Ethnography

The subculture I decided to research, is the cutting horse subculture. This is a pretty distinct subculture and Fort Worth is considered the center of this subculture. The sport of cutting, as it is commonly called, involves a person on horse back “cutting” a cow from the herd and then trying prevent the cow from returning to the herd. Like a lot of subcultures, this one has people who say they are a part of it, then those people who actually belong. When competing, the competitors are required to wear a certain style of dress, which I have found a vast majority of these people will wear when not competing. To the casual observer, these people will look like your stereotypical cowboy. Certain words cutters, those who ride cutting horses, use that have either a different meaning or are altogether different than words used by people who do other rodeo events.
I have a few friends and my grandfather, who compete(d) in cutting and to them the belt buckles they have one hold a special significance to them. Every sport gives out trophies, and belt buckles are the trophies of cutters. The belt buckle cutters will wear represent their highest achievement in the sport. My friend Cole wears his Futurity finalist belt buckle because that is the best he has ever done, and he would have done better were it not for a minor mistake. To him that belt buckle symbolizes more than just doing well, it lets him know that he can do better. My grandfather displays his most important belt buckle by itself, whereas he keeps all his others lumped together in unimportant places around his house.
While money is a large motivation for the sport, the cutters do it for the love of riding horses. This love is more than just riding a horse, it is the competition involved with cutting that drives them. Two of my friends quit because of college, and as soon as both of them got on a horse again, they instantly decided to start up again.
This topic is interesting for me because I know people who do it, and more importantly when I was growing up my grandfather competed. Though I have never tried it, I have thought about cutting, especially since I have moved to Fort Worth.