A Hierarchy of Animals: Anthropomorphism in Animal Crossing

In the world of Animal Crossing, the player is one of the very few human beings in existence. As such, interaction with other humans is limited. In fact, with the exception of other players met through the game’s online modes, the only other humans directly referenced in Animal Crossing: New Horizons are ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’, who exist solely through the letters they send to the island.

We won’t go into any further detail about the player’s seemingly incorporeal parents. For the most part, the game is spent interacting with a range of anthropomorphic animals, whether they’re permanent characters serving purposes such as running the shop or working as town hall secretary, or simply fellow residents and neighbours. All of the animals in New Horizons have their own quirky little personalities, their own likes and dislikes, ambitions, and styles.

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The problem

However, that’s not entirely true. Not all animals in Animal Crossing are your cutesy anthropomorphised friends, with the most prevalent exception to the rule being fish and insects. In New Horizons, we’re all-too-familiar with racoon landlords, hedgehog haberdashers and a whole myriad of other talkative critters. Fish and insects, on the other hand, are excluded from this position in society. They can be caught and subsequently donated as museum exhibits (1), or sold to the shop in exchange for bells (2). Initially, it’s easy to take this at face value. But, upon closer examination, this practice becomes rather sinister in the wider context of the game.

There seems to be a bizarre animal hierarchy at play here. For now, I will split this into two broad tiers. I will define all anthropomorphic animals - including permanent characters in the game such as Tom Nook - as ‘Residents’, while any non-anthropomorphic animals shall be known as ‘Beasts’. The two instances of Beasts that we have established so far - fish and insects - can be easily distinguished from Residents by their behaviour and appearance. They don’t talk or partake in activities with the Residents, and they are also much smaller and more ‘ordinary’ looking (they don’t wear clothes, and no matter how hard you stare into the eyes of a recently caught fish, there is no soul there).

The reason behind this hierarchy is unclear. In his Politics, the Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle defends a political system which suggests the existence of natural slaves and masters - a system that, he claims, “is a thing not only necessary, but expedient”. These natural slaves are pieces of property and tools of their masters. Aristotle argues that “he who can be, and therefore is, another’s, and he who participates in reason enough to apprehend, but not to have, is a slave by nature.” It isn’t clear whether the Beast ‘participates in reason enough to apprehend’ in the way that the Aristotelian natural slave does. However, it could be argued that the relation between Residents and Beasts is a sort of bastardised version of Aristotle’s theory.

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The problem advanced

Let’s assume this is the case. Fish and insects fall very neatly into the category of Beasts largely because there are no instances of fish or insect Residents. But are fish and insects the only instances of Beasts in Animal Crossing? Arguably not. In fact, there are a few different examples that suggest the distinction between Beasts and Residents to be more complex than it initially seems. I will discuss these below.

Next to the town hall is a noticeboard which allows the player to read and write messages. When the player has an unread message, a small bird will be perched upon the board. Depending on whether it is day or night, this will either be a yellow bird (we’ll call it a canary though it’s never confirmed) or a white owl. They display all the characteristics of Beasts: They look like ordinary birds, they don’t talk, and when you approach them they fly away. However, these birds don’t fit neatly into the Beast category in the same way that fish and insects do, because there are also plenty of birds in the Residents category. Why should the owl Blathers, the museum’s eccentric curator, be gifted with anthropomorphic qualities while the noticeboard owl remains mute and, for lack of a better word, soulless? What deep existential qualities separate the yellow canary from Twiggy, one of the many chirpy avian residents? This is a problem unsolved within the game and, infuriatingly, none of the residents seem interested in even addressing it. Could this deafening silence be indicative of a sinister eugenics conspiracy? (3)

Another overlap between the Resident and Beast categories occurs in certain reptiles and amphibians. Much like fish and insects, frogs, tadpoles and snapping turtles can be caught, sold, and donated to the museum. But there are just short of 20 frog Residents in New Horizons (4). What makes this so uncomfortable is not only the fact that I could be selling my neighbour Gigi’s primitive relatives for financial gain, or trapping them in an aquarium tank. It’s the fact that Gigi herself is so cool about it. What is she hiding?

Finally, there is the question of fossils. These are buried throughout the island and can be appraised by Blathers and donated to the museum. Many are dinosaur bones but the player can also find a range of other fossils including reptiles, fish, ammonites and other prehistoric animals. The existence of these fossils in Animal Crossing has several interesting implications, but for the sake of keeping this essay brief, I will focus on one: the mammoth.

When on display, its bone structure easily resembles that of a real mammoth. It stands on four legs and is much larger than the player and other Residents. I’ve chosen the mammoth as our example here, because there is a Resident in Animal Crossing - Tucker - who either is a mammoth, or at least strongly resembles one. Tucker is roughly the same size as the player, making him much smaller than the mammoth skeleton, and while Tucker has the same cartoonish design as all Residents, the mammoth skeleton appears much more lifelike, having more ordinary features and proportions. So, it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to suggest that the mammoth skeleton was once a Beast, while Tucker is definitely a Resident. After all, we made the distinction between frog Beast and frog Resident, so there’s nothing stopping us from doing the same here. That said, we can’t say for certain whether the mammoth - or indeed any other skeleton or fossil - belongs in the category of Resident or Beast because it’s dead, and also because we don’t have access to the bone structure of Residents. An unfortunate setback in this investigation.

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Conclusion

There is plenty more to be said about anthropomorphism in Animal Crossing (5), but I won’t discuss the issue any further. The comparison to Aristotle’s theory of natural slavery is perhaps one of the closest direct comparisons we can make to any real historical philosophical system. Plus, I don’t think any of the issues discussed above completely rules out that comparison. However, as will be the case with pretty much any aspect of Animal Crossing put under excessive scrutiny, there isn’t a clear explanation as to why some animals are anthropomorphised while others aren’t. Possible explanations also include magic, eugenics, or biochemical accident, but we will perhaps never know for certain.

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Notes

1. Blathers, the museum curator owl, will all-too-happily accept these donations as if nothing was amiss, and will regale the player with facts about the donated specimen. Interestingly, however, Blathers get squeamish around bugs. This is a peculiar trait in an owl considering insects comprise a large portion of their diet.

2. The official currency in Animal Crossing.

3. This is pure speculation and I am in no way accusing Nintendo of supporting such practices.

4. Although there are no turtle Residents in New Horizons, there are instances of anthropomorphic turtles and tortoises throughout the Animal Crossing series, such as Kapp’n the sailor and Tortimer the elderly mayor.

5. Such as why snowmen (referred to in-game as ‘snowboys’) are also anthropomorphic. Not only that, but if you don’t construct them perfectly, they will live in existential torment and curse you, their creator, as they slowly melt over time and eventually die.