Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-hc48f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T13:06:04.648Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Landscape for a good feminist. An archaeological review

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 April 2011

Silvia Tomášková
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

In 1998 this journal (Archaeological dialogues 5(2)) published an editorial titled ‘What is wrong with gender archaeology?’. Responding to this rhetorical question, the editor affirmed that indeed nothing was wrong with it; to the contrary, gender archaeology was as healthy as could be, ‘one of the most thriving fields within the discipline’ (Archaeological dialogues 1998, 88). Nonetheless, the writer then proceeded to describe a pervasive, ongoing issue with the article review process. Any submission that addressed gender would elicit warm praise from a reviewer chosen for familiarity with or expertise in gender studies. At the same time, the article would meet with harsh criticism from a second reviewer, selected for area, time period or topical specialization. The result was a continuing dilemma of how best to choose a third reviewer (a dilemma likely familiar to anyone who has submitted an article on any less-conventional topic to many disciplinary journals, not only in archaeology). This polarized reception of gender archaeology, and an unwillingness to engage in a dialogue around it, were persistent and deeply troubling. Comparing claims of novelty in gender archaeology with similar statements made decades earlier by New Archaeology, the editor suggested that processual archaeology gained support only after it had proven its worth in specific case studies, only ‘when substantial work demonstrated that this was indeed rather different and promising’ (Archaeological dialogues 1998, 89). Such an expectation would appear most sensible for any empirically engaged discipline.

Type
Review Article
Information
Archaeological Dialogues , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , June 2011 , pp. 109 - 136
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Articles and book chapters

1974: I.M. Holm-Olsen and G. Mandt, Kvinnens stilling i norsk arkeologi, Kontaktstensil 6, 68–75.

1982: M. Briathwaite, Archaeologia chauvinistica. Bare-faced but not naked ape, Archaeological review from Cambridge 1(2), 62–63.

1982: L. Dommasnes, Late Iron Age in western Norway. Female roles and ranks as deduced from an analysis of burial customs, Norwegian archaeological review 15(1–2), 70–84.

1984: M. Conkey and J.D. Spector, Archaeology and the study of gender, Advances in archaeological method and theory 7, 1–38.

1991: E. Engelstad, Images of power and contradiction. Feminist theory and postprocessual archaeology, Antiquity 65, 502–14.

1992: L.H. Dommasnes, Two decades of women in prehistory and in archaeology in Norway. A review, Norwegian archaeological review 25(1), 1–14.

1992: A. Wylie, Feminist theories of social power. Some implications for a processual archaeology, Norwegian archaeological review 25(1), 51–68.

1992: A. Wylie, The interplay of evidential constraints and political interests. Recent archaeological research on gender, American antiquity 57(1), 15–35.

1994: E. Engelstad, G. Mandt and J.-R. Naess, Equity issues in Norwegian archeology, Archeological papers of the American Anthropological Association 5, 139–45.

1995: M.-A. Dobres, Gender and prehistoric technology. On the social agency of technical strategies, World archaeology 27(1), 25–49.

1997: M. Conkey and J. Gero, Programme to practice: Gender and feminism in archaeology, Annual review in anthropology 26, 411–37.

1998: Editorial. What is wrong with gender archaeology, Archaeological dialogues 5(2).

1998: A.B. Knapp, Boys will be boys. Masculinist approaches to a gendered archaeology, in D.S. Whitley (ed.), Reader in archaeological theory. Post-processual and cognitive approaches, London and New York, 241–49.

1998: A.B. Knapp, Who's come a long way, baby. Masculinist approaches to a gendered archaeology, Archaeological dialogues 5(2), 91–106.

1999: C. Caesar, The construction of masculinity – the driving force of history. A new way of understanding change in the past, Lund archaeological review 5, 117–36.

2000: R. Joyce, Girling the girl and boying the boy. The production of adulthood in ancient Mesoamerica, World archaeology 32(3), 473–83.

2000: Queer archaeologies, special issue of World archaeology 32(2).

2003: M. Conkey, Has feminism changed archaeology?, Signs 28(3), 867–80.

2004: E. Engelstad, Another f-word? Feminist gender archaeology, in T. Oestigaard, N. Anfinset and T. Saetersdal (eds), Combining the past and the present. Archaeological perspectives on society, Oxford (BAR International Series), 39–45.

2005: M. Conkey, Dwelling at the margins, action at the intersection? Feminist and indigenous archaeologies, Archaeologies. Journal of the World Archaeological Congress 1(1), 9–59.

2005: R. Joyce, Archaeology of the body, Annual review in anthropology 34, 139–58.

2005: M. Moss, Rifts in the theoretical landscape of archaeology in the United States. A comment on Hegmon and Watkins, American antiquity 70(3), 581–87.

2006: B. Alberti, Archaeology, men, and masculinities. In S. Nelson (ed.), Handbook of gender archaeology, Lanham, MD, 401–34.

2006: S. Hutson, Self-citation in archaeology. Age, gender, prestige, and the self in research agendas, and patterns of gender differentiation, Journal of archaeological method and theory 13(1), 1–18.

2006: O.-M. Nøttveit, The kidney dagger as a symbol of masculine identity – the ballock dagger in the Scandinavian Context, Norwegian archaeological review 39(2), 138–50.

2007: Doing archaeology as a feminist, special issue of Journal of archaeological method and theory 14(3).

2008: B.L. Voss, Sexuality studies in archaeology, Annual review in anthropology 37, 317–36.

2009: C. Lidström Holmberg and A. Gatti, Gender and archaeology in Sweden. Paper presented at the 15th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists. Riva del Garda/Trento, Italy. EAA session and working party: Gender and Archaeology in Europe.

2009: L. Skogstrand, The Norwegian case: Gender archaeology at a mature stage? Paper presented at the 15th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists. Riva del Garda/Trento, Italy. EAA session and working party: Gender and Archaeology in Europe.

2010: L. Skogstrand, Is androcentric archaeology really about men? Archaeologies. Journal of the World Archaeological Congress, online edition, 19 October.

Books, conference proceedings and edited volumes

1987: R. Bertelsen, A. Lillehammer and J.-R. Naess (eds), Were they all men? An examination of sex roles in prehistoric society, Stavanger.

1991: J. Gero and M. Conkey (eds), Engendering archaeology, Oxford.

1991: D. Walde and N.D. Willows (eds), The archaeology of gender. Proceedings of the 22nd Annual Chacmool Conference, Calgary.

1992: C. Claassen (ed.), Exploring gender through archaeology. Selected papers from the 1991 Boone conference, Madison, WI.

1993: J. Spector, What this awl means. Feminist archaeology at a Wahpeton Dakota village, St Paul.

1994: R. Gilchrist, Gender and archaeology. The archaeology of religious women, London and New York.

1995: J. Balme and W. Beck (eds), Gendered archaeology. The Second Australian Women in Archaeology Conference, Canberra.

1996: R.P. Wright (ed.), Gender and archaeology, Philadelphia.

1997: C. Claassen and R. Joyce (eds), Women in prehistory. North America and Mesoamerica, Philadelphia.

1997: L. Hager (ed.), Women in human evolution, London and New York.

1997: J. Moore and E. Scott (eds), Invisible people and processes. Writing gender and childhood into European prehistory, Leicester.

1997: L. Wadley (ed.), Our gendered past, Johannesburg.

1998: L. Foxhall and J. Salmon (eds), When men were men. Masculinity, power and identity in classical antiquity, London and New York.

1998: K. Hays-Gilpin and D.S. Whitley (eds), Reader in gender archaeology, London and New York.

1998: S. Kent, Gender in African prehistory, Walnut Creek, CA.

1999: P. Allison (ed.), The archaeology of household activities, London and New York.

1999: R. Gilchrist, Gender and archaeology. Contesting the past, London and New York.

1999: D.M. Hadley (ed.), Masculinity in medieval Europe. London and New York.

1999: T. Sweely (ed.), Manifesting power. Gender and the interpretation of power in archaeology, London and New York.

1999: N.M. White, L. P. Sullivan and R.A. Marrinan (eds), Grit-tempered. Early women archaeologists in the southeastern United States, Gainesville.

2000: P. Crown (ed.), Women and men in the prehispanic Southwest. Labor, power and prestige, Santa Fe, NM.

2000: M. Donald and L. Hurcombe (eds), Gender and material culture in archaeological perspective, New York.

2000: M. Donald and L. Hurcombe (eds), Representations of gender from prehistory to the present, New York.

2000: R. Joyce, Gender and power in prehispanic Mesoamerica, Austin, TX.

2000: A.E. Rautman (ed.), Reading the body. Representations and remains in the archaeological record, Philadelphia.

2000: M.L. Stig Sørensen, Gender archaeology, Cambridge.

2001: B. Arnold and N.L. Wicker (eds), Gender and the archaeology of death, Walnut Creek, CA.

2001: R.A. Schmidt and B.L. Voss (eds), Archaeology of sexuality, London and New York.

2002: T. Ardren (ed.), Ancient Maya women, Walnut Creek, CA.

2002: L. Meskell, Private life in New Kingdom Egypt, Princeton.

2002: S.M. Nelson and M. Rosen-Ayalon (eds), In pursuit of gender. Worldwide archaeological approaches, Walnut Creek, CA.

2003: L. Meskell and R. Joyce, Embodied lives. Figuring ancient Maya and Egyptian experience, London and New York.

2003: S.M. Nelson (ed.), Ancient queens. Archaeological explorations, Walnut Creek, CA.

2004: P. Allison, Pompeian households. An analysis of material culture, Los Angeles.

2004: G.M. Cohen and M. Sharp Joukowsky (eds), Breaking ground. Pioneering women archaeologists, Ann Arbor.

2004: L. Meskell, Object worlds in ancient Egypt. Material biographies past and present, New York.

2004: S.M. Nelson (ed.), Gender in archaeology. Analyzing power and prestige, Lanham, MD.

2005: J.E. Baxter, The archaeology of childhood. Children, gender, and material culture, Walnut Creek, CA.

2005: M. Diaz-Andreu, S. Lucy, S. Babic and D.N. Edwards (eds), The archaeology of identity. Approaches to gender, age, status, ethnicity and religion, London and New York.

2005: T. Hjørungdal (ed.), Gender locales and local genders in archaeology, Oxford (BAR Series International Series 1425).

2006: S.M. Nelson (ed.), Handbook of gender in archaeology, Lanham, MD.

2007: S.M. Nelson (ed.), Identity and subsistence. Gender strategies for archaeology, Lanham, MD.

2007: S.M. Nelson (ed.), Women in antiquity. Theoretical approaches to gender and archaeology, Lanham, MD.

2007: S.M. Nelson (ed.), Worlds of gender. The archaeology of women's lives around the globe, Lanham, MD.

2008: R.A. Joyce, Ancient bodies, ancient lives. Sex, gender, and archaeology, London.

2008: K.M. Linduff and K.S. Rubinson (eds), Are all warriors male? Gender roles on the ancient Eurasian steppe, Lanham, MD.

2008: S. Montón-Subías and M. Sanchez-Romero (eds), Engendering social dynamics. The archaeology of maintenance activities, Oxford (BAR International Series 1862).

2008: K. Olson, Dress and the Roman woman. Self-presentation and society. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon and New York.

2010: B. Roth, Engendering households in the prehistoric Southwest, Tucson.

References in the text

Allison, P., 2006: Mapping for gender. Interpreting artefact distribution inside 1st- and 2nd-century A.D. forts in Roman Germany, Archaeological dialogues 13 (1), 1–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bjerck, H.B., 2008: Norwegian archaeological review 1968–2008. True trends? Norwegian archaeological review 41 (1), 1–13.Google Scholar
Claassen, C., 1994: Book review. What this awl means: Feminist Archaeology at a Wahpeton Dakota Village, American antiquity 59 (4), 791–93.Google Scholar
Conkey, M., and Williams, S., 1991: Original narratives. The political economy of gender in archaeology, in Di Leonardo, M. (ed.), Gender at the crossroads of knowledge, Berkeley, 102–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connell, R., 1995: Masculinities, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Cowgill, G., 1993: Distinguished lecture in archeology. Beyond criticizing New Archeology, American anthropologist 95 (3), 551–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cullen, T., 1996: Contributions to feminism in archaeology, American journal of archaeology 100 (2), 409–14.Google Scholar
Engelstad, E., 1991: Images of power and contradiction. Feminist theory and postprocessual archaeology, Antiquity 65, 502–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Engelstad, E., 2007: Much more than gender, Journal of archaeological method and theory 14, 217–34.Google Scholar
Fogelin, L., 2007: Inference to the best explanation. A common and effective form of archaeological reasoning, American antiquity 72 (4), 603–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fotiadis, M., 1994: What is archaeology's ‘mitigated objectivism’ mitigated by? Comments on Wylie, American antiquity 59 (3), 545–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gero, J., 2007: Honoring ambiguity/problematizing certitude, Journal of archaeological method and theory 14, 311–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hays-Gilpin, K., 2000: Feminist scholarship in archaeology, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 571, 89–106.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hays-Gilpin, K., 2004: Ambiguous images. Gender and rock art, Walnut Creek, CA.Google Scholar
Hegmon, M., 2003: Setting theoretical egos aside. Issues and theory in North American archaeology, American antiquity 8 (2), 213–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hendon, J.A., 2010: Household archaeology and the study of gender, in B. Roth (ed.), Engendering households in the prehistoric Southwest, Tucson, 260–66.Google Scholar
Herdt, G., 1994: Third sex, third gender. Beyond sexual dimorphism in culture and history, New York.Google Scholar
Hill, E., 1998: Gender-informed archaeology. The priority of definition, the use of analog and the multivariate approach, Journal of archaeological method and theory 5 (1), 99–128.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hollimon, S., 2001: Warfare and gender in the Northern Plains. Osteological evidence of trauma reconsidered, in Arnold, B. and Wicker, N. (eds), Gender and the archaeology of death, Walnut Creek, CA, 179–200.Google Scholar
Hurcombe, L., 1998: Book review. Hager, Women in human evolution, Antiquity 72, 452–53.Google Scholar
Joyce, R., 2006: Gender and Mesoamerican archaeology, in Nelson, S. (ed.), Handbook of gender archaeology, Lanham, MD, 785–812.Google Scholar
Kehoe, A., 1992: The muted class. Unshackling a tradition, in Claassen, C. (ed.), Exploring gender through archaeology. Selected papers from the 1991 Boone conference, Madison, WI, 23–32.Google Scholar
Kourany, J. (ed.), 2002: The gender of science. Upper Saddle River, NJ.Google Scholar
Little, B., 1994a: Book review. Exploring gender through archaeology, American antiquity 59 (2), 374–75.Google Scholar
Little, B., 1994b: Consider the hermaphroditic mind. Comment on ‘The interplay of evidential constraints and political interests: recent archaeological research on gender’, American antiquity 59 (3), 539–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lyman, L.B., and O'Brien, M., 2001: The direct historical approach, analogical reasoning, and theory in Americanist archaeology, Journal of archaeological method and theory 8 (4), 303–42.Google Scholar
Marshall, Y., 2008: Archaeological possibilities for feminist theories of transition and transformation, Feminist theory 9 (1), 25–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mobley-Tanaka, J.L., 2010: Households, communities, and the social reorganization of the Pueblo III world, in B. Roth (ed.) Engendering households in the prehistoric Southwest, Tucson, 34–49.Google Scholar
Moi, T., 2006: I am not a feminist, but . . . How feminism became the f-word. PMLA, Transactions and proceedings of the Modern Language Association of America 121 (5), 1735–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moss, M., 2005: Rifts in the theoretical landscape of archaeology in the United States. A comment on Hegmon and Watkins, American antiquity 70 (3), 581–87.Google Scholar
Robb, J., 2009: People of stone. Stelae, personhood, and society in prehistoric Europe, Journal of archaeological method and theory 16, 162–83.Google Scholar
Schiebinger, L., 1999: Has feminism changed science?, Cambridge, MA.Google Scholar
Smith, L., 1995: Gender as ‘other’ in postprocessual archaeology, in Balme, J. and Beck, W. (eds), Gendered archaeology. The Second Australian Women in Archaeology Conference, Canberra, 67–71.Google Scholar
Smith, L., and Cross, H., 1995: Reflections on women in archaeology, in Balme, J. and Beck, W. (eds), Gendered archaeology. The Second Australian Women in Archaeology Conference, Canberra, 7–27.Google Scholar
Stahl, A., and das Dores Cruz, M., 1998: Men and women in a market economy. Gender and craft production in West Central Ghana c. 1775–1995, in Kent, S. (ed.), Gender in African prehistory, Walnut Creek, CA, 205–26.Google Scholar
Steedman, C., 1986: Landscape for a good woman. A story of two lives, London.Google Scholar
Stig Sørensen, M.L., 2000: Gender archaeology, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Strum, S., and Fedigan, L. (eds) 2000: Primate encounters. Models of science, gender, and society, Chicago.Google Scholar
Tomášková, S., 2006: On being heard. Theory as an archaeological practice, Archaeological dialogues 13 (2), 47–51.Google Scholar
Tringham, R., 1991: Households with faces. The challenge of gender in prehistoric architectural remains, in Conkey, M. and Gero, J. (eds), Engendering archaeology, Oxford and Cambridge, MA, pp. 93–131.Google Scholar
VanPool, C., and VanPool, T., 1999: The scientific nature of postprocessualism, American antiquity 64 (1), 35–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vaughan, M., 1983: Which family? Problems in the reconstruction of the history of the family as an economic and cultural unit, Journal of African history 24 (2), 275–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Voutsaki, S., 2010: Agency and personhood at the onset of the Mycenaean period, Archaeological dialogues 17 (1), 65–92.Google Scholar
Wadley, L. (ed.), 1997: Our gendered past, Johannesburg.Google Scholar
Watson, P.J., and Kennedy, M., 1991: The development of horticulture in the Eastern Woodlands of North America. Women's role, in Conkey, M. and Gero, J. (eds), Engendering archaeology, Oxford and Cambridge, MA, 255–75.Google Scholar
Weglian, E., 2001: Grave goods do not a gender make. A case study from Singen am Hohentwiel, Germany, in Arnold, B. and Wicker, N. (eds), Gender and the archaeology of death, Walnut Creek, CA, 137–56.Google Scholar
Whitridge, P., 2004: Landscapes, houses, bodies, things. ‘Place’ and the archaeology of Inuit imaginaries, Journal of archaeological method and theory 11 (2), 213–50.Google Scholar
Wylie, A., 1985: Reaction against analogy, Advances in archaeological method and theory 8, 63–111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wylie, A., 2007: Doing archaeology as a feminist. Introduction, Journal of archaeological method and theory 14, 209–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zvelebil, M., 2000: Fat is feminist issue. On ideology, diet and health in hunter-gatherer societies, in Donald, M. and Hurcombe, L. (eds), Gender and material culture in archaeological perspective, New York, 209–21.Google Scholar