Ambiguous Images - (Gender and Archaeology) by Kelley Hays-Gilpin (Paperback)

About the Book

A significant contribution to the relatively unexplored field of gender in rock art, this volume contains information for those interested in past gender systems. Hays-Gilpin argues that art is both a product of its physical and social environment and a tool of influence in sh...

Book Synopsis

A significant contribution to the relatively unexplored field of gender in rock art, this volume contains information for those interested in past gender systems. Hays-Gilpin argues that art is both a product of its physical and social environment and a tool of influence in shaping behavior and ideas within a society. Rock art is often one of the strongest lines of evidence available to scholars in understanding ritual practices, gender roles, and ideological constructs of prehistoric peoples.

Review Quotes

...presents new avenues for research. Her writing style is clear, and the bibliography is valuable for students of archaeology and rock art. Recommended.

Ambiguous Images is a timely volume in which Kelley Hays-Gilpin covers a wide range of issues as she challenges popular and past stereotypes about rock art and gender-topics she describes as often marginal to the archaeological community. Yet perceptions of sex and gender affect social processes, life cycles, politics, economics, religion, and world views. Drawing on rock art throughout the world, Hays-Gilpin points the way and lays out routes for the dynamic use of rock art imagery as a creative avenue of discovery into richly gendered worlds of the past. This is an exciting addition to the fast-growing literature on gender in archaeology.

Ambiguous Images is a welcome addition to gender, aterial, visual and even 'science' culture studies, and a text I will eagerly recommend and use in the classroom.

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. . . 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.

In its wide ranging selection of case studies the book introduces the reader not only to a variety of rock art manifestations and contexts, but also to aspects of gendered rock art studies that may inspire the search for new developments in local rock art research.

Like the other books in this series, this one creates new paths for others to follow. Kelley Hays-Gilpin doesn't cut the path with a machete, however, but with a scalpel and a fine sensibility for detail. She dispassionately probes the explanations that have been put forward about gender and rock art, and without posturing shows better ways to think about both topics and to discriminate between more and less likely interpretations...The reader has in hand a wise guide, a thoughtful analysis, and a good read.

Recommended to those interested in rock art, archaeology, and Native American cultures.

With this book American rock art research comes of age. Far from a rock art-book-about-rock art, this instead is a book on how rock art informs us about prehistoric gender and social life. It is essential reading for anyone interested in symbolism, prehistoric art, feminist theory or western North American prehistory.

Written in an engaging style that will appeal to non-specialists, it is a thoughtful example of feminist archaeological scholarship that demonstrates many of the congributions of gender-sensitive research.

About the Author

Kelley Hays-Gilpin teaches archaeology, ceramic analysis, and a rock art course at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, just hours from Petrified Forest National Park and her favorite rock art. She received her PhD in anthropology at the University of Arizona in 1992, then worked for the Navajo Nation Archaeology Department for several years. She has co-authored books on prehistoric sandals of northern Arizona and pottery of Arizona's Puerco Valley, and co-edited the Reader in Gender Archaeology with David S. Whitley. Current projects include collaboration with the Museum of Northern Arizon, Harvard Peabody Museum, and the Hopi Tribe on the Southwest Mural Project, a multidisciplinary study of 15th-17th century dry fresco painting from the Puebloan region.