In conducting my study, I went to two Specialty Dog Shows, the Northern
California Pomeranian (Pom) Club in Vallejo, California on April 19, 2003
and the Northern California Siberian Husky (Sibe) Club in Novato,
California on April 26. I selected these particular shows to attend by
going to the American Kennel Club website and by searching for clubs that
were holding events in Northern California. Then, I called the Event
Secretary for further details, was advised these were events open to the
public, and contacted the Club Chair or Club Secretary to introduce myself
and make arrangements to attend. When I attended these events, I
conducted a half-dozen informal interviews at each one to get a general
background on the nature of dog shows and the participants. This
information helped me in formulating the questions for the more in-depth
interviews with my informants.
I selected two informants from
the people I informally interviewed to interview in more depth. I chose
them since they had all been long-term participants in the dog shows for
their breed and had long raised that breed and were knowledgeable about
both the breed and dog shows. In addition, they were very articulate when
I spoke with them initially at the two dog shows and they were receptive
to talking to me. All of the informants were women, since women comprise
most of the participants in dog shows generally and in these two clubs,
particularly the Pom Club. The two informants from the Pom Show were
both officers, since the officers at this club were very interested in
this project and enthusiastic about talking to me at their Specialty Show,
as well as sending over others to talk to me. However, the two
informants from the Sibe Show were both non-officers, since it was not
possible to talk to any of the Sibe Club officers because they were busy
working at that show and I found the non-officer participants I spoke to
very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about the project. So
all of the informants met my original criteria of choosing as informants
those who appear most interested in talking to me, as well as being active
participants and knowledgeable about the breed and group activities.
I conducted
participation observation at the Northern California Pomeranian Club show
on April 19, 2003 from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. I initially went to the Chief
Solano Kennel Club All Breeds Show that was held during the day at the
Solano County Fairgrounds, where I mainly observed, took photographs, and
spoke to a few attendees showing their dogs to get a general sense of a
typical dog show. Then, as the All Breeds show was ending at about 6
p.m. with the final Best of Breed and Best of Show competitions, I began
observing at the Pom Show where people were starting to gather for the
show, which was officially set to begin at 7 p.m., a half-hour after the
Best of Show competition concluded. Then, I observed, took more
pictures, and had informal interviews with a half-dozen attendees, after
the Club Chair spoke to me and then suggested others for me to talk to or
sent people over to talk to me. I asked those I talked to whether I
could call them later by phone for more in-depth phone interviews, and
they gave me their numbers.
I conducted
participant observation at the Northern California Siberian Husky Club
show on April 26, 2003 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. This was set up as an
all-day event, that followed a Sweepstakes for prize money on Friday at
the same location. As at the Pom Show, I mainly observed, took
photographs, and conducted a half-dozen informal interviews with
participants who were knowledgeable and enthusiastic about talking to
me. In fact, as I was conducting interviews with one person, two others
volunteered to talk to me, too. Again, I asked those I spoke to about
calling them later for in-depth phone interviews and got their numbers.
I conducted
the telephone interviews with my informants about 2 weeks after each of
these shows. After obtaining an informed consent for conducting the
interview, I used a semi-structured interview format, since I developed a
questionnaire guide which I followed to guide the interview. However,
when the interviewees brought up new issues or I wanted further
clarification or explanation, I used additional probes to learn more.
These interviews were designed to explore these main areas: 1) the types
of dogs the owner had owned and for how long and the reasons for choosing
that breed; 2) the types of activities the owner participated in with his
or her dog; 3) the owner’s participation in a community of other owners
with that breed; and 4) the owners views about the lifestyle, personality,
and other characteristics shared by owners of that and other breeds or
types of dogs. Additionally, I asked for some basic demographic date on
their age, occupation, and marital status. A copy of this
interview guide is in Appendix A.
I also used geographic and photographic mapping techniques to further
describe and illustrate the dog show settings where the Pomeranian and
Siberian Husky Shows took place. I collected some newsletters, Web site
pages, American Kennel Club by-laws, rules, and regulations, and other
literature about dog shows and training dogs which was available at the
shows. And finally, to provide a context for the study, I collected
statistics on the ownership of different breeds of dogs, articles about
the personality traits of owners of different breeds, and a sampling of
books about the different breeds of dogs and the two breeds that were the
focus of this study.
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