Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology

DOCUMENT Citation Only Carito Tavera-Medina.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The countries of the Central Andes are diverse in their class, ethnic, and gender compositions, as well as in how these identity categories intersect in practice. In this paper, I analyze whether this social reality—which partly began with Spanish colonization and took root during the rise of the young...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Xinyi Xie.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Museums perform as a window that exhibits the archaeological materials from the past to the public, and are often considered as neutral ‘authorities’ showing the ‘truth’. However, recent research doubts the authority of museums, arguing that the materials are interpreted and represented subjectively and selectively....

DOCUMENT Citation Only Valentina Martinez.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The visibility of female’s efforts to the development of Ecuadorian archaeology is still in progress. Therefore, we begin our conversation with an evaluation of the contributions of female archaeologists working within the domain of bio-archaeology, an arena practiced by mostly women. However, their voices are still...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Shiyu Tian.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the late 1950s, the Henan Cultural Relics Institute organized a group of female archaeologists and established a professional team named the "Liu Hulan(Liu Hulan is a famous female national heroine) Archaeological Team". This is the first professional archaeological team composed of only women in China. Through...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jimena Blasco.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Since the first historicizations of archaeology in Uruguay, the ‘pioneers’ or ‘fathers of national archaeology’ have been at the center of the story. Without detracting from their merit, their work was sustained and supported by the work of many women who, in addition to carrying out fieldwork, were especially...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Megan Leight.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. West Virginia was one of the first states to hire a “state archaeologist” in 1960. Soon after the need for another staff archaeologist was recognized and a woman, Bettye Broyles, was hired in 1963. Bettye spent over a decade excavating pre-contact and historic sites in West Virginia. Her work is evident in the dozens...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Margarita Díaz-Andreu.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the past five years, the history of women in Spanish archaeology has been explored through two projects: ArqueólogAs (2020-2024) and Herstory (2024-2028). The Herstory project aims to provide a global, comparative, and diachronic perspective on women’s roles and contributions in Spanish archaeology. A key method...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Tianyi Dong.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the history of Chinese archaeology, despite the significant contributions of women in Chinese archaeology since the early 20th century, the discipline’s historical narrative has remained predominantly male-centric, with women's voices seldom featured in mainstream discourse. Although women have played a vital role...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jocelyne Ponce.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper explores the pivotal contributions of women in shaping professional archaeology in the Maya region, with a particular focus on Guatemalan archaeology. Historically, some entered the field as wives of male archaeologists. However, during the development of professional archaeology in the 20th century, women...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Brenna Hassett.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The TrowelBlazers Project has spent more than ten years collecting, curating, and sharing the experiences of women in the "digging" sciences. While we are proud of our contribution to the understanding of the role of women in the history of archaeology, we find it necessary to ask: what is the point of us? The...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Claire Smith.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This presentation focusses how interconnected networks of women have shaped the development of Australian archaeology during the twentieth century. Through the lens of intersectionality and the multi-faceted practice of women’s roles in archaeological work, I consider the various roles that women have played in the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Hui Wu.

This is an abstract from the "Behind the Scenes and on the Stage: The Women Who Shaped Archaeology" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ms. Zeng Zhaoyu, born into a wealthy family, and her family background enabled her to self fund her studies at the University of London and follow Prof Professor Yetts studied "Chinese Archaeology and Art History" (1935). At that time, China had just emerged from thousands of years of feudal monarchy, and the...