Alice Beck Kehoe

She attended Barnard College and Harvard University, from which she received her PhD in anthropology. While a student at Barnard, she was influenced by James Ford, Gordon Ekholm, and Junius Bird; she worked summers at the American Museum of Natural History Anthropology Department. While at Harvard, she worked with Gordon Willey and Evon Vogt. Many of her influences have been colleagues such as David H. Kelley, Jane Kelley, Jennifer Brown, Robert L. Hall, Carl Johannesen and George F. Carter and his student Stephen C. Jett.

Kehoe taught at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln before teaching at Marquette University, from which she retired in 2000 as professor emeritus. She resides in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Kehoe has held offices with the American Anthropological Association (AAA), and was president of the Central States Anthropological Society (CSAS).

Kehoe has studied many aspects of Native America and is a strong believer in the theoretical link between the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (SECC) (of the Native southeastern U.S.) and Mesoamerica (Mexico and Central America). Her principal area of interest is the archaeology and cultures of the northwestern plains of the U.S. While searching for an ethnographic research topic for her dissertation, she happened upon the Saskatchewan Dakota New Tidings Ghost Dance. Kehoe has worked many years with the Blackfeet of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, an Algonquian Native American group of Browning, Montana, with whom she visits each year to study their history and culture. She has studied Native American spiritual healers ("medicine people") and worked with Piakwutch, "an elderly deeply respected Cree man who served his Saskatchewan Cree community...".{{cite book|last1=Kehoe|first1=Alice Beck|title=Shamans and Religion: An Anthropological Exploration in Critical Thinking|date=1 September 2000|publisher=Waveland Press|isbn=978-1577661627}}{{rp|60}} She has also worked among Native Americans of Bolivia at Lake Titicaca, where she chewed coca leaves with Native women of the region.{{rp|70}}

Kehoe has taken some contrarian or controversial positions throughout her career. One of the original proponents of feminist archaeology, she coedited with Sarah Milledge Nelson one of the first collections of feminist archaeology papers, Powers of Observation in 1990. An interest in pre-Columbian transoceanic contacts led to her meeting Richard Nielsen, who asked her to advise on archaeological aspects while testing the Kensington Runestone of Minnesota.{{citation needed|date=March 2024}} Though a majority of relevant scholars have concluded the Runestone is a 19th Century hoax,{{cite journal|first=Helmer|last=Gustavson|title=The non-enigmatic runes of the Kensington stone|volume=2004|issue=3|journal=Viking Heritage Magazine|publisher=Gotland University}} "[...] every Scandinavian runologist and expert in Scandinavian historical linguistics has declared the Kensington stone a hoax [...]";

{{cite book|last=Wallace|first=B|title=The Quest for America|editor=Ashe G|publisher=Praeger|location=New York|year=1971|pages=154–174|chapter=Some points of controversy|isbn=0-269-02787-4|display-editors=etal}};

{{cite book|last=Wahlgren|first=Erik|title=The Vikings and America (Ancient Peoples and Places)|publisher=Thames & Hudson|year=1986|isbn=0-500-02109-0|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/vikingsamerica00wahl}};

{{cite journal|author= Michlovic MG|title=Folk Archaeology in Anthropological Perspective|journal=Current Anthropology|volume=31|issue=11|year=1990|pages=103–107|doi= 10.1086/203813|s2cid=144500409}};

{{cite journal|author=Hughey M, Michlovic MG|title=Making history: The Vikings in the American heartland|journal=Politics, Culture and Society|volume=2|year=1989|pages=338–360|doi=10.1007/BF01384829|issue=3|s2cid=145559328}}

nevertheless there remains a community convinced of the stone's authenticity.{{cite web|url=http://www.forskning.no/Artikler/2005/desember/1133429879.66|title=forskning.no Kan du stole på Wikipedia?|language=no|access-date=2008-12-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071007033631/http://www.forskning.no/Artikler/2005/desember/1133429879.66|archive-date=2007-10-07|url-status=dead}} "Det finnes en liten klikk med amerikanere som sverger til at steinen er ekte. De er stort sett skandinaviskættede realister uten peiling på språk, og de har store skarer med tilhengere." Translation: "There is a small clique of Americans who swear to the stone's authenticity. They are mainly natural scientists of Scandinavian descent with no knowledge of linguistics, and they have large numbers of adherents." Kehoe is satisfied the item represents actual runic writing by members of a Scandinavian voyage to North America in the 14th century. One linguist who does agree with Kehoe is Richard Hall, who is not a runologist and his errors in reading the runes have been noted by runologists {{interlanguage link|James E. Knirk|de}}{{cite journal |last1=Knirk |first1=James |title=The Kensington Runestone vindicated (Book Review); The Kensington Rune-Stone (Book Review) |journal=Scandinavian Studies |date=Winter 1997 |volume=69 }} and R. I. Page.{{cite journal |last1=Page |first1=R. I. |last2=Hall |first2=Robert A. |title=Review of The Kensington Rune-Stone Is Genuine: Linguistic, Practical, Methodological Considerations, Robert A. Hall, Jr. |journal=Speculum |date=1983 |volume=58 |issue=3 |pages=748–751 |doi=10.2307/2848976 |jstor=2848976 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2848976 |access-date=17 March 2024 |issn=0038-7134}}

In 2016, Kehoe was honored by the Plains Anthropological Association with its Distinguished Service Award for her "enduring work in Anthropology and Archaeology of the Great Plains" (wording on plaque presented to Kehoe). Her memoir of her career as a woman in American archaeology, Girl Archaeologist: Sisterhood in a Sexist Profession, was published in 2022 by University of Nebraska Press.

• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=The Ghost Dance: Ethnohistory and Revitalization|year=1989|place=New York|publisher=Holt, Rinehart, and Winston|isbn=978-1577664536}}
• Nelson, Sarah M. and Kehoe, Alice Beck, eds. (1990) Powers of Observation: Alternative Views of Archaeology. Archaeological Papers of AAA Archaeology Division 2. Washington: American Anthropological Association.
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice B.|title=North American Indians: A Comprehensive Account|year=1992|place=Englewood Cliffs, NJ|publisher=Prentice Hall|isbn=978-0131928763|edition=3rd}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=Humans: An Introduction to Four-Field Anthropology|year=1998|place=New York|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0415919845}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=The Land of Prehistory: A Critical History of American Archaeology|year=1998|publisher=Routledge|place=New York|isbn=978-0415920544}}
• {{cite book|editor-last=Kehoe|editor-first=Alice Beck|editor2-last=Emmerichs|editor2-first=Mary Beth|title=Assembling the Past: Studies in the Professionalization of Archaeology|year=1999|place=Albuquerque|publisher=University of New Mexico Press|isbn=978-0826319395}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=Shamans and Religion: An Anthropological Exploration in Critical Thinking|year=2000|place=Prospect Heights, Ill.|publisher=Waveland Press|isbn=978-1577661627}}
• {{cite book|last1=Sterk|first1=Helen M.|last2=Hay|first2=Carla H.|last3=Kehoe|first3=Alice B.|last4=Ratcliffe|first4=Krista|last5=VendeVusse|first5=Leona G.|title=Who's Having this Baby? Perspectives on Birthing|year=2002|place=East Lansing|publisher=Michigan State University Press|isbn=978-0870136153}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=America Before the European Invasions|year=2002|place=New York|publisher=Longman|isbn=978-0582414860}} Second edition titled North America Before the European Invasions, published 2017 by Routledge, New York.
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=The Kensington Runestone: Approaching a Research Question Holistically|year=2005|place=Long Grove, Ill.|publisher=Waveland Press|isbn=978-1577663713}}
• {{cite book|last1=Kehoe|first1=Alice Beck|last2=Pleger|first2=Thomas C.|title=Archaeology: A Concise Introduction|year=2007|place=Long Grove, Ill.|publisher=Waveland Press|isbn=978-1577664505}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=Controversies in Archaeology|year=2008|place=Walnut Creek, Calif.|publisher=Left Coast Press|isbn=978-1598740615}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice Beck|title=Militant Christianity: An Anthropological History|year=2012|place=New York|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-1137282149}}
• {{cite book|last1=Wissler|first1=Clark|last2=Kehoe|first2=Alice Beck|last3=Miller|first3=Stewart E.|title=Amskapi Pikuni: The Blackfeet People|year=2012|place=Albany|publisher=State University of New York Press|isbn=978-1438443355}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice|title=A Passion for the True and Just: Felix and Lucy Kramer Cohen and the Indian New Deal|year=2014|place=Tucson|publisher=University of Arizona Press|isbn=978-0816530939}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice|title=Traveling Prehistoric Seas: Critical Thinking on Ancient Transoceanic Voyages|year=2016|place=Walnut Creek, Calif.|publisher=Left Coast Press|isbn=978-1-62958-067-8}}
• {{cite book|last=Kehoe|first=Alice|title=Girl Archaeologist: Sisterhood in a Sexist Profession|year=2022|place=Lincoln, Nebraska|publisher=University of Nebraska Press|isbn=978-1496229366}}

{{reflist}}

• Biographical sketch of [http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=alice-beck-kehoe Alice Beck Kehoe] at the [http://www.sciam.com/ Scientific American] website (December 16, 2008)
• Hasan, Md. Mahmudul. (2022). Alice Beck Kehoe's Girl Archaeologist and gender relations in US society. The Daily Star, 8 October 2022. p. 14. https://www.thedailystar.net/star-literature/news/alice-beck-kehoes-girl-archaeologist-and-gender-relations-us-society-3137746

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Category:1934 births

Category:Scientists from Milwaukee

Category:American archaeologists

Category:University of Nebraska–Lincoln faculty

Category:Marquette University faculty

Category:Barnard College alumni

Category:Harvard University alumni

Category:Living people

Category:Writers from Nebraska

Category:Writers from New York City

Category:Writers from Milwaukee

Category:American anthropologists

Category:American women anthropologists

Category:American women archaeologists

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Category:21st-century American women