Women Archaeologists

Women Archaeologists

The frequency of women in public and consulting archaeological positions was not the case in he founding years of New Zealand archaeology. Some women pioneered the field, to start to bring better balance to the representation of the genders in New Zealand archaeology.

Janet Davidson - the first woman to graduate with a Masters in New Zealand archaeology, and a long term contributor after that, to New Zealand and pacific archaeology and to museum curatorship.

Anne Leahy Pioneer excavator of sites, reporting of these and an inveterate site recorder, acknowledged as such by NZAA with its 2006 Groube Fieldwork Award.

Helen Leach - first woman to graduate with a PhD in archaeology in New Zealand - first woman to hold a lectureship in archaeology in New Zealand and a long term contributor to the subject - particularly on the anthropology of food.

Christina Jefferson - undertook a pioneering survey of the dendroglyphs of the Chatham Islands.

Sue Bulmer - US born but long term NZ resident. Her archaeological training was in New Zealand, her PhD from the University of PNG, on research in New Guinea. She was a passionate advocate for archaeology and contributor to it over many years from her Auckland locale.

Aileen Fox - a pioneering British archaeologist who spent a long period of her post-British university career in New Zealand displaying considerable physical and intellectual energy making a decided contribution.

Susan Davis - a British trained archaeologist. She was the first woman to hold a museum position in New Zealand specialising in archaeology, at the Dominion Museum in the 1950s.

Molly Hougard (Nicholls) - the first publication of a New Zealand archaeological site report by a woman, of a site on Ponui.