Rebecca Zarger

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This research forms a distinct part of a multi-year, six-institution project aimed at providing an interdisciplinary approach to understanding long-term human-environment dynamics in the Maya Mountains of Southern Belize. The project incorporates archaeological and ethnographic data, along with data specific to agro-ecological production, production inputs and outputs, labor scheduling, and responses to changing environments to model dynamic human responses to environmental transformation, linking these processes to ancient patterns of settlement, resource exploitation, agricultural intensification, competition, and polity stability. For an overview of the entire collaborative project, go to our National Science Foundation Human Social Dynamics project site (Douglas Kennett, PI):http://mayasim.uoregon.edu/. Below is more information on the ethnographic research and education plan for the project.

 

The ethnographic research for the project seeks to link the past to the present in Maya communities through educational curricula focused on shared heritage as well as to propose a broader conceptualization of “heritage” that links cultural and environmental histories and practices.

A variety of research methodologies are being used throughout the duration of the project including: participant observation, semi-structured and informal interviews with community members, behavioral observation, agricultural productivity tracking, interviews with Maya leaders and interested non-governmental organizations, an ethnobotanical survey of Uxbenka site, structured household surveys and pile sorts.

The types of data being collected include:

a)    histories and perceptions of agricultural production, use, tenure, and change over individual’s lifetimes

b)   histories and perceptions of general landscape change as perceived by individuals

c)    migration histories of village fissioning, movement, and spread across the region over the previous 100+ years, based on ethnographic accounts

d)  migration and landscape change histories derived from secondary sources, photographs, historical documents in the Belize National Archives

e)  current ethnoecological and agro-ecological practices, including agriculture, agroforestry, hunting and fishing, and collection and management of wild food resources

Learning the Past and Valuing the Present

We are developing collaboratively designed education materials, in the form of a curriculum for teachers and a workbook for students, which integrates environmental and cultural heritage, communicating the project findings of archaeological, ethnographic, and climatological data for school children.  Our work is in concert with several local organizations, including the Uchb’enka K’in Ajaw Associaiton (a registered Belizean community-based organization to represent the community of Santa Cruz), Tumul K’in Center for Learning and the Congress of Maya Teachers in Toledo District, Belize.  More information on this aspect of the project, and the work of doctoral student Kristina Baines can be found in additional “Current Research” links to the right.