Discuss: Choose one or two resources listed in this chapter, and discuss them in relation to what you have learned about queer archaeology.
Present: Choose a key topic or event found in this chapter. Then locate one or two resources from the “Quick Dip” and “Deep Dive” sections and develop a presentation for the class. Explain the significance of the topic, and provide additional details that support your explanation.
Create: What idea, person, or event from this chapter really moved you? Do more research on that idea, person, or event based on the resources in this chapter. Then create your own artistic response. Consider writing a poem, drawing a picture, or editing a photograph in a way that demonstrates both what you have learned and how you feel about the issue or person.
Debate: Find a partner or split into groups, and choose a topic, idea, or controversy from this chapter. Have each partner or group present an opposing perspective on it. Use at least two of the resources in this chapter to support your argument.
Quick Dip: Online Resources
“More Sex: Studying Sexuality and Gendered Roles in Archaeology,” from Rosemary A. Joyce
Rosemary A. Joyce is professor of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, and a preeminent scholar in sex and sexuality in archaeology. Joseph Schuldenrein, in his podcast Indiana Jones: Myth, Reality and 21st Century Archaeology, interviewed Joyce (https://www.voiceamerica.com/episode/83272/more-sex-studying-sexuality-and-gendered-roles-in-archaeology). She discusses the evolution of research in the archaeology of gender and sex as a subdiscipline beginning in the 1980s, when archaeologists began to more directly explore and interrogate gender roles, labor, and societal structures of the past. In the latter half of the interview, Joyce describes the emergence of feminist and queer archaeology in the 1990s as a rejection of archaeological practices that naturalized gender and sex as heteronormative and binaristic. Joyce discusses many detailed examples from the Paleolithic, Assyrian, Egyptian, Greek, Roman, medieval, and Mesoamerican time periods and up to modern ethnographies to illustrate the varied methods and interpretations used in the study of gender, sex, and sexuality in the archaeological record.
Queer Archaeology, from Chelsea Blackmore and Megan Springate
Chelsea Blackmore is assistant professor of anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Megan Springate is a historical archaeologist who edited and contributed to LGBTQ America: A Theme Study of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer History for the National Park Foundation and the National Park Service. In this interview, on the podcast Go Dig a Hole, hosted by Christopher Sims (https://player.fm/series/go-dig-a-hole/queer-archaeology-episode-16), they provide a broader view of queer archaeology, including not only theory and site-based scholarship but also how queering the field is present in other types of professional work. Blackmore discusses definitions of queer archaeology in relation to queer theory and feminist theory, underscoring contributions by eminent figures in the field. Springate introduces the LGBTQ Heritage project within the National Park Service, which preserves important LGBTQ+ sites on the National Register of Historic Places of the National Historic Landmarks program. They describe what queering archaeology and building inclusive archaeology means to them in academic and professional spaces. They also give advice to early career archaeologists and undergraduates on how to acquire knowledge and skills in queer theory and archaeology.
SAA Queer Archaeology Interest Group
The first meeting of the Queer Archaeology Interest Group occurred at the eightieth annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology (SAA) in 2015. The group focuses on queer experience in the field, and its interests lie in supporting professional archaeologists who identify as LGBTQ+. They advocate for establishing a network of scholars interested in sexuality studies and other forms of queer research; work to develop a support and mentorship program for LGBTQ+ archaeologists as a means to connect senior, junior, and student archaeologists; and facilitate the involvement of LGBTQ+ archaeologists in all aspects of the SAA. See https://www.saa.org/quick-nav/about-saa/interest-groups.
What Knowers Know Well: Why Feminism Matters to Archaeology, by Alison Wylie
Alison Wylie is a professor of philosophy and anthropology at the University of Washington and professor of philosophy at Durham University in the United Kingdom. In 2016, Wylie gave the Katz Distinguished Lecture in the Humanities as the opening keynote for the conference Feminism and Classics 7: Visions, held in Seattle, Washington. Wylie’s work advocates for a further infusion of feminist theory into archaeology as a whole. In the speech, Wylie focuses on interrogating the rejection of feminist standpoint theory and the influence of feminist politics in some circles of gender archaeology research and argues that social constructivist analyses within archaeological methodologies bring richness to empirical study in a way that calls into question the notion of value-free research. Wylie introduces social constructionism and strategies and grades of constructionist analysis, talks about situated knowledge and its value to empirical research, and ends with feminist contributions and challenges to gender archaeology rooted in standpoint theory. See https://youtu.be/ucEM1t3Drek.
Deep Dive: Books and Articles
Ancient Bodies, Ancient Lives: Sex, Gender, and Archaeology, by Rosemary A. Joyce
In this book, Rosemary Joyce explores the variety of ways in which social life has been organized by sex. She considers how ancient Greeks thought of men and women as different expressions of a single sexual potential and how Native American societies understood sexual identity. The book explains how archaeologists use the material remains of ancient cultures to learn about gender and sexuality. Joyce asks us to think about how these understandings might challenge us to think differently about our lives now (New York: Thames and Hudson, 2008).
Gender and Archaeology: Contesting the Past, by Roberta Gilchrist
In this book, Roberta Gilchrist provides a thorough overview of the definitions, interests, and methods of gender archaeology and evaluates the ever-expanding role of gender studies in archaeology. Gilchrist draws from the previous decade of research, and thus this work represents the midpoint in the twenty-year span of interest in gender and queer archaeology in the twenty-first century. Gilchrist begins in the first chapter by situating growth in gender archaeology within the progression of feminism and continues in the next chapter to interrogate how archaeological knowledge is gendered. The following chapters consider the relationship between, on one hand, production and social processes of gender in the archaeology of labor and technology and, on the other, representations of gender identity, sexuality, and the body in art, space, and grave goods. The book concludes with a case study of a medieval English castle, putting into practice concepts discussed in the previous chapters (New York: Routledge, 2012).
Gender and Power in Prehispanic Mesoamerica, by Rosemary A. Joyce
Rosemary Joyce, who has made significant contributions to the materiality and archaeology of gender, sex, and sexuality, invokes Judith Butler’s theoretical work on gender performance to situate this volume on gender in Mesoamerica. Joyce analyzes material evidence and gender depictions and roles dating from the formative Mesoamerica, Classic and Postclassic Maya, and then the Aztec periods. In this important work on gender and archaeology, Joyce reexamines the material record to reveal the contrasts between European and Mesoamerican gender ideologies in order to find alternative ways of understanding our material past (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000).
How to Do the History of Male Homosexuality, by David M. Halperin
Halperin takes a social constructionist or historicist approach to human sexuality, stressing the contextual variation of sexuality across time and space. The book challenges the use of current, taken-for-granted ideas about sexuality in historical interpretation (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002).
“Queer Archaeologies,” edited by Thomas A. Dowson
In this 2000 issue of World Archaeology(volume 32, number 2), issue editor Thomas A. Dowson introduces queer archaeology as a challenge to the normative ideas and practices entrenched in current archaeology. This peer-reviewed journal was the first in the field of archaeology to devote an entire issue to defining and discussing queer archaeologies, and this issue is frequently cited as representative of the origins of queer studies in archaeology. Dowson is a pioneer in the subfield of queer archaeologies. The articles include an anonymous autobiographical statement on the influence of sex and sexuality on a practicing archaeologist, homophobia and women in archaeology, queer theory and its relation to the study of the material past, an exploration of autoarchaeology and neo-shamanism, and biotechnology as a site of queer archaeology. Notably, several articles focus on the interpretation, or in some cases reinterpretation, of the material record as inclusive of same-sex relationships and the nonnormative. The issue as a whole gives the reader a rounded perspective of the shape of queer archaeology in the field at the end of the twentieth century.
“Sexuality Studies in Archaeology,” by Barbara L. Voss
In this article, Voss offers a comprehensive review of the state of sexuality studies as of 2008. A well-known scholar who focuses on sexuality studies in archaeology, Voss examines five areas: reproduction management, sexual representations, sexual identities, prostitution, and the sexual politics of institutions. Of note is a section at the end of the article on queer archaeologies, where Voss draws a distinction between sexuality research in archaeology and applying queer theory to archaeology, because Voss affirms the increasing influence and possibilities of queer theory in archaeological methods regarding sexuality and its wider applications to social identity. The article appears in Annual Review of Anthropology (volume 37, number 1; https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.anthro.37.081407.085238).
“Towards an Inclusive Queer Archaeology,” by Dawn M. Rutecki and Chelsea Blackmore
The authors explore the challenges and opportunities faced by LGBTQ+ archaeologists in this short introduction to a 2016 special issue of SAA Archaeological Record (volume 16, number 1; http://onlinedigeditions.com/publication/?i=287180) from the Society for American Archaeology.
