[Aztlan] UT Talk about Maya Belize and Agriculture

[Elaine Day Schele]

Hi Everyone,

Who:  Dr. Joel Wainwright, Ohio State University, Department of Geography
Title:   The Maya Farm System as an Object of Development by Dr. Joel Wainwright.
Date:   Monday 12th at 5:00 pm, Geography Building Room 102.  http://www.utexas.edu/maps/main/buildings/grg.html

I wanted to let you all know about a talk that will be given by a Dr. Joel Wainwright from Ohio State University, Department of Geography who has done extensive fieldwork work in Belize and whose book on Maya agriculture will soon be released (see the description below and its table of contents).  Pass this message along to whoever you think may be interested.

"Decolonizing Development: Colonial Power and the Maya"

Book Description
Postcolonialism and political economy are brought together in this groundbreaking book, which examines development among the Maya of Belize. Decolonizing Development investigates the ways colonialism shaped the modern world by analyzing the relationship between colonialism and development as forms of power. Through close readings of archival texts, maps, and development practices, Joel Wainwright unearths the roots of centuries of struggle over the representation of the Maya and their lands. He traces the shifts in discourses on this pre-Columbian civilization and documents indigenous resistance to the British colonial state.The politics of state-led development projects since the 1950s are explored through three case studies: the works of a soil scientist who served the British colonial state in Belize; two agricultural development projects that intended to settle Maya agriculture by improving mechanized rice production; and a 'counter-mapping' project that offers an indigenous view of the geography of southern Belize.Wainwright demonstrates how development - a stage upon which colonial struggles are replayed - sustains the very power inequalities it aims to resolve. 

Part I: Colonizing the Maya
1 The territorialization of southern Belize 
2 The matter of the Maya farm system 
3 An archaeology of Mayanism 
Part II: Aporias of development 
4 From colonial to development knowledge 
5 Settling: fieldwork in the ruins of development 
6 Finishing the critique of cultural ecology 

Elaine Schele