Welcome

G'day,

We are thrilled to welcome you to Sydney, Australia and the 27th annual conference of the International Society for Anthrozoology (ISAZ).

ISAZ has never held a conference in the southern hemisphere before, so we are even more excited to welcome you here. Australia represents a perfect location because we have a large and ever-growing anthrozoology community, and we are home to some of the world’s unique wildlife! With this in mind, we have named several of our rooms after our favourite Aussie animals - including the kangaroo, dingo, platypus, galah, and the kookaburra.

We had an overwhelming response to our call for abstracts and symposia. This has resulted in ISAZ's biggest program ever, with four concurrent sessions per day - six plenary talks, almost 100 oral presentations, 11 symposia and over 50 posters.

In the true spirit of anthrozoology, this conference is open to all disciplines relevant to the study of human–animal interactions. We are so proud to be able to boast a jam-packed program that includes something for all of our 200+ delegates, covering a variety of topics from dogs wearing diapers, to conflict with wildlife, to snails on YouTube.

Please spend your time enjoying the social events (including a magical dinner cruise along the iconic Sydney Harbour), making new collaborations and catching up with old ones, engaging with the speakers, and participating in the many wonderful symposia.

Whether you are here for just a day or the whole conference, you are very welcome, and we hope you'll enjoy the show! We also encourage you to stay a while in Australia so that you can visit some of our world-famous heritage sites and our thriving and very liveable cities and towns.

Your Aussie mates,

Anthony Podberscek The University of Sydney

Bradley Smith Central Queensland University

Pauleen Bennett La Trobe University