It seems strange to me that so many eminent scholars insist that the Mayan culture should be identical to the Euro-American, science-based, linear one to be valid. Maya is a very old culture, much battered in the last centuries, but its world view is quite different from the one in which most of us were raised. What is your family? Blood relatives? Siblings and parents? Or the community? Your linguistic "relatives?" Is time always linear, or does it move in multiple ways? Ask Einstein, inter alia. It seems to me we are cheating our students if they only have linear, factually proved things to read. By the way, does factually proved mean recorded in the newspaper? Students need to see things that are different, world views that are radically different from theirs. If they never see anything outside their own narrow culture, where we are far surer of "fact" than ever we should be, they will have no perspective, no judgment and little learning. Ask them to find the "truth" in such a book, not just the historical narrative. That should keep them hopping for a while.
JOIN THE DEBATE Be sure to include your name and affiliation. Legitimate requests for anonymity will be honored. Submissions may be condensed or edited for clarity.
| ||||||||
previous response
Copyright © 1999 by The Chronicle of Higher Education