I find that most illustrations and other representations depicting the evolution of humankind depict the evolution of males by default. A Google image search of “evolution of man” turns up a plethora of illustrations depicting the evolution of exactly that, A MAN. Women, for some strange reason, are nowhere to be seen, though I’m sure we were part of the process. Although there is this illustration which turns up on a number of websites: the evolution of man and woman.
As well as the more advanced version.
Even though I have studied a great deal of anthropology, including some physical anthropology, and have always been interested in evolution, I find that only the image of males evolving is stuck to my brain. What women looked like through the years? The gradual progression of sexual dimorphism, when things happened and what it looked like? Not so sure. If anyone knows where I could see an illustration of the evolution of women, that is, something that doesn’t depict us constantly cleaning the floor, I would be much obliged. Even though anthropology has taught me a lot about how women as gatherers were usually responsible for bringing in the most sustenance, and how societies with matrilineal kinship systems and egalitarian property structures are typically more peaceful and less patriarchal, I still get other messages from a lot of the images and language associated with our discipline. This is despite the fact that the canon of anthropology, at least on the cultural side, has been developed and influenced by female scholars.
Anthropology has, like most other sciences, been traditionally male-dominated. However, there have been a number of influential female anthropologists, the most popular of course including Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, and some more contemporary women like Sherry Ortner. Other prominent female anthropologists can be found here.
Many of these anthropologists have questioned traditional philosophical paradigms that were based on deeply rooted Western canons whose development were heavily centered on the male perspective. Many female scholars have challenged traditional notions of sexuality and gender, Margaret Mead is perhaps best known for her endeavors in that arena, and in their own lives, ahead of their times, exhibited the fact that women can do science, write well, conduct intensive fieldwork, and lead very interesting personal lives. While these women were typically relegated to lower posts than their male counterparts, or earned a lower rate of pay, they introduced and influenced a great body of work that contributes a great deal to what anthropology is today. Female scholars have also developed a lively discourse in feminism and feminist anthropology, working to understand gender and power from a cross-cultural perspective. Women almost everywhere face various kinds of oppression, but not everyone experiences oppression, or empowerment, in the same way. In recent years, it has also become important to look at how gender inequality affects men, the concept of “maleness”, and the gender continuum which varies apart from biological sex.
Despite all of this, anthropology still seems alarmingly malecentric. For a field so heavily developed and influenced by women, I have to wonder where the women are depicted, and who understands their impact. It has been said that the way we talk about things filters what we understand of our reality. Images work the same way. If I’m a woman and I want to know how we as humans evolved, but all I can find are pictures of apes turning into men, I can’t see where we are in the picture. I don’t see humans, I see men. There are a lot of discussions going on in our field about how science textbooks, particularly in the field of biology, reinforce patriarchal notions, associating the male body with the stereotypical role of aggressor and sexual predator, for example, through the use of precise language and visual depiction. It seems that anthropology should be at the cutting edge of questioning and confronting those stereotypes.
31 Comments
February 14, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Very interesting. I am a student in my first Anthropolgy class and I have the same questions? If nonhuman primate societies are studied for answers to our questions about the behaviors in our own societies, why is it we don’t see more about female contribution to the evolutionary process?
June 13, 2009 at 10:34 pm
hello, I am a year 10 student and I’m doing a project on evolution. I was searching google for images and I found an image belonging to your site of the evolution of man and a woman cleaning. I would just like to say that that is extremely sexist and rude. It is an awful picture and I am very offended.
June 15, 2009 at 11:32 am
What are you talking about, D’Arcy?
April 7, 2008 at 5:29 pm
the reason you don’t see studies on feminine evolution (culturally and physically) might be that since the field was male-dominated, women were not considered worth studying. alternatively, maybe it takes a female anthropologist to be able to provide the perspective that is needed to understand women’s historic role in society. just my own thoughts.
April 22, 2008 at 9:07 am
What a bunch of feminist bull! Does everything have to be politicized these days?
July 17, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Yes. (While men like you still exist…)
Care to explain what is “bull” (I think you mean bullshit?) about these ideas? I thought they were clearly and compellingly stated. They are indeed feminist ideas, well noted – but that’s merely accurate description, so you’ve not suggested any reasons why they might be incorrect. Is your problem with the idea of evolution, or the concept that women are human?
What’s a chap like you doing on an anthropology blog anyway?
July 22, 2009 at 4:29 pm
I can’t speak for Terry, but the bullshit I see on this blog entry is this “male perspective” crap. So what if the human depicted in a popular representation of evolution is male? I don’t see the blog author complaining about the human being white (what a nice coincidence). These complaints are illegitimate and, frankly, stupid.
This complaint could potentially be a legitimate one if it was in the context of the image being oversimplified. However, the author is complaining that women aren’t being represented in an unscientific diagram, despite their contributions to science. Whoop-te-do. You know what? Women have done ABSOLUTELY NOTHING for science. Zero, zip. All the work was done by INDIVIDUALS who just happened to be female.
It’s disgusting that the author would use the work of individuals who happened to share her sex and attribute their work to womenkind rather than to the individuals who did the work (or, at least humankind). Seriously, OP, no one cares what kind of genitalia you have. Get the hell over yourself.
April 22, 2008 at 9:36 am
Terry, everything is political and always has been. Does it make any sense, scientifically or otherwise, to use only the male body to portray medical or evolutionary models, or to base such models only on the male body?
April 22, 2008 at 8:56 pm
For the record, I agree with Maria.
May 5, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Get over it already! Find things to contribute instead of sitting back and complaining…how does that add value? Introduce a new image of a woman evolving, then you can complain about how it is an exploitation of the female body, while still others can complain that, “I am sure a man was involved in that process somewhere.” Then we can evolve any further and complain that it does incorporate all races, or alternative lifestyles, or that we came from an ape, which hasn’t been proven, or what about people with blonde hair, and so on , and so on. Like I said, get over it…focus on something valuable.
July 23, 2008 at 9:50 am
I have often believed that as ‘history’ is his story it
would be told from ‘his’ perspective, as if women
were adjutants.
It is my belief that women, in the earlier times,
pretended to be ‘weaker’ so as to avoid the dangerous exercise of tracking and trying to kill some big whatis with cheeseboard spears.
The fact women developed agriculture and domesticated animals, leaving the males to be
pretty much useless, save as the ‘hunters’ should
have reduced males to the lesser in importance.
In other species, there is usually one male who can
play the ‘king’ and ‘defender’ and lots of females who do the work and raise the children.
If one were to examine a very traditional group
one would note the periphery nature of male members.
Unfortunately for Anthropology, our ‘founding…
fathers’, have promulgated a great deal of probably
erroneous postulates.
Outside of warfare, males are the least important
members of a traditional group. They can disappear for weeks without being missed, whereas females are vital to survival of the group.
Hence, there needs to be a rethinking of the discipline.
September 16, 2008 at 10:25 am
I do not agree that requesting an evolutionary model for the female gender is complaining. It is very intriguing and actually necessary. Look at the different levels of sexual dimorphism from primate species to species; and, while humans are not considered to have sexual dimorphism, there are definite body size variations between males and females and between populations across the world. To see the rate of change from very dimorphic to being the same size should be a standard in models and diagrams. How long ago did females catch up? Were there variations in dimorphism instead of one linear change?
Females becoming bipedal poses a much greater health risk than males making their evolution much more complicated. Quadrupeds have a larger pelvic allowance for giving birth (and a safer positioning at birth) and death in child birth is much less common. To become bipedal is to expose the female and baby to health complications that hardly make it initially worth the transition. Women and the complications of child birth due to the position of the smaller pelvis opening is still dangerous and claims the lives of many around the world. The female body is so different that I would argue that males have become the standard becuase thier evolutionary reproductive structure is more simply evolved. We should require a model for females, not because it is an issue of gender equality but because females are physically structured differently from an evolutionary stand point.
September 18, 2008 at 3:10 am
Jaylar your comment in the first paragraph is is an old wives tale that has been used by western religious organizations for years to make a point. See even old wives have input into life.
Laura, may I suggest you read up on forensic anthropology a little. If you were presented with a human pelvis and asked if it was male or female it is quite possible that after a series of measurements were taken you could claim quite emphatically it was male or female and be totally wrong. The same can even occur after checking a skull. The fact is the structure of the human skeletal system doesn’t really differ so much that you can clearly define a male female skeletal type and have every female have a female skeleton type and every male have a male skeleton type, it just doesn’t happen.
September 18, 2008 at 9:33 am
This is understood, but it does not change nor does it address the fact that evolution for females would have been much more difficult and possibly on a different time scale than males. Would it have ever been at all possible to have a short overlapping time when males were mostly bipedal and females were not? This change did not occur over night. Natural selection would not favor a more dangerous child birth. Many of the first bipedal females may have died. I am just saying that an evolutionary model depicting females, and females along side males would a useful study to look into.
September 18, 2008 at 1:19 pm
The idea of a different evolutionary time frame isn’t all that strange and to me is quite feasible if it wasn’t for the fact that I pointed out above. If there was a different time scale I would think there would be more skeletal difference.
Your correct that it would be useful to study the evolution of females, and females against males but I feel it would not bring you the results you would hope for in that you appear to want a very different evolutionary timescale.
Your point about Natural Selection just cements my thoughts that it is a catch cry for people who cannot answer their own questions concerning evolution. It is obvious that Natural Selection is only a minor part in the overall picture and that there are other influences.
June 16, 2009 at 11:59 am
Excellent article. Like good collecting in the field, science benefits from an alternative point of view and different search image.
Cheers,
Heidi Henderson aka Fossil Huntress
July 22, 2009 at 4:34 pm
This post is incredibly disappointing (as I explained in my other comment that hasn’t been posted yet). I expect far, far more from an anthropoligist than petty, thoughtless comments that are obviously influenced by our sex-centric culture where the sex of a person is more important than that person as an individual, especially if they’re female.
September 10, 2009 at 4:18 pm
this article is a true statement, altho i remember having seen a depiction similar to that male line of at least a few female hominids before the digital era (once). one can easily argue that the physical development of woman was more decissive to evolutionairy changes then that of males. otoh research to eg. birth channel width’s in hominid fossils and eg. sexual dimorphism for/in australopithecus robustus has been done.
next there is suggestive french research that confirms the cartoon at least for sapiens, it however is much discredited as far fetched extrapolation even when it focusses partly on features of habitation i observed myself.
(so in my opinion it makes at least some interesting observations)
still I definetly agree the whole conceptualisation should be less masculinocentric, at least as far as humanoid decissions (other then -shortly- rape) are concerned it is woman that shaped ‘man’.
September 10, 2009 at 5:31 pm
You make absolutely no sense, Onix.
September 11, 2009 at 5:15 am
well u dont even have an argument. sorry i am not impressed, by you displaying no knowledge at all..
September 10, 2009 at 6:53 pm
I can’t speak for Terry, but the bullshit I see on this blog entry is this “male perspective” crap. So what if the human depicted in a popular representation of evolution is male? I don’t see the blog author complaining about the human being white (what a nice coincidence). These complaints are illegitimate and, frankly, stupid.
This complaint could potentially be a legitimate one if it was in the context of the image being oversimplified. However, the author is complaining that women aren’t being represented in an unscientific diagram, despite their contributions to science. Whoop-te-do. You know what? Women have done ABSOLUTELY NOTHING for science. Zero, zip. All the work was done by INDIVIDUALS who just happened to be female.
It’s disgusting that the author would use the work of individuals who happened to share her sex and attribute their work to womenkind rather than to the individuals who did the work (or, at least humankind). Seriously, no one cares what kind of genitalia you have. Get the hell over yourself.
October 9, 2009 at 4:21 am
It is about equal respect, and pay not about
our gender parts, but , as usual seems to be
men want to keep women subsevian, and to
think women are less intellectual than they
are.
We have the technology to save women’s ovum
and men’s sperm, but last time I checked you still need a woman’s uterus to carry a fetus.
Seems anthropology has already proved all modern civilizations came from a “woman’s ”
mitochondria . Not a man.
Show a little respect. Some day women, might
get tired of men and eventually not use except for
one thing.
October 9, 2009 at 9:19 am
Lay off the crack, Elanor. It’ll do wonders.
October 9, 2009 at 2:15 pm
“…last time I checked you still need a woman’s uterus to carry a fetus.”
So?
October 9, 2009 at 3:05 pm
It is sad this post comments degenerated so much without real positive discussion. I came across a certain deficit when carrying my child. I wanted to know how our first bipedal ancestors managed labour (did they do it all by themselves or did other relatives help?), how did they carry their babies when they started walking upright? was the sling one of the first portable tools? did they invent ‘nappies’? I found a few answers in a great book ‘Nisa: The Life and Words of a !Kung Woman’ by Marjorie Shostak. I was humbled by her account of the !kung stoic childbirth tradition in the bush, with no help from relatives or midwives, and by the dismissal of possibilities to go and give birth in a hospital. Also other insights, such as the view from children, were new and refreshing: the joy of children at the sight of daddy coming back home with meat, the long hours gathering with mum. Recommended reading, sure, but I want more of this. I am tired of a warfaring, weapon-centered view of cultural anthropology.
October 9, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Do you seriously think we’ll ever know if our first bipedal ancestors had help during labor? Do you really think after millions of years that a sling will be preserved? Seriously. Let’s be honest here, when you say our first bipedal ancestors you’re talking about austropithecines and the like. Of course this discussion is going to ‘degenerate’ when you have unrealistic expectations.
October 10, 2009 at 11:20 am
“how did they carry their babies when they started walking upright?”
Primate babies usually cling to their mother’s body hair and I’ve noticed that human babies have a really strong hand grip. Their feet, being adapted to upright walking rather than climbing, are relatively useless for gripping. And humans, apart from most Africans strangley enough, have long hair. Perhaps human babies clung to their mother’s head hair, supported by a single adult arm. Just an idea.
October 13, 2009 at 4:09 pm
A very good book on this subject is Sarah Blaffer Hrdy’s Mother Nature: a history of mothers, infants, and natural selection (1999). She’s an anthropologist and primatologist. The book also draws on more recent human cultural practices to explore the subject.
I’m not an academic in this field or any other, just an interested person. Hrdy’s written more recently on this general topic, 2009 – Mothers and Others: The Evolutionary Origins of Mutual Understanding. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0674032993. Haven’t read that yet, still working through Mother Nature.
October 14, 2009 at 12:40 pm
I liked Mother Nature. I was most impressed by the photo of a heavily pregnant woman carrying a grown up kid on her shoulders! I must read it again
October 14, 2009 at 3:49 am
i had a baby and it didn’t need my hair to hold on to me with support of an arm (most of the time), also some support for elanor, that at least tries to voice sth against the hell of a prick.
October 14, 2009 at 2:05 pm
“i had a baby and it didn’t need my hair to hold on to me”.
What did it hold on to? Or were you wearing clothing? A most unlikely condition for very ancient humans who were just beginning to walk upright efficiently?