Mesoamerican Religions in Distant Lands? The Case of Paquimé, Chihuahua, Mexico.
Lecture brought to you by EPAS & EPMArch: Mesoamerican Religions in Distant Lands? The Case of Paquimé, Chihuahua, Mexico.
By: Michael E. Whalen
Date: April 26ht
Time: 2:00 pm.
Location: Sun Sparkle Exhibit at EPMArch, 4301 Transmountain
Abstract:
The large northwest Mexican community of Paquimé (or Casas Grandes) long has been famous for its frequent use of symbols that diffused from Mesoamerica. These symbols most often are seen on elaborately painted ceramics. They always have been taken as reflections of Mesoamerican religious cults that were imported into the Casas Grandes area and, to a lesser extent, into other parts of the US Southwest. This talk presents an alternative interpretation based on ethnographic and archaeological data from the South Pacific, early Formative Mesoamerica and Early Horizon Peru. Here, “foreign” power symbols served new roles in reinforcing the authority of emerging elites at Paquimé, as they did all over ancient Latin America. They should not be assumed to have retained their original meanings and associated religious cults, however.
Bio:
MICHAEL E. WHALEN received his Ph.D. in Anthropology and Archaeology from the University of Michigan in 1976. He has just retired from the University of Tulsa, where he held the rank of Professor in the Department of Anthropology. His research interests include complex societies, processes of sociocultural evolution, and prehistoric social structure. He began his career in Mesoamerica, where his dissertation excavation was at a Formative period community occupied between ca. 1600 and 500 B.C. Between 1975 and 1986, he conducted large-scale surveys and excavations in the southern deserts of the U.S. Southwest, around El Paso, Texas. This area is only about 200 km from Casas Grandes, and imported Chihuahuan pottery is found on its prehistoric Pueblo period sites. It was while working here that he became interested in Casas Grandes. Since 1989, he has been investigating the Casas Grandes regional system through large-scale surveys and excavations in northwestern Chihuahua. His research has been supported by the National Science Foundation and the National Geographic Society. His publications include books, monographs, and professional papers on Oaxaca, western Texas, and northwestern Chihuahua.
