00:00.30 archpodnet Welcome back to episode one fourteen of the rock art podcast. We're talking about gender and sex and representation and in rock art and all kinds of other things so one of the things I wanted to talk about because you were you're making me think about this right at the end of the last segment is again, we make assumptions right. And sometimes all we have to go on are assumptions and we have to you know we we find a limited amount of information in the archaeological record and we have to infer the rest of it based on either something that we know of the culture like maybe it's only a couple hundred years ago and we have some written you know evidence or something like that of of behavior. But we also have to take that with a grain of salt because the person who wrote that down had their own biases but you know and and we we look at history though and we look at what we find through the lens of our own experience and our own surroundings and I think modern archeologists probably do that a lot less because we're aware of it. But like you said earlier you know. Archaeologists Forty fifty sixty years ago even some more recent than that that are just older and keep doing this are not aware of that and they just keep making these assumptions about and these biases because the first assumption is the division between men and women and and the fact that you know sex and all that is. Is treated like we generally think we treat it well I want to say like 80% of people treat it today. Obviously we've got a whole bunch of fluidity and a lot of things going on but you know your standard man woman makes a baby kind of thing I mean period historically people have known that for hundreds of thousands of years right that's not a secret but that doesn't mean that they stuck with that. 01:34.28 archpodnet During all the other times and and representing those relationships in rock art would just be ah, a logical next step. Yeah. 01:36.21 alan Exactly. 01:42.55 alan Exactly And so what I was alluding to was trying to you know, give give our listeners a taste of this indigenous cosmology and how that relates to rock art. So when we. 02:00.60 archpodnet Oh. 02:00.60 alan When we see these figures they often possess genitals or genital Symbology. So We know that either female or male and surprisingly enough there. Ah there is ah it's Ubiquitous. It's It's very very um. Prevalent in the in in in Coso rock art to find females now the other element that's fascinating is when we think about certain kinds of certain classes of celestial objects. The sun and the moon. Well, the sun is always not always but often or frequently identified as a male and the reason for that is because it's a strong.. It's a hard.. It's a intense ah energy producing. 02:40.78 archpodnet Um. 02:58.37 alan Phenomenon that dries things up and you know ah has has sort of this phenomenon so that it is a a glaring presence the opposite of that is the moon and the moon. 03:13.64 archpodnet Oh. 03:17.82 alan Is seen at night in a cooler more melodious circumstance and when native people this was American Southwest Mexico the great basin view the moon they view it as a female now. Why would that be. The reason that's a female is because it goes through various stages when we see it crescent and and you know gibbus and and growing and then vanishing and coming back. So it appears to be as though it is pregnant and birthing. 03:38.60 archpodnet Um. 03:54.60 archpodnet Right. 03:57.10 alan And then going to the cycle all over again now interestingly enough in Mesoamerican cosmology and rock art in the American Southwest amongst the hopi just for one. And then in the great basin.. There are certainly deities or supernatural beings that are feminine and those being beings are represented with. 04:28.39 archpodnet Um. 04:34.56 alan Ah, gendered sexed ah attributes that that tip it away that show that we're dealing with a supernatural being because it shows as an animal human figure and sometimes it even shows. Ah. 04:49.91 archpodnet Ram for. 04:54.80 alan The Moon the crescent Moon in association with this feminine figure. Amazing So that that and that figure So if we're taking this ethnographically and we we look at what the native people tell us. 04:58.59 archpodnet Yeah. 05:13.64 alan Through the traditions through the sacred narratives. This is a ah a being well for instance, if you want to be extreme if we look at the high cultures of Mexico they found a ah 27 ton statue. Of 1 of their basic basic high culture deities named coad leekway and it's a feminine deity. We know it's a feminine deity because it has breasts and it also is birthing a snake. 05:36.38 archpodnet Um. 05:41.50 archpodnet Ah. 05:44.57 archpodnet Okay. 05:51.66 archpodnet Wow. 05:52.30 alan And it's covered in snakes covered covered covered in snakes. So I don't mean to get off track with with this discussion but snakes ah figure highly in. Um, you know s tech cosmology both for the great base in the american southwest. And in the high cultures of Mexico as you're well aware and it is ah a figure that is prominent for a lot of reasons and um it has ah you know, ah metaphors so whenever you're thinking about the depiction of an animal a human a figure. 06:17.97 archpodnet Yeah. 06:31.82 alan You have to ask yourself what? what? What are the attributes of that figure. What's the habits and habitats of it and how can we think about that and what is that representing to the native mind and what was it trying to communicate So that's always helpful. 06:40.54 archpodnet Oh. 06:49.98 alan Um, if I get off track on this one. Let's jump. Let's jump to the Artisans right? The people who manufactured rock art and what their sex may have been for the longest time we thought that exclusively. 06:56.25 archpodnet Um, right. 07:08.89 alan These were shamans who were men but recently we found strong evidence that going back to almost the beginnings of rock art itself when we had handprints that were ah. 07:09.66 archpodnet Right. 07:28.90 alan Manifesting on the walls of dry caves with you know numbers of ten thousands of years ago they are exclusively females and young females at that and they're very strong in that perspective. 07:44.50 archpodnet Yeah. 07:46.52 alan If you think about it even further we have ethnographic evidence in Southern California that it was the women young women coming of age who ran to rocks and embellished their handprints. On those rocks or identified a a series of diamond patterns that were representing snakes again. Um on those rocks but they were the artisans the functional personae. 08:14.22 archpodnet Um. 08:24.12 alan Who are actually crafting the rock art. Not men but women. 08:26.76 archpodnet Wow. Okay, and and that's. 08:30.75 alan So that that that that that puts a whole different cast a whole different sort of genre into our understanding of the meaning function and implication of rock art doesn't it. 08:47.16 archpodnet It does no for sure I mean you see I mean name the scene and it's probably been depicted in rock art somewhere in the world right? I mean it's not always like you said hunting and things like that. So I mean it is a lot of the time or it seems like it is but not all the time and. 08:49.74 alan It's not all about hunting and men go ahead. 08:59.10 alan Um, right? but. 09:06.80 archpodnet I Think that just goes to say that you know like you said rock art wasn't exclusive to one ah gender for lack of a better word. It wasn't exclusive to that. It was probably inclusive of you know, just about anybody Um, because it's not it doesn't take somebody who's particularly strong to do it. And and sometimes not even particularly creative to be honest I mean some of those shapes those early shapes are are relatively simplistic, right? and and just about anybody could have done it for whatever reason and I always thought that the more simplistic ones The more abstract ones were really really are the product of like. 09:28.20 alan Now. Yeah. 09:41.43 archpodnet You know some sort of ritualistic behavior right? because it's representing something whereas the ones that are more identifiable figures. You know, obviously they can represent some kind of ritual but they may also just be you know people put in images that represent them or their tribe or or something on the. 09:49.46 alan Oh. 09:58.85 archpodnet You know on the wall because it's prominent and they know it'll stay there forever So who knows. 10:06.17 alan Yeah, um, I've used a set of words to talk about rock art. 1 of them is ah representing personal immortality. Um, which is which is. 10:18.85 archpodnet Nice. 10:23.64 alan Which is really what we have with rock guard. It's a freezeframe of the thoughts and yearnings and passions of a people emblazoning the rocks and in some cases ah having great great. Permanence um, it can be there for hundreds thousands of years and continues to exist in a ah ah permanent state communicating those images to those who came much much later. 10:47.80 archpodnet Um. 10:58.86 archpodnet Yeah I feel like the I I feel like the modern equivalent of that is writing a book because you know books are books are catalogued in there and even if it's not a popular book that had a a big run and you know didn't sell millions of copies or even thousands of copies. 11:01.42 alan And one of the yeah, go ahead. 11:09.20 alan Um, yeah, yeah. 11:17.88 archpodnet It's stored somewhere you know the library of Congress has a record of this book and you know as long as that sticks around for a little while. Yeah, yeah, yeah for sure. 11:19.70 alan Yeah, and it's it's and it's ah it's a legacy a legacy so I um I I noticed that when I I had left the profession for about 20 years or so and came back. 11:37.31 archpodnet Um. 11:39.47 alan And the professionals in archaeology of course were still arguing over the same topics when I had previously been and they referenced my work. They were referencing referencing articles and information that I had developed twenty years ago 11:47.30 archpodnet Right? right. 11:57.96 alan That were germane to the topic and I said Wow that's kind of neat I guess it was good that I wrote it down and then I published it. So yes now, but it's it. It is remarkable that we can have such a legacy in that people can. 12:05.84 archpodnet Ah, nice. Yeah. 12:16.22 alan Go to the library and see and touch and read and and picture the ah imagery and verbiage that's emblazoning the pages of these books because it's it's ah it's a monument a legacy to the people who crafted those original thoughts and words. 12:31.55 archpodnet Ah. 12:33.82 archpodnet Yeah, right. 12:35.61 alan And they can be ah hundreds or or even thousands of years ago and so that's as you say the modern day rock art is the books and testaments we have to ah the ah those scholars and individuals who were creative and. Decided to memorialize their thoughts. Um, and so rock art is certainly at that same genre memorializing the thoughts and stories and passions of a people and. 12:56.34 archpodnet M. 13:10.79 archpodnet Now. 13:12.73 alan That's what's so amazing to me when you view the rock art because you're seeing it in that with with your eyes but from their perspective. 13:23.69 archpodnet Right? Okay, well with that. We're going to take a break. 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