1. Explain the contributions of the Maya to art and civilization, describing at least one Mayan work of art as part of your answer. Please include page number from your book where art piece is found.…
The main arguments being made by the author to reshape our concepts about young children and embrace contemporary children culture in art classroom includes information about children of this new generation being surrounded with many information without knowing the history of the pass generations that are involved with interactions with people, places where knowledge plays a key concepts of awareness.…
The connection between the ritual sacrifice and the ballgame is evident in the Mayan language. According to Stern, the Mayan translation for the word ball, quiq, means sap or blood (35). The sap which flows out of the tree can be seen as the implication of the ritual sacrifice of the ballgame. The notion that the ball, of the ballgame, is round can be symbolized and interpreted as the human head. Which implies that death is important for the completion of the ritual.…
The first similarity between the Aztec and the Maya was their emphasis on time. We find evidence of the emphasis on time in the origin story of the Aztec and Maya. In the Nahua myth where “age is self-destructing based on a cosmic mathematical plan; the Mexica magicians will return to the place of their origin in Aztlan, only to find out about their own future demise” (114, Read & Gonzalez). Meanwhile, the Popol-Vuh tells the story of Hunahpu Posum and Hanahpu Coyote, the Maya twin heroes play the role of day keepers even though they were not born until the following age. In both origin stories, one can observe that time is a factor that occurs in an odd manner, it works in a “linear [matter] but it also doubles back on itself and springs…
Guatemala covers 42,042 sq mi and it has a population of over 17 million. Guatemala City, which is the capital is the city with the largest population. Guatemala has a very mixed ethnicity. Over half of the population is Mestizo and European. The other part of the population has a very diverse ethnicity.…
The Mayan region has many species of animals. But the Mayans only honored 2 amazing animals, the Jaguar and the Quetzel.…
Guatemala was unsuccessful in progressing socially for the indigenous Mayan people after the Guatemalan civil war to a great extent, because of the lack of leadership and social attitude towards the indigenous Mayan people. The indigenous Mayan people were seen as inferior due to them being minorities in society, which caused them to barely possess any right before and after the war. Being the lower class of the Guatemalan society, caused them to yearn for social progress in society, which was something that was not prevalent. The Guatemalan government was not focused or concerned about their education, health, housing, livelihood or social protection.…
The Mayans were an empire that was mostly made of forests and reached from the Yucatan Peninsula in South modern-day Mexico to modern-day Guatemala. The main obstacle for this empire was the forest, which took up most of the possible farmland. Trees got in the way of the sun, and took much of the nutrients and water in the soil. They also took up space that could be used for more crops. To solve this problem, the Mayans used a farming method called slash-and-burn. They cut down the trees, burned them, and the nutrients that the tree had would go in the soil in the form of ashes. One complication of this was the fact that, if someone burns the ground, it will be scorched and dry. This led to the use of sinkholes, or large depressions in the…
Centuries ago, there existed a religion, one with no true name, human sacrifices, games where participants are highly likely to die, and Gods found in almost every aspect of daily life. This was the ancient Mayan religion. Although some beliefs, values, and minor traditions are still upheld by followers today, for the most part this religion has completely vanished along with the ancient mayan civilization. This may be for good reason, as some of the practices were barbarous and bordering on pure insanity. Through the madness, there were three very important aspects of this religion that guided the mayans;…
Think of what you had for breakfast, then lunch, now dinner. What if out of the three meals a day you only had the chance to have two, if that. What if you're still under the age of 13 and you had to take over the role of one parent, maybe both for the day because they work in the fields or cleaning houses to be able to pay rent and buy food. So you're stuck taking care of babies, cooking, and somehow still managing to finish your schoolwork. This is what life in the small community of Lake Worth, Florida is like. Knowing about this motivated me to get more involved and help the Guatemalan community through service.…
Throughout my time spent here in Spain, I have found the cross-cultural similarities and differences of child-rearing practices to be an extremely interesting area of study. Comparatively the families of the American and Spanish societies have quite different methods of raising a child and introducing him or her to this world. What is and what is not socially acceptable is the only differing area when looking at any two cultures side-by-side. Certain things that are considered normal for the Spanish culture are looked at as odd from an American perspective; along with the opposite existing when the Spanish people examine American culture. The things that are taught to children living in Africa compared to those that live in America differ much more widely but still serve the same purpose. The different cultures contribute the exact same thing to each respective society in the long-run, a new productive member of each society.…
The Mayans were a group of individuals deeply involved with their religious beliefs, which expresses the taboo nature of their civilization. They did not act in accordance with present day societal norms and had numerous unique aspects within their society. Socially, they were dependent on social classes that separated the kings/queens, nobles, priests, merchants, peasants, and slaves from one another. Their ritual practices make this division apparent since the priests and kings were typically given sole power to operate at the head of religious affairs. The slaves and lower subjects were often used as means of sacrificial offerings, which depicts their low stature in the Mayan society. Politically, they were strongly involved just as they…
Classic Maya culture developed in three regions in Mesoamerica, especially the central region" of southern Guatemala. The principal city in this region was Tikal, but the spread of urbanization extended south to Honduras; the southernmost Mayan city was Copan in northern Honduras. The largest and most complete urban center was Palenque. The other major region of Mayan development was the Yucatan peninsula making up the southern and eastern portions of modern-day Mexico. After the abandonment of the Classic Mayan cities, the Yucatán peninsula became the principal region of a new, synthetic culture called Toltec-Mayan which was formed when Toltecs migrating from the north integrated with indigenous Maya peoples.…
The Maya of Mesoamerica, along with the Aztecs of Mexico and the Incas of Peru, made up the high civilizations of the American Indians at the time of the Spanish conquest. Both the Aztecs and the Incas were late civilizations, between 1300-1533 AD, but the Maya of the Yucatan and Guatemala exhibited a cultural continuity spanning more than 2,000 years, 1000 BC-AD 1542. Many aspects of this culture continue yet today. The Ancient Maya in their time had actually refined writing.…
The Mayan creation story is known as the ‘Popol Vuh’. The word ‘Popol Vuh’ itself means ‘Council Book’, and is the most important sacred book in the Maya religion. The creation belief itself is that at the beginning of the world there were only the two creator gods: Gucumatz and Tepeu. These gods decided to create earth out of the primordial sea. Once the earth was created, the gods populated it with animals, but they soon realized that animals were unable to speak and therefore could not worship them. For this reason the gods created humans and had the animal's role relegated to food for humans. This generation of humans was made out of mud, and so were weak and were soon destroyed.As a third attempt, the gods created men from wood and women from rushes. These men populated the world and procreated, but they soon forgot their gods and were punished with a flood. The few who survived were transformed into monkeys. Finally, the gods decided to mold mankind from maize. This generation, which includes the present human race, is able to worship and nourish the gods.…