Joan Gero

now at the Department of Anthropology, American University, Washington, D.C.

email address: JGERO@american.edu

Interest in Science Studies:

Archaeological method and theory, history of archaeology, gender theory; paradigm stability & organization/management of controversy; social relations among scientists and their impact on data production

Synopsis of Presentation:

Meeting of the Science Studies Group on Wednesday, December 4th, 1996. The presenters were Joan Gero (Anthropology) and Jane Przybysz (McKissick Museum). Both presentations brought Feminist sensibilities to bear on the question of how science is conducted. As one might expect of a Science Studies Group, there are hard-nosed empiricists among us who are quite willing to acknowledge that women have been under represented in most scientific endeavors, but who are rather skeptical about claims that this is due to the conduct of science itself (rather than to the more general historical pattern of keeping women in the domestic environment). They are equally skeptical about claims that a greater involvement or investment of women could affect the quality of science - after all, our standards for judging theories are not or do not seem to be gender-based.

As an answer to the skeptics among us, Joan Gero had a rich and compelling story to offer, too rich for a brief presentation and my even briefer synopsis. Joan is an archaeologist and for the most part concerned with Peruvian culture. She describes modern archaeology as extremely diverse: both, in terms of the demographics of its practitioners and in terms of specializations. This affords her the unique opportunity to observe a specialization within archaeology which turns out to be sharply gendered: as opposed to archaeology overall, it is made up entirely of men (even the so-called 'token women' appear to be missing from this field); and its methods, questions, and theories reflect a distinctly male point of view (again, as opposed to other archaeological fields and in light of the questions that clearly should be, but which are not discussed within this specialization). The specialization in question studies Paleoindians, i.e., Early Man on the American Continent.

I can only provide a drastic caricature of the history of this specialization. It all began a century ago with a stunning discovery from which the field has never recovered. The debate as to the first presence of humans on the continent was dramatically resolved when next to the bones of extinct bison was found a fluted point, presumably the weapon by which bison was killed. Paleoindians thus entered the minds of archaeologists as big-game-hunters who crafted tools to kill their prey. Even though many other artefacts of Paleoindians have been found in the meantime, artefacts having to do with cooking and eating and needle work, the exclusively male community of archaeologists has not considered the eating and living habits of male and female Paleoindians. Instead, it is exclusively devoted to replicate the tool-making and hunting practices of the big-game hunters (i.e., men). Evidence relating to small mammals, the work of ethno-botanists, etc. is simply not included in the research practices. And since archaeological evidence can be scrutinized only by those who have access to the sites, the closed network of researchers in effect prevents that other than their own questions are brought to the evidence.

Joan has studied this field in various stages. She tells a cultural history of Paleoindian research, investigates the social networks among researchers, analyzes how the theoretical framework prejudices data-collection by way of standardized observation-sheets and recording-forms, and will soon be a participant-observer in an ethnographic study of fieldwork: the predominant epistemology of replicating hunting and tool-making practices may turn out to be a form of trans-historical male bonding. As usual, here are some references to Joan's work: "Facts and Values in the Archaeological Eye: Discussion of 'The Powers of Observation'" (in Sarah Nelson and Alice Kehoe, eds. Powers of Observation: Alternative Views in Archeology, no. 2 of the Archeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association, 1990); "The Social World of Prehistoric Facts: Gender and Power in Paleoindian Research" (in Hilary du Cros and Laurajan Smith, eds. Women in Archaeology, Occasional Papers in Prehistory No. 23, Department of Prehistory, Research School of Pacific Studies, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australia, 1993); "Gender Division of Labor in the Construction of Archaeological Knowledge in the United States" (in George Bond and Angela Gilliam, eds. Social Construction of the Past: Representation as Power, London and New York: Routledge, 1994); and "Archaeological Practice and Gendered Encounters with Field Data" (in Rita Wright, ed. Gender and Archaeology, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996).

Alfred Nordmann