Maya Working Group
The Maya Working Group is a long-term research group associated with the Santa Fe Institute that complements SFI's goal of integrating Natural Science and Social Science research in novel ways to better understand the mechanisms and processes by which the world works.[1]. This group of archaeologists has focused its research on how complexity arose within Maya Civilization with a strong focus on epistemology and hermeneutics; their stated goals are not only to break ground and produce new knowledge about Maya Civilization but also to better explain how and why we know what we know[2][3]. Some of the primary research topics investigated by this group have included:
- Maya Cosmology and Archaeoastronomy
- Maya Understandings of Time
- Being Maya
- Maya Identity (philosophy)
Publications
The Maya Working Group has focused on producing accessible academic books on Maya civilization that also act as foundation texts for modern research.
The group's first book "The Maya E Groups"[4] revises our understanding of the role of the E-Group in ancient Maya civilization to provide a new foundation for future scholarship by linking the E-Group to natural and human cycles and furthering our understanding of Maya Cosmology. This goes beyond past investigations of Maya Archeoastronomy to demonstrate how E Groups serve as Community centers and as a physical manifestation of time and the calendar embedded in the Landscape. With this new foundation, the old model of E Group as an astronomical observatory has been fully rejected[5][6]. Research has built on these ideas to show that E-Group structures preceded cities and provide the earliest evidence of Maya Civilization[7]. However, the role of the E-Group as a community center persisted for millennia after the emergence of cities and helped build resilient communities that often lasted longer than their contemporaries[8][9]
The group's second book, "The Materialization of Time in the Ancient Maya World: Mythic History and Ritual Order"[10]. This book combines Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Archaeology to better understand Maya Civilization from a Maya-centered perspective. Understanding conceptions of time from the archaeological record requires consideration of divination artifacts, monumental architecture, carved altars and stela, historic records, and ethnohistoric accounts.
References
- ↑ "Our Mission". www.santafe.edu.
- ↑
Freidel, David A.; Chase, Arlen F.; Dowd, Anne S.; Murdock, Jerry (2017). Maya E Groups: Calendars, Astronomy, and Urbanism in the Early Lowlands. Gainesville: University Press of Florida. pp. xvii–xxi. ISBN 9780813054353. Search this book on
- ↑
Freidel, David A.; Chase, Arlen F.; Dowd, Anne S.; Murdock, Jerry (2017). The Materialization of Time in the Ancient Maya World: Mythic History and Ritual Order. Gainesville: University Press of Florida. pp. xvii–xviii. ISBN 9780813069807. Search this book on
- ↑
Freidel, David A.; Chase, Arlen F.; Dowd, Anne S.; Murdock, Jerry (2017). Maya E Groups: Calendars, Astronomy, and Urbanism in the Early Lowlands. Gainesville: University Press of Florida. ISBN 9780813054353. Search this book on
- ↑
Šprajc, Ivan (2021). "Astronomical aspects of Group E-type complexes and implications for understanding ancient Maya architecture and urban planning". PLOS ONE. 16 (4): e0250785. Bibcode:2021PLoSO..1650785S. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0250785. PMC 8078784 Check
|pmc=value (help). PMID 33905449 Check|pmid=value (help). - ↑ Šprajc, Ivan (2023). "Equinoctial Sun and Astronomical Alignments in Mesoamerican Architecture: Fiction and Fact". Ancient Mesoamerica. 32 (2): 281–297. doi:10.1017/S0956536121000419.
- ↑
Inomata, Takeshi; Triadan, Daniela; Vázquez López, V.A. (2020). "Monumental architecture at Aguada Fénix and the rise of Maya civilization". Nature. 582 (7813): 530–533. Bibcode:2020Natur.582..530I. doi:10.1038/s41586-020-2343-4. PMID 32494009 Check
|pmid=value (help). - ↑
Chase, Diane; Lobo, José; Feinman, Gary; Carballo, David; Chase, Arlen; Chase, Adrian; Scott, Hutson; Ossa, Alanna; Canuto, Marcello; Stanton, Travis; Gorenflow, L.; Pool, C.A.; Arroyo, B.; Liendo Stuardo, R.; Nichols, D.L. (2023). "Mesoamerican urbanism revisited: Environmental change, adaptation, resilience, persistence, and collapse". Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 120 (31): e2211558120. Bibcode:2023PNAS..12011558C. doi:10.1073/pnas.2211558120. PMC 10400939 Check
|pmc=value (help). PMID 37487066 Check|pmid=value (help). - ↑
Smith, Michael E.; Lobo, José; Peeples, Matthew A.; York, Abigail M.; Stanley, Benjamin W.; Crawford, Katherine A.; Gauthier, Nicholas; Huster, Angela C. (2021). "The persistence of ancient settlements and urban sustainability". Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 118 (20): e2018155118. Bibcode:2021PNAS..11818155S. doi:10.1073/pnas.2018155118. PMC 8157985 Check
|pmc=value (help). PMID 33972421 Check|pmid=value (help). - ↑
Freidel, David A.; Chase, Arlen F.; Dowd, Anne S.; Murdock, Jerry (2017). The Materialization of Time in the Ancient Maya World: Mythic History and Ritual Order. Gainesville: University Press of Florida. ISBN 9780813069807. Search this book on
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