The Past Is Male

Abstract

Quantitative analyses of how the past and archaeological professionals are being depicted in, for example, exhibitions and popular books offer valuable - and sometimes confronting - insights about how presentation practices continue to reflect gender stereotypes. It turns out that very often archaeology and the archaeological past are still almost exclusively associated with males and masculine activities. This, of course, distorts the truth about what actually happened in past societies. It also raises the questions of whether or not such biases have an influence on public participation in archaeology and if they may hinder the sector's ambition to foster inclusivity. In this article, we will share some of the preliminary results of an ongoing systematic evaluation of presentation practice in Dutch archaeology and on the public perception of gender stereotypes in the past.