Joshua D. Englehardt – författare

The ancient societies of western Mexico have long been understudied and misunderstood. Focusing on recent archaeological data, Ancient West Mexicos highlights the diversity and complexity of the region’s pre-Columbian cultures and argues that western Mexico was more similar to the rest of the Mesoamerican world than many researchers have believed.Chapters that treat investigations in Durango, Colima, Jalisco, Nayarit, Aguascalientes, and Michoacán draw on new evidence dating from across millennia, spanning different periods in Mesoamerican history. Contributors analyze materials including ceramics, architectural remains, textiles, and weaving tools to discern the settlement patterns, political structures, and cosmologies of the people who lived at these sites. Featuring intriguing case studies that point to unexpected pathways to sociopolitical complexity in ancient societies, these essays illustrate that the region’s archaeological record can contribute meaningfully to a more nuanced picture of Mesoamerica as a whole.Contributors: Laura Almendros López | Christopher S. Beekman | Mijaely Castañón | Fabio Germán Cupul-Magaña | Manuel Dueñas García | Joshua D. Englehardt | Rafael García de Quevedo-Machain | Verenice Y. Heredia Espinoza | Erika Ibarra | Stephen A. Kowalewski | Martha Lorenza López Mestas Camberos | Michael Mathiowetz | Joseph B. Mountjoy | David Muñiz García | M. Nicolás Caretta | José Luis Punzo Díaz | Diego Rangel | Kimberly Sumano Ortega | Jesús Zarco

The ancient societies of western Mexico have long been understudied and misunderstood. Focusing on recent archaeological data, Ancient West Mexicos highlights the diversity and complexity of the region's pre-Hispanic cultures and argues that western Mexico was more similar to the rest of the Mesoamerican world than many researchers have believed. Chapters that treat investigations in Durango, Colima, Jalisco, Nayarit, Aguascalientes, and Michoacán draw on new evidence dating from across millennia, spanning different periods in the history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. Contributors analyze materials including ceramics, architectural remains, textiles, and weaving tools to discern the settlement patterns, political structures, and cosmologies of the people who lived at these sites.Featuring intriguing case studies that point to unexpected pathways to sociopolitical complexity in these and other ancient societies, these essays illustrate that the region's archaeological record can contribute meaningfully to a more nuanced picture of Mesoamerica as a whole.

Under the Shade of Thipaak is the first book to explore the cultural role of cycads, plants that evolved over 250 million years ago and are now critically endangered, in the ancient and modern Mesoamerican and Caribbean worlds. This volume demonstrates how these ancient plants have figured prominently in regional mythologies, rituals, art, and foodways from the Pleistocene-Holocene transition to the present.Contributors discuss the importance of cycads from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including biology and population genetics, historical ecology, archaeology, art history, linguistics, and conservation and sustainability. Chapters pay special attention to the enduring conceptual relationships between cycads and maize. This book demonstrates how a close examination of cycad-human relationships can motivate conservation of these threatened plants in ways that engage local communities, as well as promote the significance of ancient and modern practices that unite nature and culture.

Society for Ethnobotany Daniel F. Austin Award

The important cultural role of an ancient, endangeredplant

 

Underthe Shade of Thipaakis the first book to explore the cultural role of cycads, plants that evolvedover 250 million years ago and are now critically endangered, in the ancientand modern Mesoamerican and Caribbean worlds. This volume demonstrates howthese ancient plants have figured prominently in regional mythologies, rituals,art, and foodways from the Pleistocene-Holocenetransition to the present.

Contributors discuss the importance of cycadsfrom a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including biology and populationgenetics, historical ecology, archaeology, art history, linguistics, andconservation and sustainability. Chapters pay special attention to the enduringconceptual relationships between cycads and maize. This book demonstrates how aclose examination of cycad-human relationships can motivate conservation of thesethreatened plants in ways that engage local communities, as well as promote thesignificance of ancient and modern practices that unite nature and culture.

Contributors: Francisco Barona-Gómez | Emanuel Bojorquez Quintal | Mark A. Bonta | Edder Daniel Bustos-Díaz | Dánae Cabrera-Toledo | Michael Calonje | Michael D. Carrasco | Angélica Cibrián-Jaramillo | Joshua D. Englehardt | Jorge González-Astorga | Naishla M. Gutiérrez-Arroyo | José Saíd Gutiérrez-Ortega | Thomas Hart | Jaime R. Pagán-Jiménez | Francisco Pérez-Zavala | Luis Rojas Abarca | Esteban Sánchez Rodríguez | Dennis William Stevenson | Amber M. VanDerwarker | Luis R. Velázquez Maldonado | Andrew P. Vovides

This research explores the development of the Maya writing system in Middle–Late Formative and Early Classic period (700 BC–AD 450) Mesoamerica. It seeks to correlate script development with interregional interaction and diachronic changes in material culture, and proposes a new methodological template for examining script development via material remains. In doing so, it contributes to anthropological debate regarding the role and effects of interregional interaction in processes of development and change of material and symbolic culture. This investigation posits that Maya writing developed in late Middle Formative through Early Classic period Mesoamerica as a correlate of interregional sociopolitical and economic interaction. Scholars working in many areas of the world have long claimed that interaction is central to cultural innovation, especially in relation to the development of writing. If the emergence of the Mayan script is a correlate of systemic interaction, then its developmental process should be traceable archaeologically through artifactual evidence. This hypothesis is tested by exploring archaeological indicators of interaction against a backdrop of previously-documented transformations in the emerging Mayan script. The methodological model proposed here builds on current models of the development of Mesoamerican writing systems and models of interregional interaction and cultural development to associate archaeological remains with the development of the Mayan script.