Women Were Hunters and Other Gendered Myths Shattered

04-08-2023

Jessica Schwarz

Women’s Rights Researcher, 

Global Human Rights Defence.

It is often viewed as a given that in prehistorical societies, men were hunters and women were gatherers. From this, we have based much of our understanding of gender and its behaviours, psychology and characteristics. However, a recent study titled The Myth of Man the Hunter (Anderson et al, 2023) debunked this myth as the study found that this gendered division of labour is incorrect as women were also hunters! In the study, the researchers identified 391 foraging societies across the world, spanning from the 1800s to the present day, with 63 of the societies also exhibiting hunting. Their analysis then revealed that women hunted in 50 of the 63 societies, regardless of maternal status, demonstrating an instrumental role. Additionally, Dr. Cara Wall-Scheffler, the lead researcher, stated that the majority of the time, ‘the hunting was purposeful. Women had their own toolkit. They had favorite weapons. Grandmas were the best hunters of the village’ (Aizenman, 2023). Prehistoric women were just as skilled at killing game as men were. Their hunting contributions have largely been dismissed in history.

The study drastically changes our understandings of gendered stereotypes, especially regarding labour. The idea of separate labour roles for men and women has come to shape much of our understandings of gender in the centuries since. Professor of history Kimberly Hamlin states that ‘next to the myth that God made a woman from man's rib to be his helper, the myth that man is the hunter and woman is the gatherer is probably the second most enduring myth that naturalizes the inferiority of women’ (Aizenman, 2023). The idea of man as the hunter justifies men’s socialisation as less emotional and more aggressive and violent, which has significant consequences for notions of masculinity and the more negative sides of it that lead to dominance, violence and rape. Painting women as predetermined caretakers and maternal figures, stemming from their supposed role as forager and caretakers and their more caring and nurturing nature, is also damaging for women as it often limits their potentials and opportunities. By now, we know that these traits are socially and culturally defined and susceptible to change—not inevitable to our gender or sex as we were previously made to believe. The myth of gender differences in our ancestors have lead us to believe that gender-based divisions of labour are natural and that different genders are supposedly better at certain roles, when, as the study reveals, it was never really the case. Now we should examine what other assumptions about gender we have falsely believed, especially as we have seen so many myths and stereotypes about women’s capabilities shattered over the past decades and centuries. Rigid gender roles only ever restrict us when we are all so full of potential—to be whoever we want to be. And to truly achieve gender equality and universal women’s rights, we must let women decide who they are and who they want to be.

Sources and further readings:

Aizenman, N. (2023, 1 July) Men are hunters, women are gatherers. That was the assumption. A new study upends it. NPR. Retrieved on 04 August 2023 from https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2023/07/01/1184749528/men-are-hunters-women-are-gatherers-that-was-the-assumption-a-new-study-upends-i

Anderson, A., Chilczuk, S., Nelson, K., Ruther, R. and Wall-Scheffler, C. (2023) The Myth of Man the Hunter: Women’s contribution to the hunt across ethnographic contexts. PLoS ONE 18(6): e0287101.