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Anth 168a/LALS100a:
The Maya – Past, Present, and Future
Spring 2017
Tuesday/Friday 9:30 PM–10:50
Charles Golden, [email protected],
781-736-2217, Office Hours: T/F 12:30 – 1:30pm or by appointment.
Who are the Maya? Popular representations of the Maya often focus on their ancient cities, magnificent
pyramids, palaces, ballcourts, and the supposed “collapse” of their civilization in the 9 th century CE. Or,
more recently, there was a public fascination with the “END OF THE WORLD” in 2012. The real picture is
far more complex, spans more than three millennia, and encompasses the modern story of more than 8
million people who speak the nearly 30 Mayan languages of Southern Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and
Honduras.
In this course we will investigate the earliest archaeological evidence for agricultural peoples that we
can securely identify as ancestors of modern Maya populations. We will explore the rise of the first
great Maya cities at places like El Mirador, the invention of the most complex writing system in the
Americas, and we will look at the rich archaeological and hieroglyphic data for understanding the lives of
kings and commoners in the first millennium AD. You will learn to read a bit of Maya hieroglyphic
inscriptions, we will question the various hypotheses for the famous “Maya Collapse,” and we will delve
into the aftermath of the supposed collapse. Woven into our discussion of the Precolumbian past will
be the ethnographic accounts of anthropologists and the voices of the Maya themselves, speaking to us
through historical and modern texts.
This Course is Writing Intensive and a Mix of Lecture and Seminar
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This course is a forum for discussion. As such, proper preparation and engaged class participation are
required. Brief writing assignments may be required for our regular meetings. Any more than two
unexcused absences during the course of the semester will result in the loss of a letter grade for class
participation for each additional absence. You should complete the readings before class on the day for
which they are assigned. You may not use computer or cell phones use in class unless academic
accommodations are required. Participation accounts for 20% of the final course grade.
Two 5-page essays will constitute the major midterm assignments. Each essay will be worth 10% of the
final grade. These papers will ask you develop an argument based on class readings, and providing
appropriate citations of those readings. You will receive the prompt for the first essay in class on 2/28
and must be submitted on Latte no later than the beginning of class on 3/7; and for the second essay,
the prompt will be distributed on 3/28 and must be submitted on Latte by 4/4. Full use of course
readings should be made in answering the exam questions. Outside readings are welcome but will not
be required.
A final paper will be an-in depth study of an object from a museum in the Boston area (or elsewhere, if
you choose). Boston has a rich collection of objects from the Maya area displayed in museums such as
the MFA and Harvard’s Peabody Museum. Many of these objects, however, are presented with limited
cultural context and, particularly in the case of art museums, without any real indication of where the
piece was originally found. You are to visit one of these collections over the course of the semester,
select an object and write a richly anthropological analysis of that piece. A 3-page proposal with
preliminary bibliography is due on 4/7 (10% of the final grade). A complete draft (10-12 pages) of the
paper is due 4/25 (10% of your final grade). You will present a summary of your findings in class during
the final sessions of the semester (10% of the final grade). You will receive comments on this draft and
are expected to revise the paper following these comments and discussion with me. A final draft of the
paper is due on 5/7 (30% of the final grade).
SOME RESOURCES FOR WRITING IN ANTHROPOLOGY AND ARCHAEOLOGY:
http://writingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/anthropology/
http://www.bu.edu/archaeology/undergraduate/writing-guide-in-archaeology/
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~anthro/undergrad_materials/anthropology_writing_guide_2010.pdf
http://www.skidmore.edu/anthropology/writing/paper.php
GRADING
A grade of “A” means “excellent” - the work is of superior quality on an exam and represents insightful,
well-considered, and well-written/produced research & write-up. A grade of “A” typically represents a
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great deal of effort, but effort alone does not guarantee an “A.” A grade of “B” means “good” - the work
fulfills all of the assignment instructions and adequately presents well-written, well-researched work.
“C” means “average” - the work submitted fulfills the letter of the assignment, but lacks sufficient quality
of research and/or presentation that would warrant a higher grade. A grade of “D” represents work that
is unsatisfactory and has not fulfilled the stated goals of the assignment, while an “E” is a failing grade
resulting from work that is incomplete, incoherent, or otherwise unacceptable given the guidelines for
the assignment.
Extensions on papers will only be given if your professor is notified ahead of time of an existing conflict,
or you provide proof of an emergency. No extensions or make-ups will be given because of conflicts with
assignments or exams in other classes. Papers turned in late without permission of the instructor will be
discounted one letter grade per day.
If you are a student who needs academic accommodations because of a documented disability you
should contact me, and present your letter of accommodation, as soon as possible. If you have questions
about documenting a disability or requesting academic accommodations you should contact
Undergraduate Academic Services. Letters of accommodations should be presented at the start of the
semester to ensure provision of accommodations. Accommodations cannot be granted retroactively.
The Brandeis Writing Center (extension 6-4885) on the first floor of the Goldfarb Library is available for
consultation throughout the academic year.
The following texts are required readings and should be purchased, or checked out from the library
(copies will be on reserve; an online version of Popul Vuh is also available at:
http://www.mesoweb.com/publications/Christenson/PopolVuh.pdf)
Michael D. Coe and
Stephen Houston
“The Maya” (9th Ed.) 2015, Thames and Hudson ISBN: 9780500291887
Allen J. Christenson “Popul Vuh” 2007, Univ. of Oklahoma Press ISBN: 0806138394
(Note that Popul Vuh is also available online at
http://www.mesoweb.com/publications/Christenson/PopolVuh.pdf)
Other assigned readings will be made available via LATTE.
This calendar represents a preliminary schedule of readings and discussions. All assignments and
readings are subject to change during the course of the semester. Students will receive written
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notification of these changes via e-mail.
T 1/17 Intro Class: Who, When, and Where are the Maya?
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “Introduction”
F 1/20 The Origins of Maya Culture and Society: The Preclassic
Restall, M. 2004. Maya Ethnogenesis. The Journal of Latin American Anthropology 9:64-89.
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “The Earliest Maya”
Joyce, Rosemary A., and John S. Henderson (2001) Beginnings of Village Life in Eastern
Mesoamerica. Latin American Antiquity 12 (1): 5-23.
T 1/24 The Origins of Maya Culture and Society: The Preclassic
Christenson, Popul Vuh, pp.59-191
F 1/27 The Origins of Maya Culture and Society: The Preclassic
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “The Rise of Maya Civilization”
Saturno, William A. 2009. Centering the Kingdom, Centering the King: Maya Creation and
Legitimization at San Bartolo, in The Art of Urbanism: How Mesoamerican Kingdoms
Represented Themselves in Architecture and Imagery, edited by William L. Fash and
Leonardo Lopez Lujan, pp. 111-134. Dumbarton Oaks, Washington, DC.
Inomata, T, D. Triadan, K. Aoyama, V. Castillo, H. Yonenobu. 2013. Early Ceremonial
Constructions at Ceibal, Guatemala, and the Origins of Lowland Maya Civilization. Science
340: 467-471.
Inomata, T., MacLellan, J., Triadan, D., Munson, J., Burham, M., Aoyama, K., Nasu, H.,
Pinzón, F. and Yonenobu, H., 2015. Development of sedentary communities in the Maya
lowlands: Coexisting mobile groups and public ceremonies at Ceibal, Guatemala.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 112(14), pp.4268-4273.
T 1/31 The Classic Period: Understanding Maya Inscriptions
Saturno, William et al. 2006. Early Maya Writing at San Bartolo, Guatemala.
Science 3 March 2006: 1281-1283.
Proskouriakoff, T. 1960. Historical Implications of a Patten of Dates at Piedras Negras,
Guatemala. American Antiquity 25:454-475.
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Coe, M. D., and M. Van Stone. 2001. Chapters 1 and 2 from Reading the Maya Glyphs. New
York: Thames and Hudson.
Video: Cracking the Maya Code (Posted to Latte)
F 2/3 The Classic Period: Understanding Maya Inscriptions
Martin, S. 2006. On Pre Columbian Narrative: Representation Across the Word Image ‐ ‐Divide. In A Pre Columbian World. J. Quilter and M.E. Miller, eds. Pp. 55 105. Washington, ‐ ‐D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.
T 2/7 Who’s Who in the Texts
Coe and Houston - The Maya – p. 258 - 278
Martin, S., and N. Grube. 2008. Introduction to Chronicle of the Maya Kings and Queens.
New York: Thames and Hudson.
Tokovinine, A. 2011. People from a Place: Re-Interpreting Classic Maya Emblem Glyphs. In
Acta MesoAmericana 23: 91 – 106.
F 2/10 Working through Texts
Houston, S. D., K. A. Taube, and D. Stuart. 1989. Folk classification of Classic Maya pottery.
American Anthropologist 91:720-726.
Stuart, D. 2005. Glyphs on Pots: Decoding Classic Maya Ceramics. A section of the 2005
edition of the Sourcebook for the 29th Maya Meetings at Texas, The University of Texas at
Austin.
Beliaev, D., A. Davletshin, and A. Tokovinine. 2010. Sweet Cacao and Sour Atole: Mixed
Drinks on Classic Maya Ceramic Vases. In Pre-Columbian Foodways Interdisciplinary
Approaches to Food, Culture, and Markets in Ancient Mesoamerica, ed. by J. E. Staller and
M. Carrasco. Pp. 257-272. Springer, New York.
T 2/14 Understanding the Imagery - Maya Souls and Bodies
Pitarch, Pedro. 2011. The Two Maya Bodies: An Elementary Model of Tzeltal Personhood.
Ethnos 1 – 22.
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Groark, Kevin P. 2009. Discourses of the Soul: The Negotiation of Personal Agency in Tzotzil
Maya Dream Narrative. American Ethnologist 36(4): 705-721.
Pitarch, Pedro. 2010. Intro and Chapter 2, The Jaguar and the Priest: An Ethnography of
Maya Souls. University of Texas Press, Austin.
F 2/17 Understanding the Imagery - Maya Souls and Bodies
Houston, S., D. Stuart and K. Taube. 2005. The Memory of Bones: Body, Being, and
Experience among the Classic Maya. University of Texas Press, Austin. Pp. 1 - 101
Fitzsimmons, J. L. 2009. Death and the Afterlife in the Lowlands, from Death and the Classic
Maya Kings. Pp. 17-60. Austin: University of Texas Press.
T 2/21 No Class (Midterm Recess)
F 2/24 No Class (Midterm Recess)
T 2/28 Deities, Imagery, and Identity
Coe and Houston - The Maya – p. 242-258
Brown, L. A. and K. Th. Emery. 2008. Negotiations with the Animate Forest: Hunting
Shrines in the Guatemalan Highlands. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 15(4):
300-337.
Astor-Aguilera, M. 2009. Mesoamerican Communicating Objects: Mayan Worldviews
Before, During, and After Spanish Contact. In Maya Worldviews at Conquest. Edited by L.
G. Cecil and T. W. Pugh, pp. 159-182. Boulder: University Press of Colorado.
F 3/3 Deities, Imagery, and Identity
Prof. Golden in New Orleans, Guest Speaker
Houston, S., and D. Stuart. 1996. Of gods, glyphs and kings: divinity and rulership among
the Classic Maya. Antiquity 70:289-312.
Stuart, D. 1996. Kings of Stone: A Consideration of Stelae in Classic Maya Ritual and
Representation. RES 29/30:148-171.
T 3/7 Early Classic: Contacts with Rest of Mesoamerica
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Coe and Houston - The Maya – “Classic Splendor: The Early Period”
Stuart, David. 2000. The Arrival of Strangers: Teotihuacan and Tollan in Classic Maya
History. In Mesoamerica's Classic Heritage: From Teotihuacan to the Aztecs, edited by D.
Carrasco, L. Jones and J. S. Sessions, pp. 465-513. University of Colorado Press, Boulder.
Sharer, R. J. 2004. "External Interaction at Early Classic Copan," in Understanding Early
Classic Copan. Edited by E. E. Bell, M. A. Canuto, and R. J. Sharer, pp. 297-318. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
Taube, K. A. 2003. "Tetitla and the Maya Presence at Teotihuacan," in The Maya and
Teotihuacan. Edited by G. E. Braswell, pp. 273-314. Austin: University of Texas Press.
F 3/10 Contacts with the Rest of Mesoamerica
Price, T. Douglas, et al. 2010. Kings and Commoners at Copan: Isotopic Evidence for Origins
and Movement in the Classic Maya Period. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 29(1):
15-32.
Wright, Lori, et al. 2010. The Children of Kaminaljuyu: Isotopic Insight into Diet and Long
Distance Interaction in Mesoamerica. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 29 (2010)
155–178
Wright, Lori E. 2005. In search of Yax Nuun Ayiin I: Revisiting the Tikal Project’s Burial 10.
Ancient Mesoamerica 16(1): 89-100.
T 3/14 The Classic Period Political Landscape
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “Classic Splendor: The Late Period”
Inomata, T. 2001. The Power and Ideology of Artistic Creation: Elite Craft Specialists in
Classic Maya Society. Current Anthropology 42:321-349.
Kovacevich, B. 2015. From the ground up: household craft specialization and Classic Maya
polity integration. In Classic Maya Polities of the Southern Lowlands: Integration,
Interaction, Dissolution. Damien B. Marken and James L. Fitzsimmons, eds. Boulder:
University of Colorado Press, pp. 39-73
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F 3/17 The Classic Period Political Landscape
Carter, Nicholas. 2016. These are our Mountains Now: Statecraft and the Foundation of a
Late Classic Maya Royal Court. Ancient Mesoamerica 27(2):233-253.
Golden, C., A. Scherer, A. R. Muñoz, and R. Vasquez. 2008. Piedras Negras and Yaxchilan:
Divergent Political Trajectories in Adjacent Maya Polities. Latin American Antiquity 19:249-
274.
LeCount, L. J., and Yaeger, J. 2010. Provincial politics and current models of the Maya state.
In Classic Maya provincial politics: Xunantunich and its hinterlands, Tucson: University of
Arizona Press, pp. 21-45
T 3/21 Communities and Social Organization
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “Maya Life on the Eve of Conquest”
Robin, Cynthia. 2006. Gender, Farming, and Long Term Change: Maya Historical and ‐Archaeological Perspectives. Current Anthropology 47(3): 409-433.
Cancian, Frank. 1996. The Hamlet as Mediator. Ethnology 35(3): 215-228.
Christenson, Popul Vuh, pp.192-195.
F 3/24 Communities and Social Organization
Gillespie, S. D. 2000. Rethinking Ancient Maya Social Organization: Replacing 'Lineage' with
'House'. American Anthropologist 102: 467-284.
Houston, S. D., and P. A. McAnany. 2003. Bodies and Blood: Critiquing Social Construction
in Maya Archaeology. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 22:26-41.
Magnoni, A., Hutson, S.R. and Dahlin, B.H., 2012. Living in the City: Settlement Patterns and
the Urban Experience at Classic Period Chunchucmil, Yucatán, Mexico. Ancient
Mesoamerica, 23(02): 313-343.
T 3/28 Collapse: Causes and Debates
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Coe and Houston - The Maya – “The Terminal Classic”
Aimers, J. and D. Hodell. 2012. Drought and the Maya. Nature 479: 44-45.
Hoggarth, Julie A., Matthew Restall, James W. Wood and Douglas J. Kennett. 2017.
Drought and Its Demographic Effects in the Maya Lowlands. Current Anthropology
0(0):000-000.
Cook, B. I., K. J. Anchukaitis, J. O. Kaplan, M. J. Puma, M. Kellley, and D. Gueyffier. 2012.
Pre-Columbian Deforestation as an Amplifier of Drought in Mesoamerica. Geophysical
Research Letters 39: 1-6.
F 3/31 Collapse: Causes and Debates
McNeil, C. 2011. Deforestation, Agroforestry, and Sustainable Land Management Practices
among the classic period Maya. Quaternary International 249 (2012) 19-30.
Turner, B. L. II and J. A. Sabloff. 2012. Classic Period collapse of the Central Maya
Lowlands: Insights about human–environment relationships for sustainability. PNAS.
www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1210106109
Golden, Charles and Andrew K. Scherer. 2013. Territories and Trust, Growth and Collapse:
Political Dynamics in Classic period Maya Kingdoms. Current Anthropology 54(4): 397-435.
T 4/4 The Postclassic – Aftermath, or new Beginning?
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “The Postclassic”
Ringle, W. M. 2004. On the Political Organization of Chichen Itza. Ancient Mesoamerica
15(2):167-218.
Andrews, Anthony P., E. Wyllys Andrews, and Fernando Robles Castellanos. 2003. The
Northern Maya Collapse and its Aftermath. Ancient Mesoamerica, 14 (1):151 - 156.
F 4/7 The Postclassic – Aftermath, or new Beginning?
Pugh, T.W., 2003. The exemplary center of the Late Postclassic Kowoj Maya. Latin American
Antiquity, pp.408-430.
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Milbrath, S. and Lope, C.P., 2009. Survival and revival of terminal Classic traditions at
Postclassic Mayapán. Latin American Antiquity, pp.581-606.
T 4/11 No Class (Spring Recess)
F 4/14 No Class (Spring Recess)
T 4/18 The Spanish and the Reorganization of Maya Society
Braswell, Geoffrey. 2001. “Post-Classic Maya Courts of the Guatemalan Highlands” in Royal
Courts of the Ancient Maya, Volume 2: Data and Case Studies. Edited by T. Inomata and S.
D. Houston, pp. 308-334. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press.
Christenson, Popul Vuh, pp. 196-305 (Also, review previous sections of Popul Vuh)
F 4/21 The Spanish and the Reorganization of Maya Society
Bernal Diaz del Castillo “The Expedition under Cordova” and “The Expedition under
Grijalva” 1996. The Discovery and Conquest of Mexico. New York: Da Capo Press.
Restall, Maya Conquistador, Selections
T 4/25 The Spanish and the Reorganization of Maya Society
Coe and Houston - The Maya – “The Enduring Maya”
Graham, E., S. Simmons, and C. D. White. 2013. The Spanish Conquest and the Maya
Collapse: How ‘Religious’ is Change? World Archaeology. http:/ / dx.doi.org/ 10.1080/
00438243.2013.770962
Pugh, T.W., 2009. Contagion and alterity: Kowoj Maya appropriations of European objects.
American Anthropologist, 111(3), pp.373-386.
Oland, Maxine. 2014. “With the Gifts and Good Treatment That He Gave Them”: Elite
Maya Adoption of Spanish Material Culture at Progresso Lagoon, Belize. International
Journal of Historical Archaeology 18(4):643-667.
F 4/28 STUDENT PRESENTATIONS
T 5/2 STUDENT PRESENTATIONS
Students are expected to follow community standards of behavior and of academic integrity detailed in
the Rights and Responsibilities Handbook.
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