‘The Interplay of Evidential Constraints and Political Interests: Recent, Archaeological Research on Gender Alison Wylie American Antiquity, Vol, 57, No. 1 Gan., 1992), 15-35. Stable URL: bhtp:flinks,jstor-org/sici?sici~0002-T3 16%28199201 %295 743A L%IC 15% 3A TIOECAGSE2.0.CO%3B2-G American Aniiquity is currently published by Society for American Archaeology. ‘Your use of the ISTOR archive indicates your acceptance of ISTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use, available at htp:sseww jstor org/aboutiterms.html. ISTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you hhave obtained prior permission, you may aot download an entie issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and ‘you may use content in the ISTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use Please contact the publisher eegarding aay Fuster use ofthis work. Publisher contact information ray he abained at tipi jstorongtournalssar en. Each copy of any part ofa JSTOR transenission must contain the same copyright tice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transtnission, ISTOR isan independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to creating and preserving a digital archive ot scholarly journals. For more information regarding ISTOR, please contact suppom@jstor org. hup:thrwwjstor.orgy ‘Tue Feb 14 19:39:20 2006THE INTERPLAY OF EVIDENTIAL CONSTRAINTS AND POLITICAL INTERESTS: RECENT ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON GENDER Alison, Wylie Inthe last few years, confetence programs and publications have begun to appear that reflect a growing inletes, lamang North dmertcon archacologt, tn reeaich inatses that focus on women and gonder ax riers f Iiestigaian. One ofthe central questions raised by these developmen has do wih hair” object" ara that ‘of archasology at @ whole ‘To tha extent thal they ave inspired by on aligned with explicit potiical Lemini) ‘omunitntents, the question arses of whether the do not themlves represent are nherently partial and interes ‘nceife standpoint, and whether then acceptance does uot undermine the cammaument 10 value neutrality and ‘ompirieal igor 2sselaced with stone cproaches i archaeciog. 1 wal argus tha, fact, a ferinse perspec, ‘mang ather crica, explicitly political perspecney, may well enhance the concoptoal ntority and empirical deo of archacalopial kno ledge claims, whore tis centrally a mater af deploying evidential constraints. Durante tos sitimas ata kan comensada a aparecer programas de conferencias y publicaciones gt rfljan tot crectenteincerds entre arguadlogas naneavnericanas en miciatias de tnvesgacién centradas en La mer 32 rat de lag sexas coma temas de esiado. Una de la princigales tncerroganiesplanieadas por estas desaralls se eflore ata objetividad de estas invsigaciones» dels arqucclogta an poneral. Eka Midd en tales eetuios ‘xx gplrador por, 0 conpremetidas com pragrama poliien feminists explicit, surge Ua pregunta det mo Depvesentan un punta de vita tinsecamente parcial velactonade a inereses especiices de si su acepractan no socava el compramiso com la neuralidad ye rigor empleo asoiados con enfraueseienificos en argue gia. Sosiengo que isna perspectiva femunisia, entre cttax perspectives ericas poliueamente explietas, bien puede Jontalecer la integridad concep » ta pertinencio emipivica del eonocinnento arquecligice, clando 26 tate Droncipalmence de expandir las Htmutes dela videncia It is a striking feature of North American archaeology that there is very little in peint advocating cor exemplifying a ferninist approach to archaeology; certainly there is nothing comparable 10 the ‘riving traditions of feminist research on women and gender that have emerged, in the last twenty ‘years, in such closely aligned felds a8 sociocultural anthropology, history, various areas in the fife Sciences (including evolutionary theory), classics, and art history, The first paper to explore system atically the relevance of feminist insights and approaches for archaeology was published in 1984 by ‘Conkey and Spector, and the first collection of essays dedicated to reporting original work in the ‘area has just appeared (Gero and Conkey, Engendering Archaeology: Women and Prehistory, 1981). ‘This collection is the outcome of a stnall working conference convened in South Carolina in April 1988 specifically for the purpose of mobilizing interest in the questions about women and gender that had been raised by Conkey and Spectoria 1984. ts organizers, Gero and Conkey, were concerned ‘hat, in the four years since the appearance of this paper, very litle work had appeared, ot acemes imminent, that took un the challenges it posed (see Gero and Conkey 1991-xi-wiit). They approached colleagues who renresented a wide range of research interests in prehistoric archaeology and asked. if they would be willing to explore the implications of taking gender seriously as a focus for analysis {in their fields; most bad never considered such an approach and had no special interest im ferninist initiatives, but agreed ta see what they could do. In effect, Gero and Conkey commissioned a series ‘of pilot projects on gender that chey hoped might demonstrate the potential of research along the lines proposed by Conkey and Spector in 1984.” “Alsen While, Depariment of Pilccaphy, University of Wasirn Ontario, Lndion, Ontario, Canada NGA 387 American Antguity, $11), 1992, op. 15-38. Copyright © 1992 by the Society for Amencan ArchacologyAMERICAN ANTIQUITY [Wok 57, Na. 1, 1092 etwoen the time of tis initial conference and the appearance of Engendering Archaeology, many of the papers prepared for discussion in South Carolina were presented in a session on gender and archacology at the annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in April 1989; they drew a substantial and enthusiastic audience, to the surprise of many of the participants. But most, significant, one much more public conference, the 1989 Chacmoal conference held the following ‘November at the University of Calgary, took “The Archaeology of Gender” as its focal theme, Tt drew over 100 contributions on a very wide range of topics, all but four of which (hie invited keynote addcesses) were submitted, directly or indirectly, in response to an open call for papers (most will appear in Walde and Witlows [1991)) So despite the fact that little more than Conkey and Spector's 1984 paper was in print at che time the Chacmoal conference was being organized and the SAA sessioa presented, an awareness of the issues they raised and an enthusiasm about the prospects for archacolagical wark on gender seem to have had taken hold across the length and broadth of the field.* ‘This precipitous emergence of broadly feminist initiatives raises a numiver of questions, First are Questions about the development itself: Why has there been no sustained interest before now in, women and gender as subjects of archaeological inquiry and/or in serutinizing the interpretive assumptions routinely made about women and gender in extant practice?; and, Why is such an interest emerging at this juncture? These are questions I have addcessed elsewhere (Wyhe 19914, 19911), but which bear Brief discussion here as a basis for considering a second set of issues to 60 ‘with the implications of embracing, or tolerating, feminist approaches. For many I betieve the real ‘question raised by these developments is not wity research on gendler is emerging (only) now, but why it should ever emerge. The gente of question posed in this connection is, “why do we need 2"; “what does it have to offer?" or, more defensively, “why should we take any of this seriously?” (after Wylie 19910). Often the most dismissive responses reflect, not just uneasiness about feminist ‘initiatives, but a general wariness about intellectual fads and fashions. Given the rapid emergence of the scientific new archaeology, displacing so-called “traditional” modes of practice, and now the equally dramatic reaction against the new archaeology and the emergence of a plethora of warring anti- o¢ postpeocessualist and critical alternatives, many are deeply weary of debate. Renfrew's ceview of “isms” of our time (Renfrew 1982:8) and the challenge Watson Gin Watson and Fotiadis 1990) issue to the advocates aF some of these “isms” to deliver the goods, a it were, convey a sense of alarm at the instabilicy af this suecession of research programs. Viewed in this ligt, the call 10 study women and gendet may seem expecially tenuous, even selfiestructive. [want to argue that a feminist perspective, which questions entrenched assumptionsabout wornen and gender and directs attention to them as subjects of inquiry, promises to sulbstantially enhance the conceptual and empirical imtegrity—the “objectivity,” properly construed—of archaeological inquiry. To this end, Lconsider how feminist initiatives have arisen and how the debate aver “isms” ‘has unfolded such that they might be viewed with particular seepticism. I offar general arguments, against this scepticism, questioning the terms of abstract debate from, which it derives, and then turn, in the final section, oan analysis of several examples of the new research on gender, drawn feom Engendering Archaeology (Gero and Conkey 1991), which illustrates how evidential consid- erations can challenge and constrain political and theoretical presuppositions, even where these ‘constitute the encompassing framework of inauiry. WHY NOW? WHY EVER? Why ts the Archaeology of Gender Emerging Only Now? ‘Where che prefiminary questions —"why not nefare now?" and, “why now?"—are concerned, my thesis is chat a number of factors have been relevant both in forestalling and in precipitating these developments in archaeology, similac to the situation described by Longino (1987) and by Longino and Doell (1983) for the life sciences." The conceptual and methodological commitments of scientific, processual archacology have tended to direct attention away from what Binford (1983, 1986a, 198: 3.23, 27-39) has vilifled, in his most uncompromising defenses of processual approaches, 26 “eth- * internal variables; gender dynamics, which would be included among such variableswate} RECENT ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON GENDER ” in most analyses, are just one example of the sort factor he considers explanatorily irrelevant and sciemtiically inaccessible (for a more detailed analysis, see Wylie [19912:35-38)). While anti- and postprocessual challenges to this general orientation have certainly been crucial in opening a space the development of an iaterestin gender, among other symbolic, ideational, social, and broadly tnnographie” dimensions of the cultural past, it is striking that one of the chief exponents of postprocessualism have done a great deal to develop a ferainist analysis of archaeological method. for theory (see Note 1). Indeed, as Ericka Engeistad (1991) argues, they have largely avoided any sustained reflexive critique of their own proposals and practice, with the result that these remain resolutely andracentric. Moreover, postprocessualists had established the need for work on variables like gender fully a decade ago, and yet there was no sustained archaeological work on gesder, per se, and no serious consideration of the implications for archaeology of feminist esearch in other ficlds, until the last few years. Given this, T suggest that social and political (hc. “external,” non cognitive) factors must play a central rale in the emergence of an interest in gender at this juncture. ‘Tobe mare specific, it wauld seem implausible, given the experience reported in other disciplinary contexts, ifthe preparedness to cansider questions abaut gender, and in some cases, the willingness tochampion research that addresses them, did not have to do with the influence of explicitly political, feminist thinking on practitioners in the field (Wylie 1991). In most cases I expect this influence will be only indirect; whether many practitioners identify as feminists or are in any sense sympathetic to feminism, a gteat many will have been affected by a growing if still Kiminal appreciation of women's issues, starting with equity issues, that grows out of sacond-wave feminist activism and thas becomte evident, in recent years, in the discourse and practice of archaeologists.’ No daub this is closely tied to the demands for equity they face as members of academic institutions, consulting, businesses, and government ageacies, and to resulting changes in the representation, roles, and status ‘of Women in these larger institutional contexts. But however they arise, and however welcome or unwelcome they may be, as these changes enforce some level of awareness of geader politics in ‘contemporary contexts they also produce (in some) a growing awareness that gender is nota “natural,” inummutable given, an insight which is seen by many as the pivotal discovery of femnnist theory (Flax 198%; Harding 1983). And {in some) this has influenced, in turn, scholarly thinking about the subjects ‘of archacological study. Whatever their political commitments, they may begin to question en- twenched assumptions about sexual divisions of labor and the status of wornen in peehistory, and to consider previously unexplored questions about the diversity of gender structures in prehistaric contexts, about the significance of gender dynamics in shaping past cuftural systems, and about the “origins and emergence of comtemporary and/or ethnohistorially documented sex/gendes systems. In some cases the influence of feoinist thinking has been direct. For example, both arganizers of the South Carolina conference have long been active on issues to do with the status of women in archaeology. Gero has published 2 number of groundbreaking articles on these issues and been actively involved in promoting rescasch on the political ¢ynamics, including the gender dynamics, of the discipfine (Gero 1983, 1985, 1988). And Conkey was a member of the Ameriean Anthro- ological Association (AAA) Committee on the Status of Women from 1974 (chair in 1973-1976) in which capacity she was drawn into the organization of a panel for the 1977 AAA meetings on sondac research in the various subfields of anthropology. Charged with presenting @ section on. archaeological research on gender, Conkey confronted the dearth af litecature in the atea; for the ‘most part she found that “women [and gender] were considered by chance rather than by design,” if they were considered at all (M. Conkey, personal communication 1991). In these connections ‘both organizers were drawn into contact with feminists working in other fields, especially socio- ‘cultural anthropology, and were aware of the insights, both critical and constructive, that had resulted from the systematic investigation of questions about the status, experience, and roles of women in their various research fields. It was quite explicitly this exposure to, and engagement in, feminist discourse outside archaeology that led them to question the assumptions about gender underlying archacological theorizing and to see both the need and the potential fora focused program of feminist research in archacology. As they came to question the assumptions about gender that underpin. contemporary sex roles, they came to see that these same assumptions infuse the theories about other people's lives they were engaged in constructing as archaeologists [a organizing events and0 AMERICAN ANTIQUITY [Nol 57, o.1, 1992 publications that they hoped would generate wider interest among archaeologists in questions about ‘ender they, and, specifically, the feminist commitments that had come to inform their own work, have been instrumental in mobjlizing the latent grass-roots interest in these Guestions that now seems widespread, even among archaeologists who would never identify as feminists and bave had ‘no contact with feminist seseacch in other contexts, On this accauat itis, most simply, the experience ‘of women and, more impartant, the emerging feminist analysis of this experience, which fgures as a key catalyst both directly and indirectly) for skepticism about entrenched conceptions of women and gender and for research ie this area a8 it is naw emerging in archaeology. Refativist Implications But if this is the case—if the new research on gender is motivated and shaped, at least in part, bby explicitly feminist commitmants—does it not follow that itis to be identified and, for many, dismissed, with the extreme ant-obiectivist positions defended by postprocessualists? Does it nat ‘exemphily precisely the sort of partisan approach to inquiry that they endorse, and that Binford. (1989:32), for example, has condemned as conceptual "postuting™? To be more specific, if political interests are allowed 10 set the agenda of archaeology, do they not irrevocaioly compromise the ‘commitments to abjectivity and value neutrality —most braadly, dhe commilment to settle empirical questions by appeal to the “world of experience" (Binford 1989:27; see also Binford 1982:136), cather than to prejudgements or sociopolitical interests-—that stand as a hallmark of science? And in this caso, what credibility can such inguiry claim on its own behalf; are its results not as limited. ‘and biased as those they are meant to displace? Perhaps more disturbing, it an explicitly partisan, feminist standpoint reveals the partiality (the unacknowledged standpoint specificity) of our best existing accounts of the past and beings into view a different past, or new ways of understanding the past, does it not follow that any number of ather standpoints might da the same? And in this ‘ase, what is to stop the proliferation of conllicting views of prebistory and, with this, a slide into ‘extreme standpoint relativism according to which the ctedibility of each of these “versions” is, strictly context or perspective and interest specific? Such conclusions only fallow, [ argue, if You accept the sharply polarized terms in which much current debate about the aims and status of archaeology has been cast, and assume that any eritique ‘of objectivist ideals, any break with the sciemific eanons of processual archaeology (originally ‘construed in rigidly positivist terms), leads irrevocably to what Trigger (1989:777) calls “hyperre- Lativisna.” This oppositional response to questions about the standards and goals of inguiry is not unique to archacalogy, on Trigger’s account the social sciences as a whole are matked by an increasingly vociferous confrontation... between on the one hand, an old-fashioned positivist certaty fat, given enough data and an adhetenoe 0 “scieti0c” canons of inserpretasion, something spproximating an objective understanding of hursen bebavior ca beachieved .. and onthe other hand, a growing relaivist ‘Septicisn thatthe understanding af fusian behavioc can ever be disentangle fram the iterests, reiudiees, 4nd sterentypes of the researcher (Trigger 1989:777, se also Bernstein (1983), Wylie 19890) (On the former view, the aim of producing “objective” knowledge —knowledge which is credible, “weve,” tcanshistorically and cross-contextually, not just given a particular standpoint (Bemstein, 1983:8-25)—can only be realized if researchers scrupulously exclude all “external,” potentially ‘biasing Gdiosyncratic oc contextually specific) factors from the practice of science, so that judaments about the adequacy of particular knowledge claims are made solely on the basis of “internal” ‘considerations of eviéence, and of coherence and consistency. Positivis/empiricist theories of sci- fence, including those that influenced North American archaeology in the 1960s and 1970s and are still evidentin archacolagical thinking, made much ofa distinction between the context of discovery, in which such “external” factors might be given free reign, and the context of verification of confirmation in which the fruits of creative speculation, however inspired or shaped, would be subjected to rigocously impartial testing against (independent) evidence; the body of empirical “facts” deployed as evidence was presumed to be the stable foundation of all (legitimate, nonanalytic) knowledge, and was, in this capacity, the final arbiter of episternic adequacyWyte RECENT ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH OW GENDER » I is by now commonly held that this view of knowledge production (specitically scientific knowledge production) is deeply problematic. The sharp distinction between the contexts of dis- covery and verification, and “foundationalist" faith in facts as the source and ground of legitimate knowledge, has brokea dawn in face of a number of challenges, Even the proponents of a robust {empiricist/positivish objectivism had, themselves, long acknowledged that all available evidence (Sometimes even all imaginable evidence) soutinely "underdetermines” interesting knowledge claims ahout the world, that is, evidence rarely entails or supports a unique explanatory or interpretive ‘conclusion and eliminates al potential rivals (ora summary, see Laudan and Leplin [1991]; Newton ‘Smith [(981]; Suppe [1979]}. Furthermore, the analyses of “contextualist” theorists (eg, Hanson 1958; Kuhn (970) suggest that the facts, data, or evidence against which theoretical constructs are tobe tested areall too intimately connected with these constructs to stand asa secureand autonamous “foundation” of knowledge, data are, famously, “theory laden.”” Tass opens up considerable space for the insinuation of “external” interests and values into the processes of both formulating and evaluating empirical knowledge claims. Indeed, sociologists of science have argued, on the basis of imaumerable derailed studies of the practice (rather than just the products) of science, that “facts” are as much made as found and that judgments about their evidential significance are radically ‘open? The most thoroughgoing “social constructivists” among them maintain that facts, and the ‘theoretical claims they are used to support, are equally a product ofthe local, ircedueibty social and political, interests that inform the actions and interactions of scientific practitioners in particular contexis, in their most radical moments, they seem co suggest that sciemtists quite Iterally create the world they purport to know (see Woolgar’s (1983:244] discussion of the range of positions at issue here). seems a short step from the original contextualist and constcuetivist arguments against naive objectivism and foundationalism to the conclusion that cognitive anarchy is unavoidable, “anything goes” in the sense (not intended by Feyerabend [1988:vi, 1-3) that virtually any kaowl- edge claim one can imagine could, in principle, find some perspective or context int which it is compelling, and that there are no overarching grounds for assessing or challenging these context specific judgments In an archaeological context, the outlines of this reaction emerge in some anti- or postprocessual literature. The point of departure is typically a “cootextualist” argument to the effect that, where archaeological data must be theory laden to stand as evidence, itis unavoidable that archaeologists hhave always, of necessity, actively constructed (not reconstructed, recaptured, of represented) the past, no matter how deeply committed they may have deen to objectivist ideals, [a some of his carly critical discussions, Hodder insists, in this connection, that any use of archacalogical data as test evidence is mediated by “an edifice of auciliary theories and assumptions which archaeologists hase simply agreed nod ta questign™ (odder \984a:27, emphasis added), evidential claims thus have nothing but conventional credibility. In short, archaeologists litevally “create facts’ "(Htodder 1984a:27), From this it follows that archaeologists ace “without any ability to test their reconstruc- tions of the past” (Hodder 1984a:26); as Shanks and Tilley mut the point four years later, “there is literally nothing independent of theory or propositions to test against, ... any test could only result in wutolagy” (Shanks and Tilley 1987b:44, 111). As a consequence, archaeological data, test evi- dence, and interpretive claims about the past must be regarded as all equat/y constructs: “knowledge consists of litle mare than the description of what has already been theoretically constituted” (Shanks and Tilley 1987a:43 sce also 19872:66). “Truth is," they declare, “a tmobile] army of metaphors” (Shanks and Tilley 1987b:22}, More specifically, Shanks and Tilley argue that what counts as ‘ruc ot plausible, indeed, what counts as a “fact” in aay eelevant sense, is determined by contextually specific interests: individual, micropottical interests, as well as class interests, vroudly construed, It is thus unavoidable that archacology is a thoroughly and irredeemably political enterprise, one ‘which is engaged in creating 2 past thought expedient for, or dictated by, present imerests (Shanks. and Tilley 1987b:209-212, but see also 192-193). And where there are no independent factual resources with which to counter the influence of “extemal” factors—where pretensions to objectivity ‘can only be, on theit account, a masking of he effects ofthese influences—Shanksand Tilley advocate self-consciously political reconstruction of the past(s) thought necessary for “active intervention in the present” (Shanks and Tilley 1987b:103), In this vein, Hodder (1983:7) once enjoined archae-» AMERICAN ANTIOUITY [Wok 57, No.1, 1982 ologists to avoid “writfing] the past" for others, or for societies in which they are not themselves prepared to live. ‘The process of polarization described by Trigger (1989:777) is complete when objectivists, reacting, against what they consider the manifestly untenable implications of “hyperrelativism,"* insist that there must be “objective foundations for philosophy, knowicdge, [and] language” (Bernstein 1983) 12); they refeet out of hand the eritical insights that arose, originally, from the failure af abjectivist Programs cast in a positivist/empiricist mold, and renew the quest for some new Archimedean point, some “stable rack upon which we can secure our lives,” and our knowledge, against the insupnortable chreat af “madness and chaos where nothing is fixed” (Bernstein 198%:4; see also Wylie 1989b:2-4). Just such a turn is evident, in the context of archaeological debate, in the exceedingly hostile counterreaction of (some) layal processuslists; in the caricatures in terms of Which the positions of ani- and postprocessualists are assessed and rejected (eg, in Binford’s (1989: 3-11] “eld guide” and discussion of "yippie” archacology, and in R. Watson's [1990] treatment of Sharks an Tilley), in uncompromising restatements ofthe central doctrines of processualism (¢g., bby Binford 1983:137, 222-224; and by Renfrew 1989:39; for fuller analysis of Binford’s position, see Wylie [1989a:103-105)}; and in the frequent accusations, on both sides, that the opposition has simply missed the point, that they indulge in “wafting ... [red herrings} in front of our noses” (Shanks and Tilley 1989:43; Binford 1989:35, see discussion in Wylie (1992). tas clear where feminist rescarch initiatives will be placed in the context of debates such as these. the past two decades, femninist-inspired research across the social and life sciences has provided trong substantive grounds for questioning the “self-cleausing" capasiay-obaciantitic meta — they hhave identified myriad instances of gender bias that have persisted, not justin instances of “bas science,” but in “good” science, “science as usual” —and frequently they have done this by bringing to bear the distinctive “angle of vision afforded by various feminist and, more generally, women's perspectives (for a summary see Wylle[1991a:38 44). In this, feminist researchers have made clear Gometimes unintentionally) the theary= and interestladen, contextual, and constructed nature of scientific knowledge, Where debate is polarized in the manner described by Trigger (1989), some argue that the move ta embrace a radically deconstructive, postmodera standpoint is irresistible; i is the logical outcome of their critiques (see Harding 1984), But are the polarized options defined in the context of these debates the only ones apen to archaeologists or other social scientists who have been grappling with an acute awareness “of how fragile is the basis on which we can clair to know anything definite about the past or about human behavior” (Trigger 1989:777)? More specifically, is the radically anti-objectivist stance endorsed, ‘most stcongly, by Shanks and Tilley the only alternative to uncompromising faith in the fovndational ‘nature of “facts” and the capacity of the “world of experience” to adjudicate all “responsible” claims to knowledge? In fact, as has been noted by virally every commentator on their work, both sympathetic and critical (¢¢., see comments published with Shanks and Tilley {1989}, Wylie 1992), Shanks and Tilley are not consistent, themselves, in maintaining a radically deconstructive position. (Clideed, this ambivalence is a consistent feauire of anti- or postprocessual literature. As early as 1986, Hodder bad substantially qualified his earlier position (1983), insisting that, although “facts” are all constructs, they derive from a “real world." w . itt (Hodder 1986:16). Fe has recently urged what seems a rapprochement with, processualism, ‘and endorsed a “guarded commitment to objectivity” (Hodder 1991:10). Although Shanks and Tilley (19872192) indicate distaste for this attempt to “neutralize and depotiticize” archaeological ‘inguiry, they themselves hasten to ada, in the same context, thax dhey “do oh mean to sesh chat all pasts are caus” (Shanks and Tilley 1987-248); hexoses ‘eal™ past (Shanks and Tilley 1987a: 10), moreaver, archaeological constructs are to be differentiated frors purely fictional accounts of the past by the fact that they are constrained by evidential considerations (“data represents a network of resistances”) that can “challenge what we say as being inadequate in one manner or another” (hanks and Tilley 19872:104). The wen away from an uncompromising constructivism seems to come, in every case, at the point where anti- or postpracessualists confront the problem that radical constructivism (or, its “hyperrelativist” implications) threatens to undermine their own political ‘and intellectual agendas as much as it does those they repudiate.Wyte} RECENT ARCHAECLOGICAL RESEARCH ON GENDER ™ 11 is suing, in this connection, that many fentinists working in the developed traditions of feminist research outside archaeology are likewise deeply “ambivalent” about the relaivistimpli-