Skelton, Chrissy (2024) Race, Rescue, Rehome: Irish Greyhounds and the Multi-Species Family. PhD thesis, National University of Ireland Maynooth.

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Abstract

This PhD research project examines the everyday practices, emotions, and senses in the circulation of working greyhounds from the racing industry to animal rescue organisations then onwards to pet homes as family members in Ireland. Greyhounds are not ‘good’ working dogs. In contrast to police dogs or hunting dogs, they have a short working life and work independently from a handler. Nor are they ‘good’ pets. Adult greyhounds need ‘petification’ training to adjust to household sounds, learn good manners, and become housetrained. These unique qualities of the greyhound confound their categorisation. Working life can be brutal for these dogs. As exposed in the media, Irish greyhounds are found shot, drowned, or beaten to death, some with their ears cut off to remove their identification tattoos (Swords 2012; Shouldice and Ryan 2019). Each year €500m is generated for the exchequer through the greyhound industry, yet budgetary considerations for the 6,000 racers retiring annually are minimal. Through fine-tuned ethnographic research I document how current and former greyhound trainers describe their lived experience as responsible members of the greyhound community. Irish animal welfare organisations are working to grant animals such as greyhounds the right to a home and retirement - a privilege usually reserved for humans. This thesis firstly explores the concerns and practices of volunteers specialising in greyhound welfare, foster and rehoming and the complex role they have in managing the industry’s wastage. Secondly, the thesis engages with the shifting debate in anthropology to define the ‘Irish family’. In Ireland, this is evident through social legislation in hard-fought referendums, for divorce in 1995, marriage equality in 2015 and abortion in 2018, to the degree that the New York Times (Hakim and Dalby 2015) referred to Ireland as the vanguard of social change. At the same time, family practices are changing and the number of Irish households keeping pets has increased to 61%. Nearly all those homes consider their pets as members of the family. The core focus of this research tracks the series of transformations a racing greyhound undergoes as it moves from revenue generator to retiree. As one node in a chain of actors, I follow its progress from working animal to pet and ethnographically document how relationships change in line with shifts in its social role. I question how the introduction of a greyhound-as-pet transforms the multisensory household, family routines and is generative of novel relationships. This research examines multiple points of the human and canine lifespans. Their respective stage-of-life can significantly impact their ability to adapt to these domestic transformations and reveals the complexity of how family is made. Taking an example of canines in Ireland, this thesis asks have anthropological studies of the Irish family missed a vital ingredient?

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Keywords:	Race; Rescue; Rehome; Irish Greyhounds; Multi-Species Family;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Anthropology
Item ID:	18886
Depositing User:	IR eTheses
Date Deposited:	13 Sep 2024 14:53
URI:
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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