Bison Bellows : Feeling the Rhetoric of Surrogate Species in a Federal Science Blog

Environmental stakeholders routinely employ surrogate species—symbolic stand-ins for socio-ecological systems—to coordinate science, management, and advocacy. Rhetorical scholarship demonstrates that surrogate species may facilitate or frustrate interorganizational collaboration through synecdoche. This article argues that synecdoche’s representational logic is affectively charged. The feelings this logic makes available may catalyze cohesion or conflict. This argument is developed through a rhetorical criticism of Bison Bellows, a U.S. National Park Service blog supporting coordinated bison restoration. The blog synecdochically constructs bison as a keystone and flagship species, inviting governmental and nongovernmental partners to feel concern for, confidence in, and curiosity about collaborative stewardship. Ultimately, this article encourages scholars and practitioners to treat synecdoche’s affective charge as integral to how surrogate species may mediate collaboration.