Researcher Alma Igra finds that what it means for a species to be native has long been bound up with ideas of human belonging: relationships with animals have been one of the many ways in which colonisers have enacted and justified control over people, resources and animals. In this blog she asks if acknowledgement of this colonial legacy can give us a broader understanding of what it means to protect nature and who we protect it for, and a more inclusive approach to animal and environmental care. Alma Igra is a historian who writes about food, science and animals in the 20th century. She completed her PhD at Columbia University in 2020 and is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Polonsky Academy.