Reviews and Comments

This book is about female erasure in prehistory research, a very interesting topic. The author is a researcher in prehistory with a focus on women, so this is her wheelhouse. The part of the book that is actually about that I found very interesting and informative. However, that's only 80 pages out of 200! Allow me to explain. The book is in four parts. Part I is a short chapter on media depictions of prehistoric women and the question of primitive violence. Although these two topics are interesting, it's not clear what connects them. At this point the book already seems weirdly structured.

Part II is a long history of misogynistic sexism through the ages. This is just gender studies 101 with no connection to prehistory at all. It feels like the author is trying to up her page count by repeating a point that a hundred feminist books have already made since the 1950s.

Part III is the heart of the book: this is the part that's actually about the topic at hand. I don't know very much about early humans and learned a great deal in this chapter: not only about what we can know of early human gender relations, but also about the strange interpretations that male researchers have made of archaeological findings, interpretations that seem more like projections of their own sexism than actual science. I enjoyed this part a lot and will definitely revisit it for more in-depth understanding.

Part IV, I'm sorry to report, is filler rubbish again. This one is a long history of rebellious women from antiquity to modern feminism. Much like part II, you could get this in any "introduction to feminism" book. Worse even, by taking on a subject this broad, the author really displays her biases in full view: the biases of a bourgeois feminist who values the biographies of a few female aristocratic literati over the sociological perspective and actual political struggles.

Instead of the basic and overly broad feminist histories in parts II and IV, the author could have written about the history of prehistoric archaeology/ paleontology. This is a fairly young discipline that's only existed since the mid 19th century. I'm sure tracing the roots of female erasure and sexism in this branch of science from its beginnings until today would have been interesting. That is the book I wish we had gotten. Ironically, it's possible that an earlier draft was just like that: this is speculation on my part, but I noticed that part II (that is about the history of misogyny) is confusingly titled "The emergence of prehistory as academic discipline", which doesn't reflect its content at all. Maybe this strange title is the remnant of an earlier draft of the book, one that I would have probably liked better.

It feels unfair to focus so much of this review on the parts that are just filler, instead of the thing that the author is an actual expert in. But she did bring this upon herself by making the filler the majority of the book. I think part of the reason this book ended up as weirdly structured as it did, is the tendency of the market to favor "big ideas books" over more specific works. It's a shame because, at least in this case, it lessens the end product by a lot. It's so easy to see what a good book this could have been. You just need to read parts I and III, skip parts II and IV, and dream up the version of part II that its title hints at.

I read this novel mostly to improve my Chinese proficiency. It was great for this purpose. The target audience is tweens I think. Children aged about 9-13. So the language is simple, the narration has a good flow, it's all quite easy to follow. Occasionally I didn't understand a detail or two, but that's fine. The book (first of a series) is set in a harry potter-like setting where the normal, human world is secretly inhabited by supernatural creatures that also have their own spaces and realms. The supernatural elements are all borrowed from Chinese literary tradition, especially the Shan Hai Jing. The book really invites the Harry Potter comparison, the little boy protagonist's female friend even has Hermione's exact personality. I did wonder about one thing: the protagonist, Zhixiao, inherits the "monster inn" from his father who died, that's what sets the plot in motion. But there is no mention of grief or loss. Zhixiao's emotional arc is about gaining confidence, getting respected, finding his strength. His relationship with his mum is an important conflict point, can he spend enough time with her while also being active in the spirit world? Will she accept his new role or try to keep him at home? But missing their dead dad/husband doesn't seem to be a factor in their conflict. I don't know, it's a bit strange. Maybe I missed something though, due to the language barrier.

All in all this is a great read for advanced Chinese learners, and probably also for tweens if they are native speakers. Looking forward to part 2.

A good little book to get white people started on anti-racism, and a good refresher for white people with prior knowledge. This book is written with a German audience in mind, which is important because many Germans like to pretend like racism is an American problem. The book invites the (presumed white) reader to introspect about their white fragility and other defense mechanisms that may arise during reading. It also points to the many situations where we enjoy white privilege without noticing. I found this very valuable. As far as knowledge goes, I didn't gain much from the book, because it stays on a very basic level; I already know the history of colonialism and what a microaggression is. What I did gain is the introspection mentioned above. Reading books like this regularly is valuable for any white person looking to develop an anti-racist attitude in everyday life. Now of course, an anti-racist mentality and attitude is not enough - action on the political and societal level is necessary, which the book doesn't address. This is fine of course. Anti-racism needs to start somewhere.