Gender Archaeology

by Marie Louise Stig Sørensen

Overview

This textbook explores the relations between gender and archaeology, providing a highly innovative account of how material culture is used in the construction of gender. Throughout this lively and accessible text, Sorensen engages with the question of how gender is materially constituted, and examines the intersection of social and material concerns from the Palaeolithic Age to the present day.

Part One discusses a range of important general issues, beginning with an overview of the role of gender and gender relations in our appropriation of past societies. After introducing the debate about feminist or gender archaeology, Sorensen examines archaeology's concern with the sex/gender distinction, the nature of negotiation, and feminist epistemological claims in relation to archaeology. In Part Two, the author focuses on the materiality of gender, exploring it through cases studies ranging from prehistory to contemporary society. Food, dress, space and contact are examined in turn, to show how they express and are used in negotiating gender roles.

This illustrated textbook will be essential reading for students and scholars in archaeology, anthropology, material culture studies and women's studies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780745668642
Publisher:	Polity Press
Publication date:	04/24/2013
Sold by:	JOHN WILEY & SONS
Format:	eBook
Pages:	248
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Jesus College, Cambridge (affiliation)

Table of Contents

	List of Illustrations	viii
	Acknowledgements	x
Part I
1	Gender into the Past	3
	Gender and archaeology: an introduction	3
	Arguing for gender archaeology	7
	The need for theorizing	10
	Outline of an argument	12
2	Gender and Archaeology: a History	16
	The development of feminist critique and gender archaeology	16
	The relatively late inclusion of gender in archaeology?	20
	The presentation of women in archaeology and prehistory	24
	Epistemology, gender and archaeology	34
	The nature of gender archaeology: contextualization	37
3	Theorizing Gender: Sex and Gender	41
	The sex--gender discussion	42
	What is sex?--current discussions within archaeology	45
	What is gender?--current discussions and archaeological practice	52
	On the relationship between sex and gender	54
4	Theorizing Gender: Negotiation and Practice	60
	Gender negotiation	60
	Agency and gender in archaeology	63
	The agent, the individual and archaeology	65
	Woman or women: the question of cross-cultural generalizations	67
	Gender (and) archaeology	70
5	The Materiality of Gender: the Gendered Object	74
	Gender and the object	74
	The nature of objects	76
	The materiality of gender: communication and practice	82
	Constructing gender through things, making objects gendered	89
Part II
6	Food: the Performance of Feeding and Eating	99
	Nutritious and symbolic: the culture of food	99
	Food and embodiment	102
	Discourse through food	106
	Drinking as social performance	117
	Archaeology, food and gender	122
7	Dressing Gender: Identity through Appearance	124
	The point of clothes	124
	Dress and archaeology: a brief outline	127
	Methodology and analysis	131
	Dress and identity in prehistory	136
	A fabric for discourse	142
8	The Engendering of Space	144
	Gendered space	144
	Archaeology and space	146
	Phenomenology and the landscape's space	152
	House and home	156
	Archaeology, gender and space	166
9	Contact: the Short-lived Triangle	168
	Adultery--changing partner	168
	Contact and innovation	169
	The archaeology of contact	171
	Technology and the danger of the new	177
	Gender and contact, gender as contact	180
10	The Beginning: on Becoming Gendered	182
	A gendered world, or looking back to the beginning	182
	Gender research and the origin of humans	187
	Gendered cultural expression and practice during the Upper Palaeolithic	190
	Gender and the Palaeolithic: self-reflection and artifice	200
11	Reflections	203
	References	209
	Index	226

Editorial Reviews

'This book is of the highest intellectual quality, carefully argued in a non-confrontational tone. Sørenson's emphasis on what archaeology can contribute to the social science discussion about gender is a refreshing change from much of the existing literature on the topic.' Elizabeth Scott, Zooarch Research

'For a penetrating analysis of the state of gender archaeology today, and an extended discussion of the ways in which archaeology can best contribute to understanding gender, this book is extremely important ... Clear and cogent, this book will be of interest to all archaeologists because of its emphasis on the materiality of gender.' Journal of Anthropological Research

'This is not just another book about the history or nature of gender archaeology or the problems associated with making women visible in the past. The author addresses these subjects, but also contributes both theoretical insights into defining gender and practical approaches to excavating "gendered" objects ... Although engendering the archaeological record is a complex endeavor, she documents ways in whch it is an achievable goal. Her book is thorough, well footnoted and well argued.' Choice

From the Publisher