)
)
)
Around the world, freshwater fishes are disappearing at an alarming rate. The inland waters in which they swim are being blocked, drained and polluted, while the fishes are being overexploited. More than one in four freshwater fish species is threatened with extinction , in an ecological crisis that is happening mostly out of sight, beneath the water’s surface, and often without the attention it needs.
Hidden within this ecological loss is another kind of extinction: a cultural one. For millennia, people have lived alongside and depended on freshwater fishes, developing rich traditions, beliefs, food cultures and stories around them. These cultural connections can endure for many centuries, forming integral parts of communities’ identities and sense of place. As these species decline, so too do the stories, rituals and memories associated with them.
SHOAL’s Twice Forgotten: The Cultural Loss of Freshwater Fishes examines this idea of double-extinction, where species disappear from cultural memory as they disappear from the wild . Through case studies and examples from around the world, Twice Forgotten highlights just how deeply humans are connected with fishes and the many contributions they make to people, whether as food and livelihood, myths, spirits and symbols, markers of place and of knowledge, or objects of beauty and fascination. It shines a light on what we stand to lose as their populations decline, and draws attention to how, without them, we would be immeasurably poorer.
Read the report here.
)