New Books in Intellectual History Andrew Billing, "Animal Rhetoric and Natural Science in Eighteenth-century Liberal Political Writing" (Routledge, 2023)
Feb 4, 2026
Andrew Billing, Professor of French and Francophone Studies and author of Animal Rhetoric and Natural Science in Eighteenth-century Liberal Political Writing, explores political zoologies in the French Enlightenment. He traces animal references in Rousseau, Diderot, La Mettrie, Quesnay, and Rétif. Short, sharp discussions cover Buffon’s influence, biological metaphors in political theory, and surprising links between animals, economy, and liberal thought.
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Genesis Of The Project
- Andrew Billing began this project after researching Rousseau for his dissertation and attending Derrida's seminar on the beast and the sovereign.
- That combination led him to expand from Rousseau to a five-author study of animal references in Enlightenment political writing.
Political Zoology As Historical Mode
- 'Political zoology' names a long Western tradition of using animals in political thought and has a distinct 18th-century scientific inflection in France.
- Billing links this moment to Buffon's natural history and the emerging discipline of zoology shaping political rhetoric.
From Empirical Animals To Political Metaphors
- Buffon and mid-18th-century natural history shifted animal references from mere metaphor toward empirical study that then informed political claims.
- Authors often transferred empirical animal facts into figurative political rhetoric while claiming scientific grounding.
