Table of Contents

Part I. Introduction: 1. Homosexuality in animals. Topics, hypotheses, and research trajectories Volker Sommer and Paul L. Vasey; Part II. Non-primates: 2. Making the best of a bad situation. Homosociality in male greylag geese Kurt Kotrschal, Josef Hemetsberger and Brigitte Weiss; 3. Pink flamingos. Atypical partnerships and sexual activity in colonially breeding birds Catherine E. King; 4. Establishing trust. Sociosexual behaviour and the development of male-male bonds among Indian Ocean bottlenose dolphins Janet Mann; 5. Going with the herd. Same-sex interaction and competition in American bison Hilde Vervaecke and Catherine Roden; 6. Exciting ungulates. Male-male mounting in fallow, white-tailed and red deer Ludek Bartos and Jana Holeckova; 7. Frustrated felines. Sexual mounting between males in feral cats Akihiro Yamane; Part III. Primates: 8. The pursuit of pleasure. An evolutionary history of homosexual behaviour in Japanese macaques Paul L. Vasey; 9. Getting to know you. Female-female consortships in free-ranging rhesus monkeys Ellen Kapsalis and Rodney L. Johnson; 10. A wild mixture of motivations. Same-sex mounting in Indian langur monkeys Volker Sommer, Peter Schauer and Diana Kyriazis; 11. Playful encounters. The development of homosexual behavior in male mountain gorillas Juichi Yamagiwa; 12. Social grease for females? Same-sex genital contacts in wild bonobos Barbara Fruth and Gottfried Hohmann; 13. The evolution of male homosexuality and its implications for human psychological and cultural variations Dennis Werner; Part IV. Outlooks: Science and Beyond: 14. Where do we go from here? Research on the evolution of homosexual behaviour in animals Paul L. Vasey; 15. Against nature?! An epilogue about animal sex and the moral dimension Volker Sommer; Acknowledgements.

Promotional Information

This book explores evolutionary aspects of same-sex sexual behaviour in animals.

About the Author

Paul L. Vasey is Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology & Neuroscience at the University of Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. Volker Sommer is Professor of Evolutionary Anthropology in the University of London.

Reviews

'For anyone interested in animal behaviour, this book is a valuable reference which brings together a collection of current research into homosexual behaviour in animals in one volume.' Biologist 'Sommer and Vasey have sharply steered the Darwinian study of homosexual behaviour out of its infancy and towards all the defining features of a mature science ... the book deserves to be widely read by researchers interested in ultimate functions of human and animal behaviour alike.' Journal of Evolutionary Psychology