In this hybrid lecture, Dr. Deb Martin and Ph.D. student Claira Ralston discuss their research on the intersectionality of gender violence in Ancestral Pueblo Groups for the UNLV Anthropology spring 2023 Proseminar Lecture Series. 

For this research, we integrated diverse sources of data on Indigenous women in thinking about both the intersectionality of gender violence as well as the "relationality" of women to others depending on their age and status. Relationality here means connectedness to others and a world view that underlies how no one exists in isolation, but rather all are shaped by the relationships to others which is dynamic and always being renegotiated and reimagined. This research uses osteobiography and individual-level analyses of burials ethically excavated and analyzed from the La Plata River Valley (New Mexico) to illustrate the variety of roles that Ancestral Pueblo women played in the past (circa AD 1100–1300). The experiences of women as a result of their gender, age, and status over the life course are reconstructed with consideration given to the gendered forms of violence they were subject to and the consequences of social violence on health. Our goal is to use modern bioarchaeological approaches that combine social theories about gender and violence with data from many other sources, including archaeological reconstruction of homes and communities, ethnohistoric resources available on Pueblo society, and Pueblo women’s contemporary voices.