Here are 10 tell-tale signs that expose unknowledgeable KS2 History resources about the Maya
I thought this was really good, so I wanted to share. Some of the images were missing, so I did my best to substitute based on the description.
Since the ancient Maya have been added to the Key Stage 2 national curriculum for History (non-European Study), thereās been a āmushroomingā of online resources covering the topic. Most of which are downright awful!
After the recent flawed news story about a teenager finding a Maya site, I thought it an apt moment to let both teachers who are teaching the Maya as well as the general public know what they need to be looking out for to confirm a resourceās unreliability
Beware!
Here are 10 tell-tale signs that expose unknowledgeable sources
1. The term āMayanā is used instead of āMayaā
The term āMayanā is ubiquitously used by ill-informed sources: āMayan peopleā, āMayan pyramidsā, āMayan civilisationāā¦
All Maya specialists -and, for that matter, all non-specialists whoāve read a book or two on the ancient Maya- know that the right word is Maya.
Their calendar is called the āMaya calendarā, their civilisation is called the āMaya civilisationā, their art is called āMaya artāā¦
The only time you should use the adjective āMayanā is when you are talking about their languages, the āMayan languagesā.
So, if you see āMayan peopleā, āMayan pyramids, āMayan artā, āMayan civilisationā, etc, on a publication (website or magazine), you can be sure the person who wrote the article doesnāt know a thing about the ancient Maya.
2. The image of the Aztec calendar stone is presented as the Maya calendar
Unscrupulous sources will use the āSun Stoneā to illustrate texts about the Maya calendar.
Unfortunately, the famous sculpture is Aztec. Not Maya.
Using the āSun Stoneā to talk about Maya calendar system is like using photos of theElizabeth Tower at Westminster (AKA āBig Benā), which was completed in 1859, to illustrate time keeping in ancient Rome!
And yes I have even seen this image adorning the front cover of books on the Maya! Beware! Which leads nicely onto point 3-
3. The Maya are identified as the Aztecs
This confusion is very common but the truth is the Aztecs were very different to theĀ Maya. They spoke a different language and had a different writing system.
Also the Maya civilisation began at least 1500 before the Aztecs.
The Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan is as far away from the great Maya site of Tikal as London is from Milan, Italy!
Stating the Maya were the same as the Aztecs, is basically saying that all Europeans are the same, having the same language, culture and beliefsā¦
Would you like to see an image of Stonehenge on the front cover of a book on the French? I think not!
Then we get the Egyptiansā¦.
4. Maya pyramids are said to be similar to Egyptian pyramids
I am afraid not!
Firstly, the ancient Maya and ancient Egyptians lived during different time periods. The time of pyramid building in Egypt was around 2000 years earlier than the earliest Maya pyramid.
Secondly, Egyptian pyramids have a different shape and use to those of the Maya.
Maya pyramids are not actually pyramidal! They have a polygonal base, but their four faces do not meet at a common point like Egyptian pyramids. Maya pyramids were flat and often had a small room built on top.
Pyramids in Egypt were used as tombs for the dead rulers, for the Maya, though the pyramids were mainly used for ceremonies carried out on top and watched from below.
Lastly, they were built differently. Maya pyramids were built in layers; each generation would build a bigger structure over the previous one. Egyptian pyramids, on the other hand, were designed and built as a single edifice.
5. It is claimed that the Maya mysteriously disappeared in the 10th century AD
Uninformed sources talk about the āmysteriousā disappearance of the ancient Maya around the 10th century AD., which mislead people to think that the Maya disappeared foreverā¦.
Firstly, the Maya did not disappear. Around 8 million Maya are still living today in various countries of Central America (Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador and Honduras); in fact half of the population of Guatemala is Maya.
Although they do not build pyramids like the ancient Maya did, modern Maya still wear similar dress, follow similar rituals and some use the ancient Maya calendar. I am sure they would all like to assure you that they have definitely not disappeared!
We know now that what is called āClassic Maya Collapseā Ā was actually a slow breakdown, followed by a reconstruction, of a number of political, economical and cultural structures in the Maya society.
Archaeologists see cities being abandoned over the course of the 9th, 10th and 11th centuries, and people travelling north into the Yucatan Peninsula (Mexico) building new great cities such as Mayapan, which was occupied up until the 15th century.
Secondly, there was nothing mysterious about it! A number of associated factors were at play.
There was a severe drought in the rainforest area that lasted decades, so people moved north where water sources were more easily available. The competition between waring factions and cities for natural resources led to increased warfare. Which, in turn, led to the breakdown of trade networks.
All this was likely exacerbated by political and economical changes in Central Mexico.
So, very much like the French did not disappear after the French Revolution -although they stopped building castles and some big political, economical and cultural changes occurred in the French society- the Maya did not mysteriously disappear around the 10th century.
6. The Maya are portrayed as blood-thirsty sacrifice-loving psychos
The Maya are often portrayed in the media and popular culture as blood-thirsty (see for example Mel Gibsonās 2006 Apocalypto), so the commonly accepted -and oft-repeated- idea is that the Maya carried out lots of sacrifices.
Actually, there is barely any trace of sacrifice in the archaeological record of the Maya area. The rare evidence comes from pictorial representations on ceramics and sculpture.
Warfare amongst the Maya was actually much less bloody than ours and no, they did not use a real skull as a ball in their ballgame! And no the loser was not put to death!
In warfare, they did capture and kill opponents, but it was on a small-scale. Rulers boasted of being āHe of five captivesā or āHe of the three captivesā.
The heart sacrifices that were recorded by the Spanish chroniclers were those of the Aztecs.
It is also important to keep in mind that the Spanish Conquistadors had lots of incentives to describe the indigenous people of the Americas as blood-thirsty savages.
It made conquest and enslavement easier to justify (see the Valladolid Debate) so lots of stories were exaggerated.
And who are we to judge when we used to have public spectacles of people being hanged or having their heads chopped off and placed on spikes on London Bridge!
7. The ancient Maya predicted that the world would end on 21 December 2012
The 2012 phenomenon was a range of beliefs that cataclysmic events would trigger then end of our world on December 21st.
This date was regarded as the end-date of a 5,126-year-long cycle in the Maya Long Count calendar and it was said that the ancient Maya had prophesied the event.
This is not true and all Maya people today and Maya specialists know this!
Very much like a century and a millennium ended in the Christian calendar on December 31st 1999, a great cycle of the Maya Long Count -the 13th bāakātunā was to end on 21 December 2012.
In Maya time-keeping, a bāakātun is a period of roughly 5,125 years.
Only two Maya monuments āTortuguero Monument 6 and La Corona Hieroglyphic Stairway 12ā mention the end of the 13th bāakātun. None of them contains any speculation or prophecy as to what would happen at that time.
While the end of the 13th bāakātun would perhaps be a cause for celebration, the next day the Maya believed that a new cycle -the 14th bāakātun- would begin; much like our New Yearās Eve.
In fact, in the temple of Inscriptions at Palenque, where we find the tomb of King Pakal, it was written that in AD 4772 the people would be celebrating the anniversary of the coronation of their new King Pakal!
8. The Maya are described as primitive people
The Maya created an incredible civilization in the rainforest where it is extremely humid, with lots of bugs and dangerous animals and little water.
There they built spectacular temples, pyramids and palaces without the use of metal tools, the wheel, or any pack animals, such as the donkey, ox or elephant.
The Maya were the only civilization in the whole of the Americas to develop a complete writing system like ours.
They were only one of two cultures in the world to develop the zero in their number system and so were able to make advanced calculations and became great astronomers.
The Maya were extremely advanced in painting and making sculptures, they played the earliest team sport in the world and most importantly, for me anyway, is that we have the ancient Maya to thank for chocolate!
So no, they were definitely not primitive!
The problem with this view of the ancient Maya is that their achievements are then explained by the help of Extra-terrestrial beings or other civilisations.
9. The great achievements of the Maya are in thanks to the Olmecs
The Olmec civilisation is an earlier culture located along the Gulf coast of Mexico.
This myth of the Olmecs being a āmother cultureā to the Maya and other cultures in Mesoamerica had been questioned over 20 years ago and has been long put to rest.
Excavations have shown that they were many other cultures, other than the Olmec living in Mesoamerica before the Maya and that rather than a āmother cultureā we should be looking at āsister culturesā all influencing each other.
Furthermore, Maya achievements in hieroglyphic writing and calendrics which no other culture in Mesoamerica had seen or used, indicate that they were much more innovators than adopters.
So, if the resource mentions the above, then it is obvious that they are not specialists and are using redundant information written over 20 years ago.
10. Chichen Itza is used as the quintessential Maya site
Chichen Itza was inhabited quite late during the Maya time period, about 1400 years after the first Maya city and is not purely Maya.
The city was quite cosmopolitan and was greatly influenced by Central Mexico, particularly the Toltecs, who may have lived there.
Therefore, its architecture and art -such as the āchacmoolsā or the ātzompantliā (AKA āskull-racksā) actually are Central Mexican, and not Maya, features.
A much better example of a typical Maya city would be Tikal, which was occupied for more than 1500 years.
So, if all you see on a website is about Chichen Itza, chances are this is not a reliable source of information about the ancient Maya and your ācharlatan alarm-bellsā should go off!
male socialization is refusing to admit youāre losing an argument even when every one of your āpointsā is being thoroughly shut down, female socialization is recognizing youāre wrong about minor things during the argument but knowing that if you verbally concede any point the man will take that as āconfirmationā of his overall Rightness. men walk away from debates feeling good about their performance despite how the debate actually went, women walk away feeling like it would have been more productive to talk to a tree
āāHurl yourself at goals above your head and bear the lacerations that come when you slip and make a fool of yourself. Try always, as long as you have breath in your body, to take the hard wayāand work, work, work to build yourself into a rich, continually evolving entity.āā
Ella Dawson has genital herpes, and she wants to tell you about it.Ā
Sheās not speaking up for the shock value ā sheās telling you because she wants all of us to be able to talk about STIs without shame or stigma. When we make it okay to talk about, she says, people are more likely to get tested and less likely to be afraid to share their status.Ā
In her badass talk at TEDxConnecticut College, Ella tells the story of her diagnosis, how she overcame feeling like āhuman trash,ā and why we need to end the stigma ā now. Itās packed with information (and a shot of humor), and if you didnāt already agree with her, you will by the time sheās done.
Watch the full talk or read the transcript here.
(Full disclosure: Ella is TEDās social media manager. This post was written by her boss who is so incredibly proud of how fearlessly she speaks out.)
OK What the fuck is wrong with this bitch. Getting herpes is most definitely a reflection on a bad decision!!! There is something in this world called condoms!! Oh yeah and they are free at Planned Parenthood so you canāt even use the fucking excuse that they are expensive or your broke so you couldnāt buy any.. Seriously what the fuck
I am not saying you have to make it a big deal that you have herpes and have to tell the fucking world but you need/should tell your sexual partner..
Hi! Thatās me. Iām that bitch. Nothing wrong with me except for an anxiety disorder and a runny nose today.
Hereās a fun fact you should probably know: condoms do not prevent the transmission of herpes. Thatās because herpes is transmitted through skin contact, not fluids, and a condom does not cover all of the areas where genital herpes can express itself. Herpes is also often transmitted through oral sex, which most people do not use protection for. Using condoms and dental dams can greatly reduce your risk of getting herpes, but telling people to just use condoms is quite useless advice. I should knowāI was a Planned Parenthood volunteer who used condoms religiously when I contracted genital herpes.
Many people do not tell their partners that they have herpes because they do not know they have herpes in the first place. Thatās because many people can carry the virus without showing symptoms, and herpes is not tested for in most standard STI tests. But most people have herpesāin fact, according to the World Health Organization, 2 in 3 people in the world have HSV-1, which is the strain of herpes that I have. In all likelihood, you have herpes too. You may have even contracted it from a family member who kissed you on the mouth when you were little.Ā
I tell all of my partners that I have genital herpes before we have sex because I think they have the right to decide what they want to do with their bodies. I consider it part of obtaining informed consent. My partner who transmitted herpes to me did not give me the option to decide whether or not I wanted to take the risk of contracting the virus, and I think that was probably because he did not know he had the virus. I harbor no ill will towards him for transmitting to me. If heād disclosed his status to me, I would have fucked him anyway.
Considering the fact that you know that condoms are available for free at Planned Parenthoodāand that your tumblr is full of porn GIFs, no judgment!āI hope that you have been tested recently for herpes as well. It requires a blood draw, so if youāve been peeing in a cup for your STI testing, you donāt know your herpes status. If you test positive for herpes, which you probably will, statistically speaking, Iāve written this guide on what to do after youāve been diagnosed. I hope you will find it helpful!
Thank you for watching my TEDx talk, which you absolutely made sure to do before calling me a bitch, and have a wonderful evening!
i love this so much. wendat is a mixed haudenosaunee person (iām wendat) and the illustration of her looks like me. this just made my heart light up š
tbh the worst thing about being a self aware mentally ill person is that people assume that because you understand your illness youāre automatically able to actually apply your knowledge to your life and cure yourself
I find it fascinating that people who choose not to have children are generally assumed to feel really strongly about not having children (or even to feel really strongly against children, anyoneās children, in general). I am probably not going to have children, not because I REALLY REALLY HATE the idea of having children, but because I donāt really really love it. Out of all the major decisions I will make in my life, this one is the only irreversible one. I can sell a house, quit a job, divorce a spouse, whatever. I cannot unhave a child. I cannot opt out of being a parent once I become a parent. I canāt even take a step back for the sake of self-care or whatever, or else my child will suffer.
So for me, having children is fuck yes or not at all. The default will be to remain childfree. Having children should be an opt-in decision, not an opt-out one. Until/unless I develop really strong feelings about wanting to have children, I wonāt have them, even if that means I never end up having them at all.
janainaart
annaxmalina
baratheonpilled
kianamaiart
blakekathryn
snowghoul
