Groundbreaking zoologist and Waterloo alum celebrated within the latest Heritage Minute | Waterloo Information

A brand new Heritage Minute from Historica Canada celebrates Dr. Anne Innis Dagg (PhD ’67, DSc ’19), a groundbreaking zoologist, animal rights advocate and feminist. Dagg obtained her doctorate diploma in animal behaviour from the University of Waterloo and later returned to campus as a college member in Independent Studies.  

Dagg’s ardour for animals, significantly giraffes, started when she was a younger woman and continued all through her life. She obtained her first two levels in biology and genetics on the University of Toronto, then launched into a solo journey to South Africa to check giraffes of their pure habitat.  

Despite being turned away quite a few occasions — with rejection letters that claimed this was no work for a girl — Dagg persevered in her mission. Eventually, she grew to become the primary Western scientist to check any African mammal within the wild. After returning to Canada, she started working towards her PhD in animal behaviour at Waterloo. Her thesis, later printed as The Giraffe: Its Biology, Behaviour and Econogy, is now thought of a canonical textual content within the subject.  

In 2019, Dagg obtained an honourary diploma from Waterloo. That similar 12 months, she was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada.