Gender Equality in Native American Tribes

The part of Blackwood's article which surprised me the most was her discussion of the "gender equality" which existed in these Eastern Native American tribes. She describes the society as being of utmost equality, where "neither women nor men had an inferior role" (pg. 32). At the same time, however, she explains that tasks necessary to the tribe's survival were "gendered." Men traditionally hunted, made weapons, and built houses; while women gathered food, raised children, and made baskets and clothes. The concept of these separate tasks actually being viewed as equally important is foreign to me coming from a modern American perspective.
From my experience, it is not possible to have truly separate tasks that are valued equally. Society seems to always place more value on typically male tasks. For this reason, it was hard for me to envision this egalitarian paradise in the Blackwood article. Yet, Native American society differed in their mutual reliance on each other for day-to-day survival. This difference in lifestyle apparently made for a difference in gender equality. This difference so foreign to me that her perfect portrayal is almost unbelievable.