Publication

In J. Chamel et Y. Dansac (éd.), Relating with More-than-Humans: Interbeing Rituality in a liwing World

In the Nepalese Himalaya, yak herding systems depend on cooperative interactions involving the shepherd with his animals. For the milking of the yaks, grazing and returning to the settlement, the shepherds are using inter-individual techniques aiming to build trust-based relationships over time. The construction of these relationships is negotiated on a daily basis between the two of them. Indeed, each of these relationships is lost if it is not nurtured. Strongly based on ethological results and studies on domestication mechanisms, this chapter will question the importance of setting up daily rituals and rhythms—as Erving Goffman (1974) has defined them for the human daily life—as a condition for extensive pastoral sustainability. At the same time, we will see how the shepherds organize their working life and their relationship with the yaks and their surrounding environment around strong moral values and a symbolic organization of the realm of life.