At 06:51 AM 5/8/00 +0200, Paul Barford wrote:

>What would be interesting would be to look at this topic not only in
national perspective but across a wider area. I am thinking in particular
of looking at eastern and central Europe in the so-called "communist" era,
which had a number of highly influential female archaeologists. Here social
attitudes were different (though differed from country to country and in
time), but paradoxically while on one hand a certain equality of the sexes
was officially approved, this went against other social attitudes, creating
a fascinating paradoxical context for archaeological activity by women. The
situation has been rendered more interesting by the changes after 1989 when
at least in some countries new social attitudes have developed, and it
would seem that the position of women in central European archaeology at
least might (?) be changing.

Indeed, a very interesting topic. Moreover, female archaeologists seem to
have played a role at least as important as that of male archaeologists in
establishing connections between "national" archaeological schools. This is
no doubt the case of Irina Rusanova (Soviet Union, now Russia), Zhivka
Vuzharova (Bulgaria), and Maria Comsa (Romania). In all three cases, these
women were (and still are) viewed as leading scholars, Vuzharova and Comsa
making extensive use of their association with Artamonov for establishing
their reputation and power within the academic establishment in their
respective countries. The same may be true about Agnes Cs. Sos in Hungary.
A younger generation of female archaeologists, who came to the fore in the
1980s, worked its way to the top by more or less openly contesting
"hard-liners," such as Comsa and Vuzharova. This is the case of Suzana
Dolinescu-Ferche and Silvia Baraschi in Romania, Liudmila Doncheva-Petkova
and Rumiana Koleva in Bulgaria, or Margit Nagy in Hungary.

My impression is that Marija Gimbutas' views of the Slavs were also
influenced by Rusanova and Vuzharova. This may also be true for her
controversial views of "Old Europe," but I do not have a sufficiently
thorough knowledge of prehistoric archaeology in those respective countries
in order to prove the point.


>The study of the position of women in archaeology in this region (these
regions) seems not to have been the subject of serious study (but I know of
some preliminary work done by Agata Ulanowska of the University of Warsaw).

Can you provide any bibliographical reference for that?


Florin Curta 
_____________________________________________________________

Florin Curta
Department of History
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
University of Florida
4411 Turlington Hall
P.O. Box 117320
Gainesville, FL 32611-7320
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
http://web.clas.ufl.edu/users/fcurta


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