Our Gigantic Zoo: A German Quest to Save the Serengeti

How did the Seregenti become an internationally renowned African conservation site and one of the most iconic destinations for a safari?In this book, Thomas M. Lekan illuminates the controversial origins of this national park by examining how Europe's greatest wildlife conservationist, former Frankfurt Zoo director and Oscar-winning documentarian Bernhard Grzimek, popularized it as a global destination. In the 1950s, Grimzek and his son Michael began a quest to save the Serengeti from modernization and "overpopulation" by remaking an imperial game reserve into a gigantic zoo for the earth's last great mammals. Grzimek, well-known to German audiences through his long-running television program, A Place for Animals, used the film Seregenti Shall Not Die to convince ordinary Europeans that they could save nature. Yet their message sidestepped the uncomfortable legacies of German colonial exploitation in the region that had endangered animals and excluded local people. After independence, Grzimek raised funds, brokered diplomatic favors, and convinced German tourists to book travel packages--all to persuade Tanzanian leader Julius Nyerere that wildlife would fuel the young nation's economic development. Grzimek helped Tanzania to create almost a dozen new national parks by 1975, but wooing tourists conflicted with rights of the Maasai and other African communities to inhabit the landscape on their own terms. Grzimek's global priorities eventually clashed with Nyerere's nationalist ones, as a more self-assertive Tanzania resented conservationists' meddling and failed promises.A story that demonstrates the conflicts between international conservation, nature tourism, decolonization, and national sovereignty, Our Gigantic Zoo explores the legacy of the man who portrayed himself as a second Noah, called on a sacred mission to protect the last vestiges of paradise for all humankind.

Table of Contents:
Preface A Note on Sources Abbreviations Introduction Mission for Africa Chapter 1 A Zookeeper's Ecology Chapter 2 No Room for Wild Animals Chapter 3 Thinking Locally, Acting Globally Chapter 4 Serengeti Shall Not Die Chapter 5 A Weakness for the Maasai Chapter 6 An Honest Broker for the Animals Chapter 7 Who Cares for Africa's Game? Epilogue A Trip to Seronera Notes Index

About the Author :
Thomas M. Lekan is a professor at the University of South Carolina with a joint appointment in the Department of History and the School of the Earth, Ocean and Environment. He is the author of Imagining the Nation in Nature: Landscape Preservation and German Identity, 1885-1945 and the co-editor of Germany's Nature: Cultural Landscapes and Environmental History.

Review :
"This monograph explores the complex legacy of West German TV personality and conservationist Bernhard Grzimek in present-day Tanzania....Lekan examines Grzimek's role in advocating for the creation of national parks in the Serengeti and encouraging German tourists to travel there to see the animals and support the parks. Grzimek's vision was realized at the expense of Maasai herdsmen..., who play an important role in the ecology of the Serengeti. Lekan places Grzimek's story within a multitude of contexts: post-war West German reluctance to confront the Nazi past, Germany's colonial history, African decolonization and neocolonialism, the Cold War, and the beginnings of ecotourism. Lekan also incorporates African voices,... illustrating leaders' engagement with and ultimate repudiation of Grzimek's program. Meticulously researched and accessibly written....Overall, Lekan highlights the dangers of 'thinking locally and acting globally,' as illustrated by Grzimek's story." -- Choice "Lekan's substantial study of German-led conservationism in East Africa illuminates the vexed relationship between global north environmentalists on one hand and global south citizens and their living spaces on the other. Our Gigantic Zoo challenges us to be vigilant about the complex motifs and possibly devastating impact of environmentalism at a moment of global environmental crisis. The book reminds us that neoliberal capitalism draws on inequalities produced by centuries of domination, and that conservationism is embedded in a larger web of power relations." -- Nina Berman, author of Germans on the Kenyan Coast: Land, Charity, and Romance "In Our Gigantic Zoo, Thomas Lekan adroitly combines biography and history to show how Bernhard Grzimek, Germany's post World War II conservation zealot, created Africa's most iconic national park on the Serengeti plains of northwestern Tanzania. The 'zookeeper,' as Lekan calls him, championed the idea that only by consuming the Serengeti could the German public save it from destruction. Grzimek's vision became reality but only at great cost both to the zookeeper himself and to the dispossessed Tanzanians who lost their home in the name of conservation and tourism. Our Gigantic Zoo is a must read for students and conservation scientists alike." -- Chris Conte, author of Highland Sanctuary: Environmental History in Tanzania's Usambara Mountains "Thomas Lekan's engrossing and highly original book is a history of vicarious West German nature conservation in East Africa during the Cold War years. It is consistently thought-provoking and illuminating on a wide range of issues--the shadow of the Nazi past, neocolonialism, human-animal relations, and eco-tourism. Elegantly organized and very well written, Our Gigantic Zoo is a major achievement." -- David Blackbourn, author of The Conquest of Nature: Water, Landscape, and the Making of Modern Germany "Our Gigantic Zoo offers a compelling and readable portrait of Bernhard Grzimek, West Germany's first celebrity animal expert, from his years as a Nazi agricultural expert to his wildlife conservation efforts in Julius Nyerere's Tanzania. Thomas Lekan looks beyond the spectacle of animal television to tell a story about Cold War geopolitics, decolonization, and colonial and post-colonial dispossession." -- Andrew Zimmerman, George Washington University