Author: Victor D. Montejo Publisher: University of Texas Press ISBN: 0292778651 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 261
Book Description
When Mayan leaders protested the celebration of the Quincentenary of the "discovery" of America and joined with other indigenous groups in the Americas to proclaim an alternate celebration of 500 years of resistance, they rose to national prominence in Guatemala. This was possible in part because of the cultural, political, economic, and religious revitalization that occurred in Mayan communities in the later half of the twentieth century. Another result of the revitalization was Mayan students' enrollment in graduate programs in order to reclaim the intellectual history of the brilliant Mayan past. Victor Montejo was one of those students. This is the first book to be published outside of Guatemala where a Mayan writer other than Rigoberta Menchu discusses the history and problems of the country. It collects essays Montejo has written over the past ten years that address three critical issues facing Mayan peoples today: identity, representation, and Mayan leadership. Montejo is deeply invested in furthering the discussion of the effectiveness of Mayan leadership because he believes that self-evaluation is necessary for the movement to advance. He also criticizes the racist treatment that Mayans experience, and advocates for the construction of a more pluralistic Guatemala that recognizes cultural diversity and abandons assimilation. This volume maps a new political alternative for the future of the movement that promotes inter-ethnic collaboration alongside a reverence for Mayan culture.
Author: Nancy J. Wellmeier Publisher: Taylor & Francis ISBN: 9780815331179 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 332
Book Description
This book analyzes the lives and the continuing ritual traditions of the Mayas who live in the United States. Focusing on a predominantly Maya town in rural Florida, it shows how members of this ancient Central American civilization use their religious tradition to maintain their ethnic identity in an unfamiliar environment. Bringing together studies of Mesoamerican fiesta or cargo systems, religious ritual and migration studies, this interdisciplinary work describes the religious traditions of indigenous Guatemala, the crisis migration of the 1980s, and the Mayas' daily life in the United States, including Maya women's reflections on their new challenges. The book is unique in its focus on the transfer of the fiesta cycle to the diaspora and its analysis of the behind-the-scenes aspects of ritual. The rise of leadership, contested interpretations of ethnic identity, choices about symbolic representation, and maintenance of ties to villages of origin all take place in the context of organizing public ritual events. Through these strategies, the Maya people not only cope materially and spiritually with the chaotic experience of uprootedness, but find ways to strengthen their unique identity. Bibliography. Index.
Author: Dumbarton Oaks Publisher: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library & Collection ISBN: 9780884023753 Category : Maya art Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
This introduction to Maya art is based on study of one of the most important collections in the United States, assembled by Robert Woods Bliss between 1935 and 1962. The catalogue, written by leading Maya scholars, contains detailed analyses of specific works of art along with thematic essays situating them within the context of Maya culture.
Author: Tamara L. Underiner Publisher: University of Texas Press ISBN: 0292773730 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 216
Book Description
From the dramatization of local legends to the staging of plays by Shakespeare and other canonical playwrights to the exploration of contemporary sociopolitical problems and their effects on women and children, Mayan theatre is a flourishing cultural institution in southern Mexico. Part of a larger movement to define Mayan self-identity and reclaim a Mayan cultural heritage, theatre in Mayan languages has both reflected on and contributed to a growing awareness of Mayans as contemporary cultural and political players in Mexico and on the world's stage. In this book, Tamara Underiner draws on fieldwork with theatre groups in Chiapas, Tabasco, and Yucatán to observe the Maya peoples in the process of defining themselves through theatrical performance. She looks at the activities of four theatre groups or networks, focusing on their operating strategies and on close analyses of selected dramatic texts. She shows that while each group works under the rubric of Mayan or indigenous theatre, their works are also in constant dialogue, confrontation, and collaboration with the wider, non-Mayan world. Her observations thus reveal not only how theatre is an agent of cultural self-definition and community-building but also how theatre negotiates complex relations among indigenous communities in Mayan Mexico, state governments, and non-Mayan artists and researchers.
Author: Sylvanus Griswold Morley Publisher: Stanford University Press ISBN: 9780804721301 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 940
Book Description
"Comprehensive synthesis of ancient Maya scholarship. Extensive summary of the archaeology of the Maya world provides the historical context for a detailed topical synthesis of chronological and geographic variability within the Maya cultural tradition"--
Author: Dennis Tedlock Publisher: Univ of California Press ISBN: 0520271378 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 481
Book Description
A chronological survey of Mayan literature, covering two thousand years, from the earliest hieroglyphic inscriptions to later works using the Roman alphabet.
Author: Neagu Djuvara Publisher: Humanitas SA ISBN: 973506619X Category : History Languages : en Pages : 490
Book Description
And, in the shadow of the major civilization, before it disappeared in its turn, how many other cultures have perished without a trace? This immense tragedy is being lived now by many cultures, with great intensity. One has to belong to such a culture in course of extinction or dying slowly even before its flourishing, to understand the infinite distress of those who are helplessly watching the inexorable disappearance of their most precious values. With each dying culture, it is a unique flower that is withering never to bloom again, an incomparable fragrance that fades away forever. There is in the smallest idioms, there is in the “Weltanschauung” of the smallest tribe doomed to extinction treasures of wisdom and poetry. Lost…lost for all eternity. In the life of peoples, as in the whole Creation, the most striking thing that actually shocks the mind is the infinite waste of Nature. Those who at present are fortunate enough to belong to the universal cultures, may still live with the illusion of their perpetuity. But for how long? Indead what is left of Ancient Egypt, of Mesopotamia, of Crete, of Mexico and of Peru? And how can we be sure that our conceited race that for centuries extends its domination over peoples and things will not also fall one day in torpor and become apathetic? Neagu Djuvara
Author: Robert J. Sharer Publisher: Stanford University Press ISBN: 9780804748179 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 986
Book Description
The rich findings of recent exploration and research are incorporated in this completely revised and greatly expanded sixth edition of this standard work on the Maya people. New field discoveries, new technical advances, new successes in the decipherment of Maya writing, and new theoretical perspectives on the Maya past have made this new edition necessary.
Author: Victor D. Montejo
Author: Nancy J. Wellmeier
Author: Dumbarton Oaks
Author: Herbert Joseph Spinden
Author: Tamara L. Underiner
Author: Sylvanus Griswold Morley
Author: Dennis Tedlock
Author: Neagu Djuvara
Author: Carol Krup
Author: Robert J. Sharer