Gender in Archaeology: Analyzing Power and Prestige

by Sarah Milledge Nelson

Sarah Milledge Nelson takes on the formidable task of attempting the first comprehensive feminist, theoretical synthesis of the flood of archaeological work on gender. She examines the roles of women and men in such areas as human origins, the sexual division of labor, kinship and other social formations, state development, and ideology. Nelson provides examples from gender-specific archaeological studies worldwide to examine such traditional myths as woman the gatherer, the goddess hypothesis, and the Amazon warriors, replacing them with a more nuanced, informed treatment of gender based on the latest research. She also examines the structure of the archaeological discipline in her attempt to understand and change a discipline that has made women all but invisible both as researchers and objects of research. Nelson's book is a benchmark work for all archaeologists working on or interested in gender and points the way toward fruitful avenues for further research.

Genres: Archaeology, Nonfiction, Science, Anthropology

Paperback

First published August 8, 1997

Reviews

[Chelsea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read this a few years ago and just realized I didn't have it listed on goodreads! A really excellent book!

[Tara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nelson draws from numerous examples in archaeology and ethnography to demonstrate the need to study both male and female roles when reconstructing past societies. She suggests that though gender archaeology has been a subdiscipline since Conkey and Spector's ground-breaking essay in 1984, we are still struggling with some very androcentric assumptions.

My favorite quote (regarding gender stereotyping in archeology): "Women are perceived as constrained to stay near camp, although the camp itself is believed to have been moved fairly frequently. Women, who presumably have ranged through the entire territory, are nonetheless conceptualized as tethered to the home base, like domesticated animals" (p 68).

[Paul Richards]

While this book is a bit more academic than I might like, it brought out convincingly the immense impact of patriarchal attitudes in shaping how we look at our prehistoric past. And it shows what we have missed. We have missed everything but what justifies and bolsters the current state of family and political life we call patriarchy. Most astounding to me is the arrogance and dismissive attitudes of so called leaders of thought in this field. Thank goodness women are starting to turn the lights on, illuminating the vast impact of matrilineal and matrilocal cultures in shaping human life. And it gives a glimpse of how the suppression of women has robbed us of a balanced view of history, prehistory and how it clouds our thinking about everything.

[Cassia Holden]

Having the opportunity to read interesting books you’d never know existed otherwise because of a class is always so exciting. Thank you to my gen-ed anthropology class professor❤️