Ruth E. Tringham is a Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. She has also been a Professor at University College, London and Harvard University. She has been involved in many archaeological projects (directing many of them) and has several published works, including Archaeology and The Goddess: Exploring the Contours of Feminist Archaeology, Men and Women in Prehistoric Architecture, and Households with Faces: the Challenge of Gender in Prehistoric Architectural Remains.
Tringham has a somewhat feminist view on the more male-dominated field of archaeology, helping to broaden the field . She has also challenged the scientific method in an attempt to broaden the methods and ways in which archaeologists learn about and interpret the past. In addition, she has criticized the somewhat careless way in which terms are thrown around in the field of archaeology to define the things and ideas of the past. Some of Tringham's other interests include prehistoric archaeology, European prehistory, archaeology and popular culture, and architecture and gender aspects in prehistory.
Some of the projects she has been involved in include field research at the Neolithic settlement of Opovo in Yugoslavia, at Podgoritsa Tell in Bulgaria, and at Çatalhöyük in Turkey. The excavation at Opovo took place during each summer from 1983 to 1989. She directed the excavations in collaboration with Dr. Bogdan Brukner. A primary focus was on the house societies, which is another of Tringham's interests.
The field work at Podgoritsa Tell included a continuation of her explorations of the "life-histories of households." She worked there from 1992 to 1995. The project was the first time Americans collaborated with Bulgarian archaeologists. However, because of problems including the Bulgarian archaeologists unwillingness to deviate from their standard practices of excavation, Tringham felt it would be impossible to explore the questions that were important to their involvement in the project, so she withdrew the participation of her University of California, Berkeley group from the project.
Tringham is the Director of the BACH (Berkeley Archaeologists at Çatalhöyük) team for field research at Çatalhöyük. The research actually began in the 1960's but BACH joined in 1997. Some of questions being sought after in the Çatalhöyük project are why people started domesticating animals, living in cities, and growing food. Tringham has a particular interest in the life history of the houses, how they were built, who lived in them, and how they were destroyed. The Çatalhöyük project will go on until the 2010's. It is uncertain how long BACH will be there but Tringham hopes it will be a long-term involvement.
Ruth Tringham is currently making advances in the future of archaeology by being a member of the Berkeley Multimedia Research Center and by creating and developing the Chimera Web which allows people to see photographic images based on prehistoric reconstructions.
References:
Mysteries of Çatalhöyük: Frequent Questions. Mysteries of Çatalhöyük (21 June 1999) http://www.sci.mus.mn.us/catal/faq/ 7 Dec. 2000
Mysteries of Çatalhöyük: People and Places: Ruth Tringham Mysteries of Çatalhöyük (29 June 1999) http://www.sci.mus.mn.us/catal/people/bios/ruth.htm 7 Dec. 2000
Archaeology in the Realm of Ruth Tringham Archaeology in the Realm of Ruth Tringham (4 May 1998) http://www.utexas.edu/courses/wilson/ant304/biography/arybios98/collinsbio.html 7 Dec. 2000
Anthropology Faculty, Ruth Tringham Anthropology at UC Berkeley (Last update unknown) http://anthropology.berkeley.edu/tringham.html 7 Dec. 2000
The Beatrice Bain Research Group's Gender Directory Gender Directory T-Z (18 Nov. 1998) http://socrates.berkeley.edu:7013/gdnamet-z.html 7 Dec. 2000
http://ls.berkeley.edu/dept/anth/tringham.html
Written by Ryan Shirk
Edited by Marcy L. Voelker, 2007