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Thesis ID: CBB001562815

The Hunter's Gaze: Charles Darwin and the Role of Dogs and Sport in Nineteenth-Century Natural History (2011)

University of Cambridge (United Kingdom)
Publication date: 2011
Language: English

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Hunting; trapping Natural history Dogs; cats Science and sports 19th century Darwin, Charles Robert

Charles Darwin grew up in the sporting Shropshire countryside and, like many great naturalists of the nineteenth century, was a dog-and-gun man. My thesis confronts the paradox of how a dog and sporting culture that immersed participants in the practices and literature of improved breeding of dogs and the struggle-for-life in the hunting field, has yet been excluded from history of science narratives. I approach the problem by studying Darwin¿s childhood and university experience, rather than education, to see how his experience with pet and hunting dogs affected his approach to nature. By focusing on the English dog culture in which Darwin grew up, especially in the Shropshire and Cambridge communities where he was most active, I construct a model of observational practice that directed the attention of hunting naturalists to the intimate details of animal habitats and allowed to pursue nature¿s evolutionary riddles as participants in nature. My thesis argues that Darwin's intimate knowledge of domestic dogs, their breed traits and hunting practices offered him a view of nature that from early in his childhood imparted to him the critical role of adaptation in species construction. That canine foundation led Darwin in each of his primary monographs to present specific dog breed-types to explain the mechanics of natural selection and the evolution of non-physical characteristics that were essential to explain the descent of many from lower animal forms. My thesis thus offers a new explanation of how Darwin arrived at his remarkable conclusions, and further suggests how more discriminating and detailed examinations of the roles of specific breeds and minute species characteristics can help explain the broader effects of animal roles in natural history.

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Description Cited in ProQuest Diss. & Thes. . ProQuest Doc. ID 1124072707.

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