
Making Sense of Sheepdogs
Breeds of Empire and the Sound of the Global Countryside
Gareth Enticott(Author)
Routledge (Publisher)
Will be published approx. on 9. October 2026
348 pages
E-Book
978-1-040-69040-6 (ISBN)
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for ePUB without DRM
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Description
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Tracing the invention of sheepdogs in the UK, and their journey to New Zealand and back again, this book shows how sheepdogs, shepherds and the countryside evolve in response to global agriculture, rural cultures, and soundscapes.
This book offers a unique, empirically rich understanding of how sheepdogs, shepherds and the landscapes they work in co-produce sheepdog cultures that circumnavigate the world. The book's benefit lies in showing how global sheepdog cultures evolve through multispecies relations, offering new understandings of rural change, mobility, and soundscapes. It delivers this through a distinctive blend of historical research, multispecies ethnography, and sonic geography, combining archival materials, interviews, field observations, and analysis of sheepdog trialling, shepherding, media, and rural events. Each chapter shows, in detail, how sheepdogs function as cultural, economic, and affective resources and provides comparative insights into how working dogs adapt, and transform rural life under pressure from climate change, afforestation, labour shifts, and agricultural modernisation. In bringing these materials together, the book equips scholars, students, and sheepdog enthusiasts with a powerful framework for understanding the global evolution of sheepdogs and the wider multispecies rural worlds they help to create.
The book will appeal to all dog lovers, researchers and practitioners working in human-animal studies, rural and cultural studies, agricultural policy and working-dog training as well as shepherds, rural organisations and anyone curious about the evolution, movement, and cultural significance of sheepdogs across diverse landscapes.
This book offers a unique, empirically rich understanding of how sheepdogs, shepherds and the landscapes they work in co-produce sheepdog cultures that circumnavigate the world. The book's benefit lies in showing how global sheepdog cultures evolve through multispecies relations, offering new understandings of rural change, mobility, and soundscapes. It delivers this through a distinctive blend of historical research, multispecies ethnography, and sonic geography, combining archival materials, interviews, field observations, and analysis of sheepdog trialling, shepherding, media, and rural events. Each chapter shows, in detail, how sheepdogs function as cultural, economic, and affective resources and provides comparative insights into how working dogs adapt, and transform rural life under pressure from climate change, afforestation, labour shifts, and agricultural modernisation. In bringing these materials together, the book equips scholars, students, and sheepdog enthusiasts with a powerful framework for understanding the global evolution of sheepdogs and the wider multispecies rural worlds they help to create.
The book will appeal to all dog lovers, researchers and practitioners working in human-animal studies, rural and cultural studies, agricultural policy and working-dog training as well as shepherds, rural organisations and anyone curious about the evolution, movement, and cultural significance of sheepdogs across diverse landscapes.
Reviews / Votes
"In Making Sense of Sheepdogs Gareth Enticott makes a bold and original contribution to Geography by showing how rural worlds are not just human products but can also be shaped through the movements, noises and labour of working sheepdogs. With sound at the centre of analysis, it offers a richly textured account of how sheepdogs help produce global rural identities across the different landscapes and histories of New Zealand and the United Kingdom. It is a book of wide international relevance, opening up new ways of thinking about empire, multispecies relations and geographies of rural life."Dr Keith Halfacree, Swansea University, UK
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Reflowable
Illustrations
1 Tables, black and white; 44 Halftones, black and white; 44 Illustrations, black and white
ISBN-13
978-1-040-69040-6 (9781040690406)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Book
approx. 10/2026
1st Edition
Routledge
€191.50
Not yet published

Book
approx. 10/2026
1st Edition
Routledge
€52.50
Not yet published
Person
Gareth Enticott is Professor of Human Geography in the School of Social and Spatial Sciences, Cardiff University, UK.
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