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Janet Davidson

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Janet Davidson
ONZM
Born1941 (age 84–85)
Lower Hutt, New Zealand
Occupations
  • Archaeologist
  • museum curator
Academic background
EducationUniversity of Auckland
Academic work
DisciplinePacific archaeology
Institutions

Janet Marjorie Davidson ONZM (born 1941) is a New Zealand museum curator and archaeologist who has carried out extensive field work in the Pacific Islands throughout Polynesia, Micronesia and Melanesia. She has been the E. Earle Vaile archaeologist at the Auckland War Memorial Museum and a senior curator at Te Papa Tongarewa.

Early life

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Davidson was born in 1941 in Lower Hutt to John and Christine Davidson.[1][2][3] Her father taught classics and mathematics at Hutt Valley High School and her brother John became a professor of classics at Victoria University of Wellington.[3] She attended Hutt Valley High School.[2][4] As a teenager she became interested in a career in museums and archaeology and commenced work at the Dominion Museum as a vacation assistant in 1958.[1][3] She began studying for a Bachelor of Arts at Victoria University of Wellington but subsequently switched to the University of Auckland, graduating in 1962.[5] Early archaeology work included excavations of middens at Porirua, the site of the Paremata barracks and at Sarah's Gully on the Coromandel.[1][5]

Career

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In 1964, Davidson graduated with a Master of Arts degree in anthropology from the University of Auckland with a thesis that analysed shell middens from a range of archaeological sites.[3][5][6] From 1964 to 1966 she was a Bernice P. Bishop Museum Field Associate in Anthropology.[3] In 1966 she was appointed as the E. Earle Vaile archaeologist at the Auckland Institute and Museum (based in the Auckland War Memorial Museum).[5][7] From 1974 to 1976 she was a Rhodes Visiting Fellow in Oxford;[5][8] during this period her position at the museum was filled by the British archaeologist Aileen Fox.[9] In 1980 she moved to Dunedin to join her husband, Foss Leach,[10] continuing her association with the Museum as an honorary research associate in archaeology.[11] She was an honorary lecturer at the University of Otago and later held the positions of ethnologist at the National Museum from 1991 to 1996 and Curator of Pacific Collections, at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa from 1996 to 2002.[3][7]

Davidson began carrying out fieldwork in the Pacific with Roger Green in the early 1960s while she was still a student.[5] She excavated sites at Moorea in French Polynesia (1961–1962), Upolu in Samoa (1964, 1965–1966), Tongatapu and Vava'u in Tonga (1964) and Nukuoro (1965).[5][4] The Nukuoro excavation was the first on a coral atoll and Davidson's excavation techniques demonstrated that cultural transformation from pre-human times could be uncovered.[3][5] Later with Foss Leach she excavated in the Federated States of Micronesia as well as Papua New Guinea and, in particular, the Namu burial ground on Taumako in the Solomon Islands.[5] Davidson and Leach's report on Taumako was published in 2008.[5]

Davidson and Green co-authored a two-volume report Archaeology in Western Samoa and laid the foundation for archaeology in Samoa and the study of settlement patterns in Samoa before 1840;[5][12] her findings on settlement patterns challenged views current at the time.[3] In 1969 Davidson participated in the Cook Bicentenary Expedition undertaking archaeological research at the Vava'u Group, Tonga.[2][13]

In New Zealand Davidson did extensive fieldwork in Northland, Auckland and the Coromandel.[3][5] From 1966 to 1978 she investigated settlement patterns on Motutapu Island. There she and Anne Leahy carried out excavations at Station Bay investigating undefended sites and pā.[5] In 1971–1972 she carried out an archaeological survey of Te Paki in Northland for the Department of Lands and Survey after the land had been purchased by the government in 1966.[5][14]

Davidson has had a public role giving talks promoting archaeology and educating the public.[3][5] Throughout her career she has advocated for the preservation of archaeological sites, calling for legislative protection in the early 1970s.[5][15] In 1972 she became the first woman president of the New Zealand Archaeological Association holding the office for two years.[5][16] She had previously been the Association's secretary from 1966 to 1972.[5] She also served on the council of the Polynesian Society and the Auckland Civic Trust.[5][8] An advocate for archaeology in the Historic Places Trust she served on the council from 1968 to 1978; during her tenure the Historic Places Amendment Act 1976 was passed which gave protection to historic places.[5]

While at the Dominion Museum and Te Papa Davidson undertook the reorganisation and rehousing of the collections of Māori artefacts and the curation and storage of the faunal remains collections.[3] On her retirement from Te Papa in 2002 Davidson and Leach (with his research interests in the settlement of Palliser Bay) established a research project called 'Bridge and Barrier? Māori occupation on the shores of Cook Strait, New Zealand'.[3] This involved working with Māori iwi Rangitāne ki Wairau and Ngati Hinewaka on experimental studies growing and storing kūmara (sweet potato) in Ngākuta Bay in the Marlborough Sounds.[3][5]

Davidson has published widely on the prehistory of New Zealand and the Pacific Islands.[3] She edited the New Zealand Journal of Archaeology from 1985 to 2008.[17] She was also a major contributor to the Journal of the Polynesian Society.[17] She published two major books: The Prehistory of New Zealand in 1984[10] and The Cook Voyages Encounters: The Cook Voyages Collections of Te Papa in 2019.[17]

Honours

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In 1985 Davidson was made a Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi.[3][18] She received the Elsdon Best Memorial Medal from the Polynesian Society in 1986 for outstanding scholarship in the study of the Māori people.[3][19] In the same year the University of Otago awarded her a Doctor of Science.[3][5] The Auckland Institute and Museum made her an Honorary Fellow in 1999.[3] In the 1996 Queen's Birthday Honours, Davidson was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to archaeology.[20]

The festschrift Vastly Ingenious: The Archaeology of Pacific Material Culture – in honour of Janet M. Davidson was published in 2007.[5] It presented essays of new research by leading international scholars with an introduction by Roger Green. Published by Otago University Press, the book was edited by three Pacific prehistorians: Atholl Anderson, Kaye C. Green, and Foss Leach.[21]

In 2014 Davidson received the Roger C. Green Lifetime Achievement Award from the New Zealand Archaeological Association.[5][22] She was selected as one of the Royal Society Te Apārangi's "150 women in 150 words" in 2017, celebrating the contributions of women to knowledge in New Zealand.[1]

Selected works

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References

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  1. 1 2 3 4 "Janet Davidson". Royal Society of New Zealand. Retrieved 13 April 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 "Janet Davidson, E. Earle Vaile Archaeologist". AGMANZ News. 3 (2): 4–5. 1972 – via NDHA.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Green, Roger C (2007). "Janet M. Davidson: A museum archaeologist". In Anderson, Atholl; Green, K.; Leach, Foss (eds.). Vastly ingenious: the archaeology of Pacific material culture: in honour of Janet M. Davidson. Dunedin, N.Z: Otago University Press. pp. 9–28. ISBN 978-1-877372-45-2.
  4. 1 2 "Adventure on coral island: Archaeology Makes Life Sparkle For Hutt Woman". Evening Post. 24 August 1965. p. 23. Retrieved 22 June 2026 – via Papers Past.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Jones, Kevin (2014). "Roger C. Green Lifetime Achievement Award. Janet Davidson" (PDF). New Zealand Archaeological Association. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  6. ↑ Davidson, Janet. The physical analysis of refuse in New Zealand archaeological sites. Thesis (MA). University of Auckland.
  7. 1 2 McCarthy, Conal (2013). "Janet Davidson, around 1962". Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  8. 1 2 "Rhodes to Oxford". Press. 1 May 1974. p. 6. Retrieved 22 June 2026 – via Papers Past.
  9. ↑ "Auckland War Memorial Museum News Number Fourteen" (PDF). Museum Quarterly. 14. Auckland: Auckland War Memorial Museum. June 1983. ISSN 0111-2252. Wikidata Q115749472.
  10. 1 2 Bellwood, Peter (1986). "Peter Bellwood's review of Janet Davidson's The Prehistory of New Zealand". Pacific Studies. 9 (3): 182. Retrieved 15 January 2026.
  11. ↑ "Auckland Museum News Number One" (PDF). Museum Quarterly. 1. Auckland: Auckland War Memorial Museum. March 1980. ISSN 0111-2252. Wikidata Q115749458.
  12. ↑ Davidson, Janet M. (1969). "Settlement patterns in Samoa before 1840". Journal of the Polynesian Society. 78 (1): 44–82. Retrieved 1 November 2009.
  13. ↑ Fraser, Ronald. "A Narrative of the Cook Bicentenary Expedition". The Royal Society of New Zealand bulletin. 8: 21–28. ISSN 1176-1865. Wikidata Q125502663.
  14. ↑ "Te Paki Coastal Park: A Valuable Development in the Far North". Forest and Bird (181 (supplement)): 1. 1 August 1971.
  15. ↑ "Call for protection of old Maori sites". Press. 18 May 1973. p. 5. Retrieved 22 June 2026 – via Papers Past.
  16. ↑ "Archaeology president". Press. 6 June 1972. p. 6. Retrieved 22 June 2026.
  17. 1 2 3 "Q&A with Janet Davidson, author of The Cook Voyages Encounters: The Cook Voyages Collections of Te Papa". tepapa.govt.nz. Retrieved 21 June 2026.
  18. ↑ "All Fellows. D-F". Royal Society Te Apārangi. Retrieved 23 June 2026.
  19. ↑ "Award of the 2022 Elsdon Best Memorial Medal". Waka kuaka: The Journal of the Polynesian Society. 131 (4): 361. 2022.
  20. ↑ "Queen's Birthday honours list 1996". Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. 3 June 1996. Retrieved 20 July 2020.
  21. ↑ Anderson, Atholl; Green, K.; Leach, Foss, eds. (2007). Vastly ingenious: the archaeology of Pacific material culture: in honour of Janet M. Davidson. Dunedin, N.Z: Otago University Press. ISBN 978-1-877372-45-2.
  22. ↑ "Previous Award Winners". NZ Archaeological Association. Retrieved 21 June 2026.

Further reading

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Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Janet_Davidson&oldid=1364472626"