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What do dogs mean in America? How do Americans make meaning through
their dogs? The United States has long expressed its cultural
unconscious through canine iconography. Through our dogs, we figure
out what we're thinking and who we are, representing by proxy the
things that we don't quite want to recognize in ourselves. Often,
it's a specific breed or type of dog that serves as an informal
cultural mascot, embodying an era's needs, fears, desires,
longings, aspirations, repressions, and hopeless contradictions.
Combining cultural studies with personal narrative, this book
creates a playful, speculative reading of American culture through
its canine self-representations. Looking at seven different breeds
or types over the last seven decades, readers will go on an
intellectual dog walk through some of the mazes of American
cultural mythology.
For many of us, the only way we meet "dangerous" dogs is through
news reports about vicious attacks, and films and TV shows that
feature out-of-control versions of man's best friend. But there's
more to the Bad Dog's story than sensational headlines and movie
beasts. A deeper look at these representations reveals a villain
much closer to home. This book takes the reader on a rich journey
through depictions of violent dogs in popular media. It explores
how press accounts and screen stories transform canines into
bloodthirsty hunters, rabies-infested strays, ferocious fighters,
rogue law enforcement partners and diabolical pets, all adding up
to a frightening picture of our usually beloved companions. But,
when media tell the dangerous dog's story, it is often with a deep
connection to the person on the other end of the leash.
At age 60, Susan Hartzler has learned to accept, even love, the
single life, provided she has good friends and a dog or two by her
side. Always attracted to the quintessential bad boy with his good
looks and charming ways, she was sure she could change "the one"
into a devoted partner and loving father, but her compulsive giving
and fixing behaviors went hand in hand with her disappointing and
disastrous romantic relationships. On a purposeful trip to the
pound, she hoped to find a dog to care for, one that would sniff
out the bad guys, give her a sense of purpose, and help her find
meaning in her crazy world. Thoughtful and funny, this memoir
follows Susan's life through the many ups and downs on her way to
finding unconditional love. Her journey is a personal one, full of
the hard decisions it took to learn to put herself first and stop
entering and staying in unhealthy relationships. By saving a dog,
she rescues herself, learning to love herself as much as her dog
loves her.
The Custers and Their Dogs is the first book to seriously explore
the little known history of General George Armstrong and Libbie
Custer as wholehearted dog lovers. At the time of Custer's death at
Little Bighorn, they owned a rollicking pack of forty hunting
hounds-including Scottish Deerhounds, Russian Wolfhounds,
Greyhounds, and Foxhounds. Told engagingly through a dog owner's
lens, this biography of the Custers' life covers their first dogs
in the Civil War and Texas, hunting on the Kansas and Dakota
frontiers, entertaining tourist buffalo hunters such as a Russian
Archduke, English aristocracy, and The Great Showman, P. T. Barnum
(all whom presented the general with hounds), Custer's attack on
the Washita village (when he was accused of strangling his own
dogs), and the 7th Cavalry's march to Little Bighorn with an
analysis of the many rumors about a Last Stand dog. Duggan also
reveals how the Custers' pack was re-homed after Armstrong's death
in the first national dog rescue effort-and the strange fate of
Libbie's favorite staghound. Included is an appendix discussing
depictions of General Custer's dogs in art, literature, and film.
One of the oldest known breeds of domesticated dogs, the Saluki
traveled throughout the Middle East with a number of nomadic desert
tribes, who favored the dogs for their unparalleled ability to hunt
desert gazelles. Famously carved into the walls of the Pharaohs'
tombs, the Saluki have an exotic history that piqued the interests
of dog enthusiasts and breeders during the early 20th century,
including notable Edwardian men and women who played significant
roles in popularizing the breed and importing the Saluki to Europe
and the United States.This book tells the unique, true story of the
characters who brought the Saluki to the West, most notably the
Honorable Florence Amherst, who became smitten with the breed
during a family tour of Egypt and went on to breed a staggering
number of 50 litters and 199 registered puppies. The author also
brings into the story a range of other prominent world travelers
who fell under the Salukis' spell, including Lady Jane Digby, Lady
Anne Blunt, Austen Layard and Gertrude Bell. Also covered in this
book are a number of lesser-known but just as dedicated Saluki
aficionados, mainly military officers who became addicted to
hunting with their hounds in the deserts of Iraq, Syria, Palestine,
and Egypt and who sought to replicate that addiction upon their
return home.
Dogs have a storied history in health care, and the human-animal
relationship has been used in the field for decades. Over the
years, certain dogs have improved and advanced the field of health
care in myriad ways. In this book, the author presents the stories
of these pioneer dogs, from the mercy dogs of World War I, to the
medicine-toting sled dogs Togo and Balto, to contemporary therapy
dogs. More than the dogs themselves, this book is about the
human-animal relationship, and moments in history where that
relationship propelled health care forward.
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