Dogs in the Leisure Experience. Neil Carr
the early outdoorsmen and explorers of Canada and the northern states of the USA utilized basically any dogs they could find that had stamina and strength, with mongrels the most common among them (Coppinger, 1977). Furthermore, it is clear that throughout the history of the sport of sled dog racing almost every type of dog has been utilized either as part of a team or as an entire one, including – according to Coppinger (1977) – Walker Coonhounds, Border Collies, Scotch Collies, Golden Retrievers, Labrador Retrievers, Pointers, Dalmatians, Airedales, German Shepherds, Belgian Shepherds, Doberman Pinschers and Weimaraners.
If you visit the dog sled operators of today you are unlikely to find many dogs who would meet the breed standards of a Husky, as defined by the Kennel Club, or any other northern breed. Indeed, my own experience of an operator in Austria in 2013 was that alongside Huskies he was running a couple of Husky/Collie crosses, arguing that the cross offered exemplar strength and endurance as well as being easier to train and more friendly towards guests of the business than pure Huskies. Similarly, the husband of a couple interviewed in Switzerland in 2013 who ran a sled dog tour operation had previously raced sled dogs with a team of collies at one stage and one mixed with 50% collies and 50% Huskies. The picture in Fig. 2.2 also clearly shows that sled dog operators do not always use Huskies though at the same time most advertise their businesses with pictures of this breed. It appears to have been the Europeans who most enthusiastically bought into the idealized image of the Husky as ‘the’ sled dog. For example, the Swiss Club for Northern Dogs, which was set up in 1959, restricted entry to its races to northern purebred dogs only, such as ‘the Siberian Husky, the Alaskan Malamute, the Bearhound, the Finnish Spitz, the Norwegian Elkhound and the Akita’ (Coppinger, 1977: 143).
Even though the search and rescue dogs are clearly working when out in search of lost people, there is a strong element of leisure in the whole experience of these dogs and their handlers, who tend to be volunteers (leaving aside for the moment the whole concept of whether the dog actually ‘volunteers’). With volunteering undertaken during one’s free time, for at least partially internally driven motivations and desires, it has been widely recognized as a form of leisure (Henderson, 1984; Stebbins, 1996). In this way, the meet and greet dogs at airports and their owners may be said to be engaging in leisure as much as work. This neatly exemplifies the problematic state of attempts to view leisure and work as a binary when the reality is clearly much more complex and dependent on the perception of the individual involved. However, in these instances it is not a case of the ‘individual’ involved, but of the individuals involved (i.e. the dog and its owner). Is the activity being engaged in by both felt as work, leisure or a mixture of both by both participants? This is a question that needs more detailed analysis to be able to answer but such work should be situated in the context of recognizing the ‘with’ nature of the relation between dogs and their owners and the social agency and of both.
In the blurring of the divide between work and leisure for dogs and arguably also for their owners (or handlers, given that dogs are not always owned by those who work with them daily) we see the potential for multiple meanings to be associated with dogs in any ‘one’ activity. For example, in the contemporary world of dog sledding the dog can be seen as object, tool, leisured creature (discussed in detail in Chapter 4) and leisure companion to humans. It has been suggested that work, or at least work in a quasi-form through sport, can be utilized as a means of giving dogs a value of self-worth. In an interview with Scotty Allan, one of the great early dog sled racers at the beginning of the 20th century, he stated: ‘Maybe it [the publicity stemming from his races and wins] will bring about a world-wide change in regard to dogs; change useless pets all over the earth into worthwhile, self-respecting animals – give them useful work. Dogs are like humans in that they are better off and happier if they have responsibilities’ (Garst, 1948: 4). This quotation is interesting in many ways for it shows Allan viewed dogs as sentient beings and sought ways to ensure their happiness. At the same time it shows the distain of this outdoorsman for anything so frivolous, in his view, as pets.
Overall, this chapter has aimed to show the diversity of the roles working dogs play in the leisure experience and how many of these roles have, over time, morphed into sport and leisure pursuits. In relation to the dogs, the dominant theme of the chapter has been of them as objects or tools that have been utilized by humans. In this way they fit the conceptualization of dogs as objects that was discussed in Chapter 1 with all the related implications relating to their rights and welfare. Whether these dogs really are only objects or are at least treated as such by their owners will be discussed in Chapter 3.
Introduction: Defining Sport Dogs
Within this chapter ‘sport dogs’ are defined as canines that are required to take part in a sporting activity at the behest of their human owners. These sport dogs are distinguished from the working dogs and leisured dogs who form the foci of Chapters 2 and 4 though the shifting boundaries between them are recognized. Sport dogs are animals used by humans in the leisure environment in a formal sporting event for recreational purposes and/or in search of a victory in an event. This chapter will look at the extent and nature of a variety of sporting activities where dogs play a prominent/dominant role and will look at changes in these sports across space and time. This analysis will be situated within discussions of changing social norms and values relating to the rights of animals in general and dogs in particular, including the use of representations of sport dogs as a means of constructing personal identity.
The range of sports in which dogs have taken and/or still take part is truly impressive and ranges from widely known sports to those that are best described as ‘fringe’ activities known by relatively few people beyond their active participants. In this way the range of dog sports is arguably very similar to that of sports in general. A list of sports in which dogs take part is provided in Table 3.1; while it may be desirable to say this is an exhaustive list such a claim is avoided due to the knowledge that new sports appear to be emerging frequently and that finding ‘every’ niche sport is difficult if not impossible. My publisher made a logical plea for ordering the material in Table 3.1, potentially differentiating between those sports that are still actively engaged in and those that have faded into history. The problem is that while the prominence of some of these sports may have changed and the nature of others has morphed over time it is very difficult to say with any certainty that any of the sports in Table 3.1 are confined to history. Consequently, beyond grouping the sports and providing brief details of those that are more obscure, I have resisted the temptation to structure the material in the table. Rather, examples of the difficulty associated with doing so are highlighted throughout this chapter.
Table 3.1. Dog sports.
| Sport | Brief description |
| Bull-baiting | A bull is positioned to enable several dogs to attack it with the bull ultimately being killed |
| Badger baiting |
Entails placing dogs in a badger’s burrow |