Society for Ethnobotany Daniel F. Austin Award
The important cultural role of an ancient, endangered
plant
Under
the Shade of Thipaak
is the first book to explore the cultural role of cycads, plants that evolved
over 250 million years ago and are now critically endangered, in the ancient
and modern Mesoamerican and Caribbean worlds. This volume demonstrates how
these ancient plants have figured prominently in regional mythologies, rituals,
art, and foodways from the Pleistocene-Holocene
transition to the present.
Contributors discuss the importance of cycads
from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including biology and population
genetics, historical ecology, archaeology, art history, linguistics, and
conservation and sustainability. Chapters pay special attention to the enduring
conceptual relationships between cycads and maize. This book demonstrates how a
close examination of cycad-human relationships can motivate conservation of these
threatened plants in ways that engage local communities, as well as promote the
significance of ancient and modern practices that unite nature and culture.
Contributors: Francisco Barona-Gómez | Emanuel Bojorquez Quintal | Mark A. Bonta | Edder Daniel Bustos-Díaz | Dánae Cabrera-Toledo | Michael Calonje | Michael D. Carrasco | Angélica Cibrián-Jaramillo | Joshua D. Englehardt | Jorge González-Astorga | Naishla M. Gutiérrez-Arroyo | José Saíd Gutiérrez-Ortega | Thomas Hart | Jaime R. Pagán-Jiménez | Francisco Pérez-Zavala | Luis Rojas Abarca | Esteban Sánchez Rodríguez | Dennis William Stevenson | Amber M. VanDerwarker | Luis R. Velázquez Maldonado | Andrew P. Vovides
