A Woman's Touch: The Absent Presence in Antarctica

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Pre-Recorded Video Presentation Things and the Global Antarctica", at the 2023 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The historic sites on the Antarctic Peninsula cared for by the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust offer a series of snapshots of the British scientific history in Antarctica between 1944 -1993. On the face of it, these histories appear straightforward; their narratives emerging from the rich assemblages of artefacts which were left, sometimes in a hurry, and supported by archival collections in the UK, detailing the logistics, scientific endeavours and personal testimonies of those who were there. Tales of heroic acts, pioneering science and the no-nonsense masculine pragmatism which characterise this era are now being interrogated anew as we take a second look at particularly what we can learn from the material culture about the human experience during these Antarctic deployments. The picture that emerges is a more nuanced and more complex depiction of the culture, and of the individual roles and experiences than traditional narratives might suggest.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Pre-Recorded Video Presentation Things and the Global Antarctica   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2023

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow