To Gender or Not to Gender : A critical reassessment of how gender is – and can be – approached in archaeology, exemplified in two Scandinavian burial assemblages dating to the early Medieval period

Abstract: Gender research in archaeology is a complex topic that puzzled scholars for decades. The past 50 years of it has seen a lot of theorizing, heated discussions, and requests for new additions to the archaeological toolkit so that this type of research can get a proper launch. Humans' approach to gender has changed drastically over the course of history and will probably always continue to change. This is why archaeology needs to stay up to date with current gender discourses, but also study the differences of it in the past. This thesis will approach the topic of gender in a couple of different ways. The first half of the thesis will provide a theoretical deep dive, followed by a trip around the globe where different views on gender are explored from a historical as well as a modern perspective. The second half of the thesis consists of two case studies where gender will be approached trough two 12th-century burial assemblages once located in separate areas of modern-day Sweden. The first one is grave 9 from the Sámi grave field at Vivallen, Härjedalen, and the second one is grave A6 from Klinta, Köpingsvik, Öland. These graves were chosen because they share many similarities and provide interesting analytical parallels to each other. They were also chosen because they make good examples of just how complex archaeological gender research can be, even when geographically confined to a small area like modern-day Sweden.