Job association to biological sex began 5,000 years ago - study
The findings support the claim that the source of gender inequalities are partially rooted in the Neolithic period and its colonization of Europe by farmers.
By TAMAR URIEL-BEERIUpdated: APRIL 16, 2021 12:30A facial reconstruction of a 5600 year old skull found on the Maltese island of Gozo is seen during Jewellery Through the Times, part of Fashion Week Malta, in which models presented replicas of jewellery worn in Neolithic Malta, in Lija outside Valletta, May 7, 2013. The replicas were recreated wit(photo credit: REUTERS/DARRIN ZAMMIT LUPI)
There has long been a deeply-engrained social correlation between certain jobs and specific genders. New research dates this correlation back to the Neolithic period, when sex was synonymous with certain types of labor.Stone tools buried in graves provide evidence to a separation of labor according to sex, according to a new study by researchers from Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas in Spain.The peer-reviewed open-sourced study presented in PLOS analyzed over 400 stone tools which were buried in graves throughout Europe from the Early Neolithic period – which began approximately 5,000 years ago – to understand the use of each tool was. They then looked at the biological sex of the person it was buried with.Through this method, researchers found a consistent correlation; males were more commonly buried with tools used for hunting, butchery, woodwork, or generally violent tools, while females were more often buried with stone tools used on leather or animal hides. These findings also expanded the range of tasks "known to have been carried out" by both men and women of the time.There were, however, certain geographical exceptions and differences, depending on the community in Europe, suggesting that farming patterns – and labor sharing by sex – were different as they spread across the continent.That said, the study took into account that the graves may not be accurately representing the everyday life of the times. However, the researchers noted, they did depict symbolic versions of sex with gender roles that are stigmatized today.The study noted also that early findings suggest that females and children were more physically battered than the males, while the male adults were the ones most often found with interpersonal violent stone tools or weapons."Task specialisation is considered to have had a foundational role in the emergence of property, surplus accumulation, political power concentration and social exploitation," the study remarked. "However, these processes are often interpreted without considering possible sexual divisions in labour and gender symbolic systems, often allowing a binary gender hierarchy dominated by males to be an implicit factor in Neolithic social systems."The findings support the claim that the source of gender inequalities are partially rooted in the Neolithic period and its colonization of Europe by farmers.
