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''' '' PLANET :
WOMAN'S PLACE? '' '''
A WOMAN'S PLACE ON THE !PLANET! HUNTING WITH SPEARS : Many new reports contradict prevalent notion that men used to be the ones to catch food.
NEW STUDY SAYS A WOMAN'S PLACE might never have been at home to begin with. Scientists said on Wednesday that they had discovered the 9,000 - year-old remains of a young woman in the Peruvian Andes, alongside a well-stocked big game hunting toolkit.
Based on a further analysis of 27 individuals at burial; sites with similar tools, a team led by Randall Haas at the University of California Davis concluded that between 30% to 50% of hunters in the Americas during this period may have been women.
THE PAPER - PUBLISHED IN THE JOURNAL SCIENCE ADVANCES - contradicts the prevalent notion that in hunter-gatherers societies, the hunters were mainly men and the gatherers were mainly women, reported AFP.
''I think that it tells us that that at least for some portion of human prehistory, that assumption was inaccurate,'' Haas stated.
He added that the results ''highlight the disparities in labour practice today. In terms of things like gender pay gaps, titles and ranks. The results totally underscore that there may be nothing ''natural'' about these disparities.
The skeletal remains of six people including two hunters were discovered in 2018 by Haas and members of the local Mulla Fasiri community at Wilamaya Patjxa, an important archaeological site in highland Peru.
Analysis of the bone structure as well as biological molecules called peptides in their tooth enamel allowed scientists to identify one as a 17-to-19 year old female, and the second as a 25-to-30-year old male.
Excavating the teen's burial site was particularly ''interesting and exciting'' for the team, said Haas. As they dug, they uncovered an array of hunting and animal processing tools that provided strong evidence for her human status.
These included some projectile points for felling large animals, a knife and flakes of rock for removing internal organs, and tools for scraping and tanning hides. The artifacts were likely placed together in a perishable container like a leather bag.
According to the paper, the teen dubbed ''WMPS'' by the scientists, would have used a weapon called an ''atlatl,'' a spear-throwing lever that allowed our ancient ancestors to throw spears much much farther.
Her main prey at the time would have been species like the vicuuna, a wild ancestor of the alpaca, and Andrean deers.
NOT AN ANOMOLY : To find out whether the female hunter was an outlier, or one of the many from her time the researchers conducted an a review of 429 individuals individuals across 107 sites in the Americas from around 17,000 to 4,000 years ago.
Of those, they found 27 individuals whose sex had reliably been determined and who were buried along side big game hunting tools - finding that 16 were male and 11 were female.
''The sample is sufficient to warrant the conclusion that female participation in early big game hunting was likely non-trivial,'' the team wrote, using a statistical model.
The new study adds to a body of literature that supports ''the contention that modern gender constructs often do not reflect the past ones,'' the team wrote. This includes the 2017 confirmation of a female Viking warrior through a genetic study.
Certain questions remain, such as why many modern hunter-gatherer societies do show sex-bias in hunting activities. Or, perhaps the atkati used by WMPS and the contemporaries had a less steep learning curve than the technologies that succeeded it making it possible to achieve proficiency in childhood before girls reached sexual maturity and had to devote their time to childcare and rearing.
By contrast, mastering the bow and arrow requires ongoing practice well into the teenage years. Hass said he hoped his paper might spark further research to find out whether there were female hunters at the time in other parts of the world.
With respectful dedication to all the Women of the World, Founder Framers of !WOW!, Scientists, Students, Professors and Teachers. See Ya all prepare and register for Great Global Elections on The World Students Society : wssciw.blogspot.com and Twitter -!E-WOW! - The Ecosystem 2011 :
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