Time and the Highland Maya

Rating:
Summary: Useful Material for both the Archeologist and Anthropologist
Review: Professor Tedlock has presented us with what may be the definitive book on Maya timekeeping, at least as it is practiced today - and can we really tell exactly how it was practiced at any other time?

This is first and foremost a work of anthrpology, a fact which Professor Tedlock is very clear about from the start. Having said that, she states that in her viewpoint, cultural anthropologists cannot really take a "neutral" stand with regard to the material they are studying; she cites the example of the students of musicology and linguistics, whose expertise is measured in terms of their virtuosity or fluency in the medium they are studying. That being the case, can an anthropologist really provide a valid description of Mayan timekeeping unless he or she is actually willing to undergo the training of a timekeeper?

For the reader's information, a "timekeeper" is an individual who has been trained in the system of the Mayan calendar, understands the meaning of the days and can make predictions regarding whether certain actions are favorable or not at certain times. One may dismiss it as a form of astrology. Nevertheless, timekeeping was undeniably an important, even central, activity of the ancient Maya, and much of their history is unintelligible without reference to it. The value of Professor Tedlock's work, and of this book in particular, is found in the material that she can present to Mayan archeologists and epigraphers to help them understand their source material.

Professor Tedlock explains the process by which timekeepers were selected in the traditional Maya world, and the training and rituals which they must undergo. She also explains the meanings, in general, of the day names in the traditional divination calendar. Most interesting is her insistence, based on what her teachers told her, that the day names in and of themselves mean almost nothing - maybe at most, the same as the year names mean in the Chinese calendar. I can think of grandiose theories expressed in several books on the subject by Mayanists that will be deflated by that revelation.

This is not a work of murky mysticism, and the New Age cultivator of Mayan lore should be advised to stay away. I found the book to be an excellent supplement to mainstream work by Mayanists, providing a different perspective on the same data. If the overall field of Mayan studies interests you I think that you will agree with me.

Rating:
Summary: A Mayan Shamanic Apprentice
Review: This ethnography was written by a woman professor who undertook an apprenticeship among the Maya during the 1970s. It shows in that it has the type of detailed information that only a person who had entered into this system and had learned it from the inside out would know. The material on Maya astronomy is totally new and very important! The information on priest-shamans and shaman-priests I found particularly useful in understanding the debates about shamans, shamanhood, priests, and priesthood. I also recommend her husband's Mayan publications: the prize-winning Popol Vuh, Breath on the Mirror, Days from a Dream Almanac, and his newest book, the just released Rabinal Achi.