Landscape with Bees: Beekeeping at Hacienda San Pedro Cholul, Yucatán, Mexico

Álvarez, Héctor Hernández; Zimmermann, Mario; Alexander, R.

doi:10.1007/s10761-022-00679-y

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 27 publications

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“…Projects based in communities and at universities such as the Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán (UADY) are modeling alternative archaeological approaches that involve the study of the people who lived and worked at haciendas , engagement with contemporary communities about the meanings surrounding heritage, and training local archaeologists (Hernández Álvarez and Zimmermann, 2016; Zimmermann et al., 2020). Rescue excavations conducted as part of public works projects have also increased knowledge about Colonial‐period realities in Yucatán, especially in urban contexts (e.g., Burgos Villanueva, 1995; Burgos Villanueva, Palomo Carrillo, and Dzul Góngora, 2010).…”

Section: Disciplinary Reckoningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tracing the structural consequences of colonialism in rural Yucatán, Mexico

Dedrick

McAnany

Alpuche

2023

American Anthropologist

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Archaeologists from the United States working in what is referred to as the Maya area have paid insufficient attention to the structural violence of colonial rule and how their own narratives may perpetuate it. This article addresses the pervasive effects of colonial violence on farming communities in Yucatán, Mexico, which resulted in the undercutting of sustainable livelihoods and the imposition of hierarchies leading to systemic racism. The interpretation of archaeological and historical evidence can reveal the challenges that colonialism and its consequences posed for Indigenous peoples in their daily lives and also distinguish tactics that they used to achieve well-being. Following an account of colonial policies and their outcomes, we demonstrate how closely linked archaeological practice has been with colonial and imperial interests in Yucatán and suggest how archaeologists can reckon with the violence of colonialism and its resonances in archaeology today.

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Section: Disciplinary Reckoningmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tracing the structural consequences of colonialism in rural Yucatán, Mexico

Dedrick

McAnany

Alpuche

2023

American Anthropologist

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Beekeeping from the South

Márquez-Osuna

2024

Agricultural History

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This article examines the role of the stingless bee Melipona beecheii in beekeeping practices in the Yucatán Peninsula, México, in the nineteenth century. Native to Yucatán, the Melipona bee is capable of producing large amounts of honey and has been bred by Maya communities for over three thousand years. In the twentieth century, the Melipona population declined with the implementation of modern apiculture, a system designed to maximize the production of honey and wax with the European native honeybee, Apis mellifera. Previous scholarship on beekeeping has labeled the development of modern apiculture and the systematic expansion of the European honeybee across the Americas as a success story. However, these studies do not consider the cultural, economic, and social transformations brought by the introduction of Apis mellifera in environments that were already rich in bee biodiversity. In order to provide some clues about the impact of—and responses to—modern apiculture, this article focuses on the moment before this process occurred in the Yucatán Peninsula, when Melipona was still environmentally, culturally, and economically significant. The author argues that, far from being an unchanging cultural practice doomed to be superseded by modern apiculture, Melipona beekeeping continued to adapt in sophisticated ways to a modernizing world. During a period of upheaval, extraction of natural resources, environmental exploitation, violence, and Indigenous peoples’ defense of their land, the Melipona continued to be the only domesticated bee species used for beeswax and honey extraction in the entire peninsula during the nineteenth century.

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Landscape with Bees: Beekeeping at Hacienda San Pedro Cholul, Yucatán, Mexico

Cited by 2 publications

References 27 publications

Tracing the structural consequences of colonialism in rural Yucatán, Mexico

Tracing the structural consequences of colonialism in rural Yucatán, Mexico

Beekeeping from the South

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