Robin Kuehn
Community FellowBiography
Robin seeks to embrace the true questions that our community must consider in learning to coexist with the wild beings among us. She currently lives in the Hudson Valley of New York State, working in wildlife conservation. She has a Master’s of Science in Anthrozoology through Canisius University, studying the impacts of interpersonal relationships between certain humans and free-ranging non-human individuals. She also holds a Bachelor’s in Human Ecology from the College of the Atlantic, where she began to understand the complexities and nuances in how humans relate to the world around them.
Her background in working with human and non-human animals is diverse, including wildlife rehabilitation, wildlife and environmental education, field research, animal training, and domestic pet care and education. This has offered her much insight and compassion regarding the wicked problems our society faces in the way we negotiate the experiences and survival of other beings. Much of Robin’s experience has been working with raptors and other birds, and the extremely mixed reactions people have between beings of different physical shapes gave her pause to think about the way we traditionally value or devalue these and other wild lives.
Her current research interests include ideals among “management” of wild bodies by systems and groups with contradictory ecocentric or biocentric values, and perfectionist expectations of what physical abilities and social circumstances enable a good life in the wild. Her experience with wildlife rehabilitation led her to these ethical questions, especially when we feel obligated to make merciful decisions on behalf of the reduced suffering of one individual, or the betterment of an entire population or ecological community. What makes us feel obligated to intervene? What perspectives do we maintain that limit our acceptance of risk and change on behalf of other species?