Book
In the eyes of the ancestors: belief and behavior in a Mayan community
Yale University Press • New Haven, Conn. • Published In 1970 • Pages:
By: Nash, June C..
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
This book describes and analyzes changes taking place in the 1950s and 1960s in the Tzeltal community of Amatenango del Valle (Tzo?ontahal). These changes were in the economy, relationships to the Mexican government and the surrounding Ladino population, political leadership, and religion. Villagers were beginning to break the pattern of Ladino entrepreneurship through their own co-operatives (trucking co-op and co-op store). Political leadership, which had traditionally rested on the principle of age grading, had in some cases been given to young persons on grounds of their ability to write and speak Spanish. Literacy was increasing among the young people. Belief in the overall importance of the ancestors for the well-being of the community had given way to strong skepticism. As a result certain ceremonies had been dropped, and the healing practitioners were no longer considered as benevolent religious agents but were through-out suspected of witchcraft.
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Acculturation and culture contact
- Sociocultural trends
- Production and supply
- cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Tzeltal
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 1995
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- Middle America and the Caribbean
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- Maya Area
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- Book
- Evaluation
- Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Ethnographer
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 5: Excellent Primary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- Sigrid Khera ; John Beierle
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- 1957, 1958, 1965, 1966, 1967 (18 months total)
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- 1950s-1960s
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- municipio of Amatenango del Valle, community of Tzo?ontahal, Chiapas, Mexico
- NotesAdditional notes
- [by] June Nash
- Bibliography: p. 355-362. Includes index
- LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
- 70081425
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Tzeltal Indians