THE CONNECTION BETWEEN DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AND ANIMAL CRUELTY IN PUERTO RICO: AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL STUDY

Violence against women is one of Puerto Rico’s most critical social problems and for this reason, anthropological thought is critically necessary. Some women in Puerto Rico are vulnerable to situations of violence and control through domestic violence while their animals become involved in the same tangle of abuse. Women’s voices about their animals have not been heard simply because nobody has inquired. I asked women survivors of domestic abuse whether or not their male partners had engaged in any type of animal cruelty against household and domesticated animals. My intention in conducting this research was to examine, both from an anthropological and from a gender perspective, the correlation in Puerto Rico between domestic violence and animal cruelty through ethnographic work. Interviews with professional shelter staff were conducted as well to establish whether or not women seeking shelter talk about their pets being hurt by their male partners—and if so, what consequences that abuse has for the women. My main objective was to determine whether the results of research that had been conducted in other cultures that demonstrated a link between animal abuse and domestic violence findings would be translatable to Puerto Rican culture. There is a remarkable void in this area of study in the Caribbean and Latin America that needs to be addressed and this study is a contribution toward analysis, dialogue, and change