Reading 'images stone, b.c.' (Pacific Northwest Coast archaeology, queer theory)

The vibrant artistic traditions of America's Pacific Northwest Coast people s are well documented in the ethnographic literature. Far less numerous, bu t equally fascinating, are the artworks which survive from a prehistoric pe riod lasting at least 10,000 years. One little known collection of 136 ston e artefacts from this area was brought together for exhibition in 1975. The striking and often explicit sexual imagery of these artefacts prompted ant hropologist Wilson Duff to offer an unconventional, and therefore also cont roversial reading of their meaning in his book images stone b.c. In reading images stone b.c. through the lens of queer theory this paper suggests tha t the radical potential of Wilson Duff's ideas, and his vision of these art efacts in particular, was far greater than he was able to realize before hi s untimely death.