Gender and prehistoric technology: On the social agency of technical strategies

Technological production is a materially grounded arena within which social identities can be defined, expressed and mediated. A focus on the microscale dynamics of social agency manifest in differentiated communities of people involved in material culture production and use draws attention to potential contexts accounting for the kinds of site‐specific technical variability often brushed aside as archaeological ‘noise’. This essay presents the outline of a conceptual framework and methodology for studying the social agency of prehistoric technology with the goal of understanding the dialectic of gendered practices and technical strategies. The main intent is to rethink the concept of technology so as to bring to prominence the artifice of technological activities as socially constituted. A case study considering late Ice Age (Magdalenian) bone and antler technologies practised in the French Midi‐Pyrenees provides grounding for the theoretical discussion.