Ancient American Studies

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Ancient American Studies is the science of the pre-Columbian cultures of the American double continent and its successor societies of the indigenous autochthonous population ( North American Indians and Latin American Indians ) as well as the immigrant Europeans, Africans and Asians. It examines diachronous cultural, social, economic and political processes from the first settlement of the continent to the present.

Ancient American Studies is an interdisciplinary science. It is both an archaeological , philological , ethnological and historical science.

Based on the founders of the subject, including the Mexicanists Eduard Seler and Cäcilie Seler-Sachs in Berlin and Manuel Gamio in Mexico, the high cultures of South , Meso and North America were initially the Aztecs , Chichimecs , Huaxteks , Maya , Mixtecs , Olmecs , Purépecha (Tarasken), Toltecs , Totonaks , Zapotecs and Inca , the main research focus. In the 20th century, two antagonistic currents emerged in ancient American studies : the (dominant) direction of the "isolationists", whose supporters assume an independent cultural development in America since the Stone Age settlement, and the (minority) direction of the " diffusionists ", whose advocates assume intercontinental pre-Columbian contacts by sea - above all between Asia, the South Seas and the New World.

With its multi-method and multi-perspective approach, the academic discipline of Ancient American Studies has proven to be well equipped, especially in the current time, to analyze the diverse social, cultural, economic and political interrelationships of American cultures in the past and present under global conditions. As a result, from 1980 onwards, past and present were increasingly linked in research methods and thematic focuses.

The main scientific languages ​​in American Studies are Spanish , Portuguese and - especially in publications - English .

In Germany, ancient American studies are taught and researched at the University of Bonn under the direction of Nikolai Grube and Karoline Noack . At the Latin American Institute of the Free University of Berlin represented Ingrid Kummels and Stephanie Protect Ancient American Studies in teaching and research. At other universities there is no independent American branch, but the subject is represented by ethnology, for example at the University of Hamburg and the University of Göttingen . Ancient American Studies is classified as a small subject in Germany .

In the Netherlands, ancient American studies (in English) are offered at the University of Leiden , under the direction of Corinne Hofman , Dean of the Faculty of Archeology in Leiden.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cornelia Giesing, " Das vorkolumbische Amerika in circumpazifischer Sicht " (online as PDF file, 4.88 MB), from: Wolfgang Stein (ed.); State Museum for Ethnology - Munich, "COLUMBUS or who discovered America?", Munich (Hirmer Verlag), 1992 (pp. 38–68), ISBN 3-7774-6060-5 .
  2. ↑ Dürr, Eveline / Kummels, Ingrid / Noack, Karoline: Prefacio: Dinámicas de la conformación de espacios identitarios en America Latina. In: Köhler, Romy / Ebert, Anne (eds.): Las agencias de lo indígena en la larga era de globalización. Microperspectivas de su producción y representación desde la época colonial temprana hasta el presente. Estudios Indiana, No. 7 . IAI / Gebr. Mann Verlag, Berlin 2015, p. 31-44 (www.iai.spk-berlin.de/index.php?id=1068#2281).
  3. ↑ see page of the Small Subjects for Ancient American Studies, accessed on April 17, 2019 .
  4. ^ Archeology of the Americas - Leiden University. In: Leiden University. Retrieved January 19, 2017 (American English).

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