Essay on "women power " in neolithic times
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Gender is a concept that changes across time and around the world. So, what did it mean back in the earliest days of humanity's existence? In this lesson, we'll examine women's roles in Stone Age societies and see how they changed with time.
Stone Age Women
Long, long ago, humans lived in bands of roving hunter-gatherers, surviving off the land and their wits alone. Men were strong, brave, and stoic as they battled mammoths and saber-tooth cats. Women were nurturing and domestic, gathering plants to eat. That's just the way it was.
Wait, hold on there. Did all men hunt, while all women gathered? Were all chores segregated by gender? How did they decide? We may have some assumptions about what life was like in the Stone Age, but as it turns out, not all of our assumptions are realistic. Gender segregation is not something that has ever been natural or universal in human history, so to understand the role of women in the Stone Age we need to put aside our assumptions, and take a closer look at what life was really like way back when.
The Paleolithic Woman
To start, let's divide the broad category of ''Stone Age'' into some more specific periods. Most of this lengthy era can be classified as the Paleolithic, or the Old Stone Age. This was the world before the advent of agriculture, when all societies were nomadic or semi-nomadic, relying on their skills as hunters and gatherers.
For a long time, we had some pretty strong assumptions about Paleolithic life. It was assumed that men (who do have greater capacity for physical strength) were better suited to act as hunters in a world where prey included massive beasts like mammoths. Women, on the other hand, were assumed to control more domestic chores, primarily due to the responsibilities of child raising.
In some cases, this division may have been accurate. However, there is less and less evidence that this was the norm. Archeologists and paleoanthropologists have realized that the assumed segregation of labor placed disproportionate demands on the time of men and women. In a small society where everybody had to work in order for the group to survive, it seems unlikely that anyone would be sitting idly while others labored. It's more likely that nearly all chores were shared between men and women, depending on the needs of the group at that time. Realistically, mammoth hunts would have been relatively rare events; this wasn't something you did every day. So, even if those hunts were gender segregated, does it mean that more common chores like gathering nuts and berries were?
This logic extends beyond just food acquisition. As scholars reexamined our assumptions, we realized that there was essentially no evidence at all to support the notion that men were the only ones making stone tools. There's also evidence that children may have been raised in a more communal fashion, with parenting being a group effort. Furthermore, studies in 2012 found that of Paleolithic handprints painted onto cave walls in France and Spain, 3/4 belonged to women (we can tell because men and women have different finger lengths relative to palm size). This forces us to question the assumptions that men were responsible for Paleolithic art as well.
Overall, it seems that Paleolithic societies were pretty egalitarian. The reality is that we have very little evidence about their lives, so the real question is this: where did our assumptions come from? In part, they came from studying living hunter-gatherer societies. Many of these studies were conducted on Amerindian nations of the Great Plains during the 19th century, and were interpreted through the strongly patriarchal lens of Euro-American society at that time. Elements of these cultures like matrilineal decent and the power of women were often ignored in favor of aspects that fit into a Western pattern of gender norms. So, there was a strong bias and it led to the creation of assumptions about ancient peoples.
Stone Age Women
Long, long ago, humans lived in bands of roving hunter-gatherers, surviving off the land and their wits alone. Men were strong, brave, and stoic as they battled mammoths and saber-tooth cats. Women were nurturing and domestic, gathering plants to eat. That's just the way it was.
Wait, hold on there. Did all men hunt, while all women gathered? Were all chores segregated by gender? How did they decide? We may have some assumptions about what life was like in the Stone Age, but as it turns out, not all of our assumptions are realistic. Gender segregation is not something that has ever been natural or universal in human history, so to understand the role of women in the Stone Age we need to put aside our assumptions, and take a closer look at what life was really like way back when.
The Paleolithic Woman
To start, let's divide the broad category of ''Stone Age'' into some more specific periods. Most of this lengthy era can be classified as the Paleolithic, or the Old Stone Age. This was the world before the advent of agriculture, when all societies were nomadic or semi-nomadic, relying on their skills as hunters and gatherers.
For a long time, we had some pretty strong assumptions about Paleolithic life. It was assumed that men (who do have greater capacity for physical strength) were better suited to act as hunters in a world where prey included massive beasts like mammoths. Women, on the other hand, were assumed to control more domestic chores, primarily due to the responsibilities of child raising.
In some cases, this division may have been accurate. However, there is less and less evidence that this was the norm. Archeologists and paleoanthropologists have realized that the assumed segregation of labor placed disproportionate demands on the time of men and women. In a small society where everybody had to work in order for the group to survive, it seems unlikely that anyone would be sitting idly while others labored. It's more likely that nearly all chores were shared between men and women, depending on the needs of the group at that time. Realistically, mammoth hunts would have been relatively rare events; this wasn't something you did every day. So, even if those hunts were gender segregated, does it mean that more common chores like gathering nuts and berries were?
This logic extends beyond just food acquisition. As scholars reexamined our assumptions, we realized that there was essentially no evidence at all to support the notion that men were the only ones making stone tools. There's also evidence that children may have been raised in a more communal fashion, with parenting being a group effort. Furthermore, studies in 2012 found that of Paleolithic handprints painted onto cave walls in France and Spain, 3/4 belonged to women (we can tell because men and women have different finger lengths relative to palm size). This forces us to question the assumptions that men were responsible for Paleolithic art as well.
Overall, it seems that Paleolithic societies were pretty egalitarian. The reality is that we have very little evidence about their lives, so the real question is this: where did our assumptions come from? In part, they came from studying living hunter-gatherer societies. Many of these studies were conducted on Amerindian nations of the Great Plains during the 19th century, and were interpreted through the strongly patriarchal lens of Euro-American society at that time. Elements of these cultures like matrilineal decent and the power of women were often ignored in favor of aspects that fit into a Western pattern of gender norms. So, there was a strong bias and it led to the creation of assumptions about ancient peoples.
mitesh123:
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Answer:Of too much high quality but good nice keep it up Utkarsh
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