Layers in South American History part I: Thoughts from a comparative scholar

PATREON:   / austinhoward  

Blog post: https://cognitiveanthropology.wordpre...

Who can deny the aesthetic charm of Europe? However, who can deny the feeling that everything is known and in reach and that those dedicating their lives to the study of the history and the living cultures of Europe are somehow rehearsing and rehashing the same old stories? 

And who, I continue, can also deny what has been deemed the WEIRD (Western Educated Industrialised Rich and Democratic) bias in science and in the media? There is a simultaneous depth and superficiality to it all. We live surrounded by the past in Europe, those who live or have lived there - and those who travel there to see it.

Life is easy, on the whole, for many inhabitants. History is accessible with monuments and edifices erected in, from and about the ‘glorious’ past of the ‘old continent’ And yet, in many ways compared to the United States, for instance, which lacks the sheer number and the time depth of the tokens of ‘days gone by,’ in comparison Europe is 'modern’ in other respects. To use the logic of the United States' Empire, Europe would actually be the ‘First World’s’ First World. This is especially true of certain parts of Northern, Western and Central Europe. At any rate, at least as much so is Japan which also mixes the modern, the seemingly ‘futuristic’ at times (proving the ‘the future is now’) - mixing this with the emblematic past much more so than the Koreas, ravaged as they were by the neo-colonial Korean War.

What is the pattern that presents itself to us in, say, South America? Do the layers line up - either of the Japanese or European models, or do they fit more closely with that of the United States or yet another model not discussed here? This is something which is hard to say. Perhaps this is all the more reason it may be worth trying.

Intellectual property of Austin Howard.

Austin is pursuing a doctorate in linguistics. He specialises in the intersection of cognitive science, anthropology and language sciences, using fieldwork to elucidate the interaction of culture and cognition. He is an ardent fan of poetry, theatre and language-learning. Puns and all forms of humour keep his mind sharp and his spirits high. Austin is an avid collector and taster of teas and other infusions. His masters and internships were completed in the Netherlands (MA from Radboud University Nijmegen and subsequent research assistantship at Leiden University) and Austria (Austrian Academy of Sciences). His recent work has taken him from the edges of Anatolia to the rainforests of the Amazon.

This is research I (Austin Howard) carried out, graciously supported by the Whitten Research Fund 2023-2024: https://salsa-tipiti.org/news/austin-...
Thanks to SALSA-tipiti!

For layers still being uncovered, see this PBS documentary,
Ancient Builders of the Amazon | Full Documentary | NOVA | PBS:
   • Ancient Builders of the Amazon | Full Docu...  

#history #anthropology #indigenas #linguistics #aesthetics #culturalheritage

Listeners/viewers may also enjoy the work of Daniel Everett on the Pirahã. On my podcast, both Nick Emlen and Janis Nuckolls have discussed Quechua and Kichwa, respectively from Perú and Ecuador, both part of the larger Quechuan family, spread both before and after the rise of the Inca in the Andes, and now being spoken along the Andes but also into Amazonia.