Gumbs work- both poetry and activism- will find something they enjoy and learn from within it.

This was also posted to my goodreads.