Download or read book Chamulas in the World of the Sun written by Gary H. Gossen and published by . This book was released on 1974 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The oral tradition of the Chamula people in southern Mexico is rich and varied. Descendents of the Ancient Maya, the Chamulas use language in a special way that expresses their understanding of the social and cosmic order to which they belong. In this innovative study in anthropology and folkore, Gary Gossen offers a brilliant analysis of the cosmology, symbollism, and verbal behavior of the Chamulas.
Download or read book Chamulas in the World of the Sun written by Gary H. Gossen and published by . This book was released on 1984 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The oral tradition of the Chamula people in southern Mexico is rich and varied in its humor, detail, style, imagery, and insight. Descendants of the Ancient Maya, the Chamulas use language in a way that expresses their special understanding of the social and cosmic order to which they belong. The Sun/Christ deity presides over this universe. In this innovative study in anthropology and folklore, Gary Gossen offers a brilliant analysis of the cosmology, symbolism, and verbal behavior of the Chamulas, based upon his systematic collections of their oral traditions within the framework of their own folk classification scheme of language. Not surprisingly, the underlying structure of Chamula categories of time and space also provides an important key to understanding the style, structure, and performance of their folklore. Cosmology is thus used in this book as a metalanguage for reporting and analyzing another language, the reservoir of symbols and information in Chamula oral tradition. Mr. Gossen's analysis runs the gamut from children's improvised games and songs through court language and oratory to the appropriate language for joking, gossip, sacred narrative, prayer and ritual formulas. In addition, his description and analysis are augmented by more than 180 abstracts of narrative texts and several original Chamula drawings. There is a good chance that this book may come to be regarded as a classic in the field of symbolic analysis of myth and oral tradition. There are few, if any, published studies dealing with such a superb collection of texts and supporting ethnographic materials. -- Gary H. Gossen teaches anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. -- Amazon.
Download or read book An Epoch of Miracles written by and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2014-07-29 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Mr. Allan Burns, I am here to tell you an example, the example of the Hunchbacks.” So said Paulino Yamá, traditionalist and storyteller, to Allan Burns, anthropologist and linguist, as he began one story that found its way into this book. Paulino Yamá was just one of several master storytellers from the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico from whom Burns learned not only the Mayan language but also the style and performance of myths, stories, riddles, prayers, and other forms of speech of their people. The result is An Epoch of Miracles, a wonderfully readable yet thoroughly scholarly set of translations from the oral literature of the Yucatec Maya, an important New World tradition never before systematically described. An Epoch of Miracles brings us over thirty-five long narratives of things large, small, strange, and “regular” and as many delightful short pieces, such as bird lore, riddles, and definitions of anteaters, rainbows, and other commonplaces of the Mayan world. Here are profound narratives of the Feathered Serpent, the mighty Rain God Chac and his helpers, and the mysterious cult of the Speaking Cross. But because these are modern, “Petroleum Age” Maya, here too are a discussion with Cuba’s Fidel Castro and a greeting to former president Richard Nixon. All pieces are translated ethnopoetically; examples of several genres are presented bilingually. An especially valuable feature is the indication of performance style, such as pauses and voice quality, given with each piece.
Download or read book Supplement to the Handbook of Middle American Indians Volume 3 written by Munro S. Edmonson and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 1985 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Engaging Ancient Maya Sculpture at Piedras Negras Guatemala written by Megan E. O'Neil and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2014-02-25 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now shrouded in Guatemalan jungle, the ancient Maya city of Piedras Negras flourished between the sixth and ninth centuries, when its rulers erected monumental limestone sculptures carved with hieroglyphic texts and images of themselves and family members, advisers, and captives. In Engaging Ancient Maya Sculpture at Piedras Negras, Guatemala, Megan E. O’Neil offers new ways to understand these stelae, altars, and panels by exploring how ancient Maya people interacted with them. These monuments, considered sacred, were one of the community’s important forms of cultural and religious expression. Stelae may have held the essence of rulers they commemorated, and the objects remained loci for reverence of those rulers after they died. Using a variety of evidence,O’Neil examines how the forms, compositions, and contexts of the sculptures invited people to engage with them and the figures they embodied looks at these monuments not as inert bearers of images but as palpable presences that existed in real space at specific historical moments. Her analysis brings to the fore the material and affective force of these powerful objects that were seen, touched, and manipulated in the past. O’Neil investigates the monuments not only at the moment of their creation but also in later years and shows how they changed over time. She argues that the relationships among sculptures of different generations were performed in processions, through which ancient Maya people integrated historical dialogues and ancestral commemoration into the landscape. With the help of more than 160 illustrations, O’Neil reveals these sculptures’ continuing life histories, which in the past century have included their fragmentation and transformation into commodities sold on the international art market. Shedding light on modern-day transposition and display of these ancient monuments, O’Neil’s study contributes to ongoing discussions of cultural patrimony.
Download or read book Women and Alcohol in a Highland Maya Town written by Christine Eber and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2010-06-28 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Healing roles and rituals involving alcohol are a major source of power and identity for women and men in Highland Chiapas, Mexico, where abstention from alcohol can bring a loss of meaningful roles and of a sense of community. Yet, as in other parts of the world, alcohol use sometimes leads to abuse, whose effects must then be combated by individuals and the community. In this pioneering ethnography, Christine Eber looks at women and drinking in the community of San Pedro Chenalhó to address the issues of women’s identities, roles, relationships, and sources of power. She explores various personal and social strategies women use to avoid problem drinking, including conversion to Protestant religions, membership in cooperatives or Catholic Action, and modification of ritual forms with substitute beverages. The book’s women-centered perspective reveals important data on women and drinking not reported in earlier ethnographies of Highland Chiapas communities. Eber’s reflexive approach, blending the women’s stories, analyses, songs, and prayers with her own and other ethnographers’ views, shows how Western, individualistic approaches to the problems of alcohol abuse are inadequate for understanding women’s experiences with problem and ritual drinking in a non-Western culture. In a new epilogue, Christine Eber describes how events of the last decade, including the Zapatista uprising, have strengthened women's resolve to gain greater control over their lives by controlling the effects of alcohol in the community.
Download or read book Mortuary Landscapes of the Classic Maya written by Andrew K. Scherer and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2015-11-15 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the tombs of the elite to the graves of commoners, mortuary remains offer rich insights into Classic Maya society. In Mortuary Landscapes of the Classic Maya: Rituals of Body and Soul, the anthropological archaeologist and bioarchaeologist Andrew K. Scherer explores the broad range of burial practices among the Maya of the Classic period (AD 250–900), integrating information gleaned from his own fieldwork with insights from the fields of iconography, epigraphy, and ethnography to illuminate this society’s rich funerary traditions. Scherer’s study of burials along the Usumacinta River at the Mexican-Guatemalan border and in the Central Petén region of Guatemala—areas that include Piedras Negras, El Kinel, Tecolote, El Zotz, and Yaxha—reveals commonalities and differences among royal, elite, and commoner mortuary practices. By analyzing skeletons containing dental and cranial modifications, as well as the adornments of interred bodies, Scherer probes Classic Maya conceptions of body, wellness, and the afterlife. Scherer also moves beyond the body to look at the spatial orientation of the burials and their integration into the architecture of Maya communities. Taking a unique interdisciplinary approach, the author examines how Classic Maya deathways can expand our understanding of this society’s beliefs and traditions, making Mortuary Landscapes of the Classic Maya an important step forward in Mesoamerican archeology.
Download or read book Four Creations written by Gary H. Gossen and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 1222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Four Creations is a collection of seventy-four stories told to Gary H. Gossen by Tzotzil Maya storytellers in San Juan Chamula, Mexico. Spanning four cycles of creations, destructions, and restorations from the dawn of cosmic order to the present era, this epic history reveals a distinctly Maya vision of the universe, grand in scope yet leavened with local humor, irony, and the Tzotzil narrators’ own critical commentaries. Four Creations includes mythic accounts of modern history, such as the Wars of Independence, the Mexican Revolution, and the current Protestant evangelical movement. Given in both transcribed Tzotzil and English translations, the texts are enlivened by more than one hundred Maya Indian drawings and by Gossen’s extensive ethnographic and historical notes based on his conversations with the narrators and more than thirty-five years of study. Miguel León-Portílla’s Foreword situates Four Creations within the broader context of Mesoamerican culture and traditions, while the Afterword by Jan Rus relates this work to recent events in modern-day Chamula.
Download or read book In the Name of God written by Edmondo F. Lupieri and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 2011-12-20 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the conquistadores in Central and South America to the Jesuits in China, Edmondo Lupieri traces the consequences of European war and conquest for global cultural identities from the age of exploration to the present. In the Name of God exposes the economic, political, and religious justifications and motivations behind the European conquests and uncovers some of the historical roots of genocide, racism, and "just war." Lupieri's animated and comprehensive historical-sociological study masterfully weaves together a tapestry of ideas, individuals, and people groups, linking them throughout to present-day realities in often surprising ways. Unflinchingly critical, Lupieri describes how European-indigenous encounters have shaped Christianity -- and the world -- irrevocably.
Download or read book Supplement to the Handbook of Middle American Indians Volume 3 written by Victoria Reifler Bricker and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2010-07-22 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The sixteen-volume Handbook of Middle American Indians, completed in 1976, has been acclaimed the world over as the single most valuable resource ever produced for those involved in the study of Mesoamerica. When it was determined in 1978 that the Handbook should be updated periodically, Victoria Reifler Bricker, well-known cultural anthropologist, was elected to be general editor. This third volume of the Supplement is devoted to the aboriginal literatures of Mesoamerica, a topic receiving little attention in the original Handbook. According to the general editor, "This volume does more than supplement and update the coverage of Middle American Indian literatures in the Handbook. It breaks new ground by defining the parameters of a new interdisciplinary field in Middle American Indian studies." The aim of the present volume is to consider literature from five Middle American Indian languages: Nahuatl, Yucatecan Maya, Quiche, Tzotzil, and Chorti. The first three literatures are well documented for both the Classical and Modern variants of their languages and are obvious candidates for inclusion in this volume. The literatures of Tzotzil and Chorti, on the other hand, are oral, and heretofore little has been written of their genres and styles. Taken together, these essays represent a substantial contribution to the Handbook series, with the volume editor's introduction placing in geographic perspective the five literatures chosen as representative of the Middle American literary tradition.
Download or read book In the Maw of the Earth Monster written by James E. Brady and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2013-04-01 with total page 449 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As portals to the supernatural realm that creates and animates the universe, caves have always been held sacred by the peoples of Mesoamerica. From ancient times to the present, Mesoamericans have made pilgrimages to caves for ceremonies ranging from rituals of passage to petitions for rain and a plentiful harvest. So important were caves to the pre-Hispanic peoples that they are mentioned in Maya hieroglyphic writing and portrayed in the Central Mexican and Oaxacan pictorial codices. Many ancient settlements were located in proximity to caves. This volume gathers papers from twenty prominent Mesoamerican archaeologists, linguists, and ethnographers to present a state-of-the-art survey of ritual cave use in Mesoamerica from Pre-Columbian times to the present. Organized geographically, the book examines cave use in Central Mexico, Oaxaca, and the Maya region. Some reports present detailed site studies, while others offer new theoretical understandings of cave rituals. As a whole, the collection validates cave study as the cutting edge of scientific investigation of indigenous ritual and belief. It confirms that the indigenous religious system of Mesoamerica was and still is much more terrestrially focused that has been generally appreciated.
Download or read book On Earth as it is in Heaven written by Virginia Garrard-Burnett and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2000 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Collects nine previously published essays that consider the entire region and so provide a more comparative view of the range of religious experience than studies that focus on a particular country. They also range widely across religion, covering not only the dominant Catholicism, but also popular Indian and African religious forms and new elements such as Protestantism and Mormonism. The collection is suitable for a course. It is not indexed. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.
Download or read book In This Body written by Servando Z. Hinojosa and published by UNM Press. This book was released on 2015-11-01 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Kaqchikel Maya, who live in the highlands of central Guatemala, experience soul as part of a continuum of bodily states. This account of life in one highland Maya community shows how, among Kaqchikels, spirit expresses itself fundamentally through the body, and not as something entirely separate from the body. By examining the lived-meanings of midwifery, soul therapy, and community dance in the town of San Juan Comalapa, the book identifies the body as the primary vehicle for spiritual grounding in daily life. Hinojosa invites readers to understand how specialists in these activities articulate their knowledge of the spirit through their understanding of blood, and he encourages readers to glimpse the hidden life of the body and how bodily processes guide local understandings of spirit at the personal and group level. This work further illuminates the agentive role of the body in Maya spiritual experience and enriches the current discussions of Maya spiritual revitalization.
Download or read book Parallel Worlds written by Kerry M. Hull and published by "O'Reilly Media, Inc.". This book was released on 2012-05-15 with total page 510 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite recent developments in epigraphy, ethnopoetics, and the literary investigation of colonial and modern materials, few studies have compared glyphic texts and historic Maya literatures. Parallel Worlds examines Maya writing and literary traditions from the Classic period until today, revealing remarkable continuities across time. In this volume, contributions from leading scholars in Maya literary studies examine Maya discourse from Classic period hieroglyphic inscriptions to contemporary spoken narratives, focusing on parallelism to unite the literature historically. Contributors take an ethnopoetic approach, examining literary and verbal arts from a historical perspective, acknowledging that poetic form is as important as narrative content in deciphering what these writings reveal about ancient and contemporary worldviews. Encompassing a variety of literary motifs, including humor, folklore, incantation, mythology, and more specific forms of parallelism such as couplets, chiasms, kennings, and hyperbatons, Parallel Worlds is a rich journey through Maya culture and pre-Columbian literature that will be of interest to students and scholars of anthropology, ethnography, Latin American history, epigraphy, comparative literature, language studies, indigenous studies, and mythology.
Download or read book Telling Maya Tales written by Gary H. Gossen and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-12-02 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Telling Maya Tales offers an experimental ethnographic portrait of the San Juan Chamula, the largest and most influential Maya community of Highland Chiapas, in the late twentieth century--the era of the Zapatistas. In this collection of essays, the author, whose field work in the area spans two generations of anthropological thought, explores several expressions of Tzotzil ethnic affirmation, ranging from oral narrative to ritual drama and political action. His work covers the current era, when the Chamula Tzotzils mingle chaotically and sometimes violently with the social and political space of modern Mexico--most recently, in the context of the Maya Zapatista movement of 1994.
Download or read book Time and the Highland Maya written by Barbara Tedlock and published by UNM Press. This book was released on 1992 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Described as a landmark in the ethnographic study of the Maya, this study of ritual and cosmology among the contemporary Quiché Indians of highland Guatemala has now been updated to address changes that have occurred in the last decade. The Classic Mayan obsession with time has never been better known. Here, Barbara Tedlock redirects our attention to the present-day keepers of the ancient calendar. Combining anthropology with formal apprenticeship to a diviner, she refutes long-held ethnographic assumptions and opens a door to the order of the Mayan cosmos and its daily ritual. Unable to visit the region for over ten years, Tedlock returned in 1989 to find that observance of the traditional calendar and religion is stronger than ever, despite a brutal civil war. ". . . a well-written, highly readable, and deeply convincing contribution. . . ." --Michael Coe
Download or read book Skywatchers written by Anthony F. Aveni and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2001-08-15 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Skywatchers of Ancient Mexico helped establish the field of archaeoastronomy, and it remains the standard introduction to this subject. Combining basic astronomy with archaeological and ethnological data, it presented a readable and entertaining synthesis of all that was known of ancient astronomy in the western hemisphere as of 1980. In this revised edition, Anthony Aveni draws on his own and others' discoveries of the past twenty years to bring the Skywatchers story up to the present. He offers new data and interpretations in many areas, including: The study of Mesoamerican time and calendrical systems and their unprecedented continuity in contemporary Mesoamerican culture The connections between Precolumbian religion, astrology, and scientific, quantitative astronomy The relationship between Highland Mexico and the world of the Maya and the state of Pan-American scientific practices The use of personal computer software for computing astronomical data With this updated information, Skywatchers will serve a new generation of general and scholarly readers and will be useful in courses on archaeoastronomy, astronomy, history of astronomy, history of science, anthropology, archaeology, and world religions.
