Archaeology of Gender

Погребения женщин с предметами вооружения являются панкультурным феноменом для обществ степной/лесостепной полосы Евразии раннего железного века. Предлагаемая статья посвящена систематизации и интерпретации женских захоронений с оружием саргатской культуры Зауралья и Западной Сибири. Включение саргатских данных в общий контекст развития скотоводческих обществ Евразии позволит расширить наши знания о древних социальных структурах и месте, занимаемом внем женщинами

This paper discusses female toiletry items found in seven Pompeian houses, which all contain two distinct deposits of such objects; one, presumably, in storage, and the other in its place of use. The placing of the latter, mostly collocated in oeci flanking the tablinum, is analysed as an indication of the locus of female space in the Roman house.

The following contribution was conceived as a short overview of the
international and Romanian literature on gender archaeology, with the
purpose of underlining the importance of both theoretical studies and change of mentalities in Romanian archaeology. Using mainly the anglo-saxon bibliography, I have outlined the importance of perceiving gender archaeology as another alternative in discussing social relations in ancient societies and not as a biased tool in finding women in the past. Sadly, the Romanian contributions to the subject are almost absent, but there is a growing concern related to gender relations in the ancient world, dr. Nona Palincaș being the front (wo)man in this direction of study.

The University Press of Florida has just announced the publication of this new book on women, textiles, exchange, and changing ideologies, materialities, and gender across the North Atlantic.
Spanning nearly a millennium, it uses interdisciplinary analyses of archaeological collections from Norway, Scotland, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland, and Arctic Canada to weave new perspectives on the development of North Atlantic societies, responses to climate change, and shifts in international trade, largely through a focus on women, while at the same time untangling and unraveling misconceptions about women's roles and the importance of textiles to North Atlantic households and communities.
Publication date is November 3, 2020; pre-orders are being accepted by UPF now.
Learn more about this book at UPF.com

El periodo colonial en las Américas se inició con el arribo de Cristóbal Colón. No he podido dar con la relación etimológica entre "Colón" y "colonialismo", pero el título de este ensayo alude a una propuesta que busca editar el prejuicio colonial y español en la interpretación de la princesa indígena que tuvo un lugar tan preeminente en la conquista de México. Y como tal representa una perspectiva poscolonial de la conquista al empoderar las voces de autores subalternos y no dominantes con la intención de argumentar una historia alternativa nativa y feminista (Gosden, 2001). Doña Marina, con otras 19 mujeres, fue bautizada poco después de ser entregada por el cacique de Potonchan, de la región del Golfo sur de México, al ejército de Her-nán Cortés (Díaz del Castillo, 1963; Karttunen, 1997). Al conocerse su manejo de varias lenguas, mostrándose bilingüe por lo menos en dialectos mayenses y náhuatl, Cortés la toma para sí y ella se convierte en su traductora, consejera y amante. La mayor parte de la información que se conoce de fuentes históricas proviene de cronistas coloniales: Bernal Díaz del Castillo (1963) y Fernando Ló-pez de Gómara (1964). Cortés (1986) alude a doña Marina como una mujer nativa que acompañaba al ejército en una reveladora descripción de su sentir hacia la madre del heredero de su imperio. Con base mayormente en estas crónicas históricas, ali-mentadas por un fervor nacionalista y antiespañol, durante los siglos XIX y XX, doña Marina ha sido repudiada como

This chapter investigates the depiction of female genitalia in Roman society both in the Mediterranean and the north-west provinces. It begins by outlining a number of basic premises shaping the investigation and an explanation of the central hypothesis, namely that the faithful depiction of female genitalia was a taboo in Graeco-Roman society. This is followed by two parts examining and comparing the depictions of female genitalia, first, on women in Mediterranean culture and, second, the north-western provinces. In a third part, “disembodied” symbolical depictions of female genitals and their possible use as apotropaia are discussed for both the Mediterranean culture and the north-western provinces.

Gender, together with style, religion and landscape, is one of the most popular topics in rock art studies. This book is a welcome addition to the growing literature on the subject. It is not a work of research but a book which seeks to summarise the state of play.. The account of gender in North American rock art (with some forays into rock art traditions elsewhere in the world) in Chapters 4 to 8 is undoubtedly the best part of the book. The information provided is fascinating because of its complexity, its erudition and its sophistication. The author’s knowledge of a vast range of relevant literature is most impressive on issues such as the relation between rock art and fertility shrines, authorship, life cycles, puberty rites and ritual landscape. Most of the information given is related to ethnographic sources, effectively bringing out the challenges their use entails in the interpretation of rock art. This book will have a significant impact on the field of North American rock art studies and will become a standard work of reference and point of departure for much future scholarship.

Resumen: el papel activo del género femenino en las diferentes etapas cronológicas está siendo ampliamente estudiado en la actualidad a través de conceptos como «identidad relacional» o «actividades de mantenimiento» y de investigaciones enfocadas hacia la transmisión oral, el ámbito privado o la vida cotidiana en disciplinas como la Arqueología, la Historia o la Musicología. Esta comunicación aplica esta metodología a un estudio del mundo musical ibero desde la perspectiva de género, que analiza la posición de la mujer en ese entorno a través de diferentes ejemplos materiales –atendiendo a su estudio formal, así como al contexto arqueológico en el que aparecen– procedentes de Sant Miquel de Llíria, Serreta de Alcoy, L´Albufereta, Cigarralejo, Cabecico del Tesoro y Osuna. Partiendo de las interpretaciones que de estos materiales se han realizado tanto en sus correspondientes memorias arqueológicas como en publicaciones posteriores que establecen una relación directa entre mujer ibera y transmisión oral a través de la música, se propone un análisis que ayude a comprender las funciones musicales desempeñadas por el género
femenino como actividades relevantes y determinantes para el desarrollo y la perpetuación de la cultura íbera. Ese mismo modelo podrá contribuir a la comprensión de las sucesivas explicaciones que se dieron de los materiales estudiados desde las primeras apariciones (auletrís de Osuna de Sevilla en 1903) hasta las más recientes (terracotas de l´Albufereta en Alicante y el Cigarralejo en Murcia).
Abstract: the active role of the female gender in the different chronological stages is being widely studied at present through concepts such as «relational identity» or «maintenance activities» and also through research focused on oral transmission, the private sphere or daily life in disciplines such as Archaeology, History or Musicology. This communication applies this methodology to a study of the Iberian musical world from the perspective of gender, which analyzes the position of women in that environment through different material examples –attending to both their formal study, and the archaeological context in which they appear– from Sant Miquel de Llíria, Serreta de Alcoy, L’Albufereta, Cigarralejo, Cabecico del Tesoro and Osuna. Starting with the interpretation of these materials presented both in their archaeological memories and in subsequent publications which establish a direct relationship between Iberian women and oral transmission through music, this paper proposes an analysis with the purpose of understanding the musical roles performed by the female gender as relevant and determining activities for the development and perpetuation of the Iberian Culture. That same model may contribute to the understanding of the successive explanations given of the materials studied from the first appearances (auletrís of Osuna de Sevilla in 1903) to the most recent (terracotas de l’Albufereta in Alicante and the Cigarralejo in Murcia).

Material culture studies demonstrate how objects may act to communicate information regarding social identity. In this study we consider ethnohistorical, ethnographic, and archaeological evidence for Postclassic spinning and weaving as symbols relating to female ideology in ancient Mexico. We then relate aA contextual interpretation of texts and images is related to contemporary symbolism, particularly associated with members of the  female  earth/fertility deity complex depicted and described in pre-Columbian and early Colonial pictorial manuscripts. For our case study we analyze decorative imagery found on baked clay spindle whorls from Postclassic Cholula, Mexico. This collection is  is used as a case study representative of an iconographic system relating to female ideology. Whorls as well as other spinning and weaving tools paralleled male-oriented weapons to create a symbolic equivalence, or as we argue, a usurpation of the male symbols within a female worldview as a form of resistance to male domination. We conclude that the symbolic system used on spindle whorls and in other aspects of female practice created a communication network understood by Postclassic women.