La Domesticación y la Ganadería (I)

CONCEPTO DE DOMESTICACIÓN

“Proceso mediante el cual una población animal se adapta al hombre y a una situación de cautividad a través de una serie de modificaciones genéticas que suceden en el curso de generaciones y a través de una serie de procesos de adaptación producidos por el ambiente y repetidos por generaciones” (Price, 1984).

“DOMESTICACIÓN” VS. “DOMESTICAR”
“Domestication is more than taming” (Darwin).
+ La domesticación debe ser tratada en términos más amplios (rango de especie). Implica cambios morfo-fisiológicos y etológicos. Es un proceso genético.
+ Domesticar à Podemos “domesticar” (o “domar”) un determinado animal. Ello no implica que éste pertenezca a una especie doméstica.
Un animal puede ser domesticable sin necesidad de estar englobado en una especie clásicamente denominada doméstica.

OBJETIVOS

- Labores de trabajo.
- Alimentación.
- Control reproductivo.
- Compañía.
- Protección / Guerra.
- Cruces raciales / Genética.
- Socio-económico.

RESULTADO

- Mejora del manejo.
- Modificaciones:
* Morfológicas
* Fisiológicas
* Etológicas

ETAPAS

Zeuner (1963)

- Primera etapa: relación hombre-animal débil. Frecuentes cruces entre animales salvajes y cautivos.
- Segunda etapa: control reproductivo y selección previa. Objetivos: reducción de sus dimensiones y mejora de manejo. Evitar acoplamientos con animales salvajes para fijar caracteres.
- Tercera etapa: cruce de formas domésticas con salvajes. Las primeras, pequeñas, las segundas, grandes. Intentar mantener características de docilidad pre-seleccionadas. Fines productivos.
- Cuarta etapa: aparición de razas especializadas (cárnicas, lecheras, etc.) gracias a la selección llevada por el hombre.
- Quinta etapa: evitar cruces entre formas salvajes y domésticas. Se lleva un control de la población salvaje (disminución por sacrificio o “asimilación”).

Hart (1985)

- Sexta etapa: características comportamentales y genéticas de animales de producción - modificación - pérdida de adaptabilidad al medio natural - menor capacidad supervivencia y reproducción. Puede haber readaptación.

PROCESO

La domesticación supuso:
+ evolución hacia el sedentarismo. A ello contribuyó igualmente el cambio de mentalidad en cuestiones agrícolas;
+ formación de una civilización como tal;
+ pervivencia de especies animales menos adaptadas al medio.

Ellis Island (II) [Immigration and Inspections]

The processing of immigrants were different according to their purchasing power, so to speak, people who travelled in first or second class were better treated than “steerage” ones. When any ship arrived, federal officers in charge of inspection (specially administrative inspection) could get into the ship and do their processing there in a superficial way, but only with first class, sometimes with second class, too. If the inspectors thought immigrants were suspected of having problems with their documents or being sick, they were sent to the island definitely. The government thought people who could pay a travel in first or second class didn´t have to be analyzed in the way the “rest” were or in the same place.

The “rest”, that´s to say, the third class were moved from the Hudson or East River piers to Ellis Island in order to pass the whole inspection. They could be healthy, though they had had a throughout travel in bad conditions, what usually turned them into ideal carriers of infectious diseases. If they were approved the processing (administrative and medical), they can enter the country at last. The primary inspection (at first sight, during six seconds) was in the Great Hall (before called the Registry Room). The second inspection was based on the previous one, what mean that people tried to hide obvious signs of disease. Besides there was an important questionnaire called “the ship´s manifest log”, that everybody had to fill; it consisted on twenty-nine personalized questions (name, occupation, monetary level, etc.).

If the medical test with the questions and the documents were in order they could enter definitely in the USA. Sometimes there was any document that was missing or wasn´t in order, they had to sort out it before going to the pier; but, if the problem was in the medical test, the officers should decide, they could deport (about two per cent, approximately) or put into quarantine and treat people in Ellis hospital, observing their progress. The most usual reasons to deny the access were being carrier of chronic contagious diseases, having a criminal background (“become a public charge”), having an illegal contract or having insanity, in general.

There were two agencies that were in charge of the tests, “the USA Public Health Service” and “the Bureau of Immigration” (this one was reconverted on “the Immigration and Naturalization Service”). Although Ellis Island was also known as “The Island of Tears” or “Hearthbreak Island”, more than ninety-seven per cent of people passed the inspections. The other two per cent had to return to their countries again. A “Wall of Honour” shows all the immigrants that were processed in the island from its opening.

These acronyms designating diseases were chalked the clothing of people who were pointed out as probable sick immigrants during the primary medical inspection. the six-second medical examination.

- B - Back
- C - Conjunctivitis
- CT - Trachoma
- E - Eyes
- F - Face
- FT - Feet
- G - Goiter
- H - Heart
- K - Hernia
- L - Lameness
- N - Neck
- P - Physical and Lungs
- PG - Pregnancy
- S - Senility
- SC - Scalp
- SI - Special Inquiry
- X - Suspected Mental defect
- X (circled) - Signs of Mental defect

Ellis Island (I) [History]

Ellis Island was the main immigration station from 1890 to 1954. It is an island located in New York Harbour, in the upper bay just off the New Jersey coast (it belonged to New York State and to New Jersey State; now it is under jurisdiction of the National Park Service). It´s area has increased eight times over its original island, that was New York´s duty; the artificial portion is surrounding the first one. This creates a problem with competences between the two states, since both have a tax number for their portion of island. Nowadays, though the reason was given to New Jersey for the whole island, it is part of the National Park Service, like a Federal property. None of the two states have administrative responsibility.

More than twelve million immigrants entered the USA through Ellis Island, many others were deported. Although President Benjamin Harrison designated this construction as the ideal place to receive immigrants in 1890, it didn´t work as its objective until 1892. Besides, the island had its own previous history; it had had several denominations, like “Kioshk” or “Gull” Island, called in this way by local Indian tribes. Not only these nouns, but also “Little Oyster”, “Dyre”, “Bucking” or “Anderson´s” Island. But nowadays everybody knows it as “Ellis” Island because it was property of Samuel Ellis in the 1770´s. It was also harbour fort, a jetty for pirates, an ammunition depot and a key factor for the British during the Independence War before be converted to a Federal immigration centre. In Ellis Island (Fort Gibson in 1812), a parapet for three tiers of circular guns was constructed in order to make it part of a defence system next to Castle Clinton (at the Battery), Castle Williams (on Governor´s Island), Fort Wood (on Bedloe´s Island) and two earthworks forts (at the Verrazano Narrows).

The first immigration centre was Castle Clinton (or Castle Garden), from 1855 to 1890. There were almost eight million immigrants that enter the USA through this other island. While the Federal Government was constructing the new immigration centre in Ellis Island, the Barge Office (at the Battery) was used as the second and provisional immigration station. The third centre was Ellis Island, inaugurated in 1892, but in 1897 was burned completely by a fire. The new building was designed by architects Edward Lippincott Tilton and William Alciphron Boring, opened in 1900. This building obtained the gold medal at the 1900 Paris Exposition thanks to its beauty, design and originality (and for being a fireproof construction). In 1954 it was closed definitely.

The most important port for immigrants was New York Harbour, but it wasn´t the unique, there were others like San Francisco, Baltimore, Boston or Miami. Ellis Island is bound to sea companies, such as White and Red Star, for example.

Ellis Island was rising each year. There were more than one million of immigrants processed by year. The building was completed by hospitals, contagious diseases wards (inside or outside the hospitals) or kitchens. But always there weren´t enough bunk beds.

Apart from its use for immigrants, the island has had more utilities; during the World War I, it was used to intern German mariners and enemies together with ill USA soldiers that returned from Europe. The immigrants were processed on board ships or at the docks. The rest were transferred to other ports. When the war finished, Ellis Island returned to its work with immigration. In 1924, after the Immigration Act of that year, the processing of immigrants (medical and administrative), as well as refugees and asylum seekers, was diverted to embassies and consulates; those had to give a report on new immigrants. Ellis Island was from this moment a detention and deportation centre for people with problems with their documents, refugees and the displaced.

From the World War II, the main building operated as a Coast Guard training base, too. The rest of constructions were assigned to an internment camp for war prisoners, specially for people related to Axis forces, as well as deportation station.

The last utility was in order to hold members of Comunism or Fascism, from 1950 (due to the Internal Security Act of that year) to 1954, when it was closed. In 1965, the island was declared as a part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument. It was reopened between 1976 and 1984; this year was again closed in order to repair its installations. From 1990 it is the Ellis Island Immigration Museum and it´s visited by two million people each year. There are ferries connecting Jersey City and New York City.