The sambaquieira society from the perspective of sex and gender

Abstract

The research on sambaquis is a founding theme of Brazilian archaeology and there is a varied and extensive scientific production concerning this kind of archaeological site. Nevertheless, the great majority of the studies about the society that colonized the seashore aims to project on them some classification models that do not consider the different social segments that form them. The study of gender is a fruitful way to identify and characterize social segments that share the same space and ideology. Taking for background the path of the concept of gender in social sciences and its extensions to the archaeology of sambaquis this article analyses some elements of the mortuary contexts of these sites identifying the presence of symbolic constructions of extreme variability that point to some aspects of the social life among the fishercollectors of Rio de Janeiro State seashores.