Popol Vuh

The Popol Vuh is considered the most important piece of Mayan literature to have survived the conquest, as it offers important details about Mayan culture, their cosmogony, and religion. Scholars have addressed the influence of the Christian Bible in this canon, especially what refers to the description of the creation (Tedlock 2013, Recinos et al 1950). The story of the creation of lands, rivers and skies is often compared to the book of Genesis (Recinos et al 8, Tedlock 62). The book, however, is full of Indigenous flavors, details, and bears outstanding knowledge relevant to Mayan culture; for example, the different attempts made by the gods in order to create animals and human beings who would worship them and, the humiliation and punishment given to beings who were unable to recognize and adore their creators (Recinos 84-94). The Popol Vuh describes the gods’ experimentation process with human work (Tedlock 68) and admits that the creator gods are also able to make mistakes as modelers.

Mayan sense of resistance is evident from the very moment of the creation. The world was in darkness after a flood and the story goes on to explain how the twins, Hunahpú and Xbalanqué’s (different spellings are used), battle with the Lord of Xibalbá (Tedlock 43) for the light of the moon and the sun. After defeating the Lords of the underworld, the twins rise as the moon and the sun (Tedlock 287). Maya K’iche’ people see the moon as the nocturnal equivalent of the sun, and together they make a full day cycle. Finally, when there is sun and light, the gods are able to mold the perfect human out of maize which explains the important relationship Mayan people profess for this seed and their traditional territories (Recinos 167). Once the world had been created and silence and darkness had been undone, words, la palabra, were created to narrate the Book of Council, Popol Vuh.

Chilam Balam

Another outstanding piece of Indigenous literature for Mayan peoples is, indeed, the Chilam Balam of Chumayel (Roys 1950). This document describes the creation of the twenty-day calendar, even before the creation of the world (Leon Portilla 233), then the creation of everything around us is detailed day by day, the Chilam Balam states:

the uninal,

 twenty-day cycle,

was created,

the day, as it was called,

was created,

heaven and earth were created,

the stairway of water,

the earth, rocks, and trees;

the things of the sea

and the things of the land

were created (Leon Portilla 234).

In the Chilam Balam, in comparison with the Popol Vuh, humans were molded out of mud. On day thirteen “On 13-Akbal he [the creator] took water and watered the ground, then he shaped it and it became man” (Leon Portilla 235). The idea of circularity in the Mayan world is constant, it symbolizes the union of the beginning with the end, translated as cyclicity of time. This belief explains that, according to the Mayans, things happen because they are destined that way. As stated in the Chilam Balam “Every day is set in order according to the count, beginning in the east, as it is arranged…” (Leon Portilla 236).

The last piece of literature I would like to include in this chapter is Los Cantares de Dzitbalche translated and annotated by the anthologist, linguist, and Mayanist, Alfredo Barrera Vasquez, a Yucatan native scholar known for his extensive work in Mayan culture and his contributions to promote literacy among Mayan peoples (Marin 2013).

Los Cantares de Dzitbalché constitutes the publication of an important first-hand Mayan source that registers both its pre-colonial roots and the modification Mayan thought underwent as a result of the Spanish conquest. The songs included in this work are not easy to interpret due to the cryptic language in which they are written. They require a broad knowledge of the culture and religion of the pre-colonial Mayans, since the songs do not explicitly address the sacred world, although it is embedded within the language. The introduction and cultural comments offered by Barrera Vasquez are essential to achieve a more approximate understanding of the Indigenous knowledge included in the songs (Vasquez 1965).

The translation of the songs involved knowing the ancient religious corpus exercised by pre-Hispanic cultures, the changes it suffered as a result of the contact between original groups and Europeans colonizers. This process involved the juxtaposition of elements of Christianity and native traditions, resulting in a new syncretized religion, which shows the way in which the Mayans, from the colonization period, modified their way of perceiving and explaining the world. Thus, the knowledge and analysis of Los Cantares de Dzitbalché unravels the complexity of the symbolism that makes up the songs to make them accessible to the reader, even if they are not a specialist in Mayan culture.

In the pursuit of language and cultural reclamation, Briceño Chel and other Mayan linguists and activists such as Pedro Uc Be, Feliciano Sanchez Chan, and Briceida Cuevas Cob, among others, utilize some of the most influential Mayan documents and oral traditions in their works. I have tried to follow their example in my personal teaching practice; for example, while seeking to introduce students to different forms of Indigenous literatures, including poetry and oral traditions, I created a class in 2020 entitled “Indigenous Voices in Mexican Literature.” This class was inspired by Indigenous literary traditions often ignored by Western ideologies. I included, for example, The Popol Vuh –The Sacred book of the Maya, parts of the Chilam Balan of Chumayel, and Los Cantares of Dzitbalché. Additionally, to prove that Mayan people were not all exterminated during colonial times and that their languages were never fully erased due to colonization and christianization, I turn to important Mayan activists and human rights defenders. For example, to talk about the sufferings endured by the Maya K’iche’ and Maya Ixil communities, I quote the voices of Nobel Peace Prize winner, Rigoberta Menchú Tum, journalist and anthropologist Irma Alicia Velasquez Nimatuj, and human rights activist Andrea Ixchíu. To talk about language reclamation, I cite the efforts of my good friend and colleague Fidencio Briceño Chel whose work has had outstanding results for Mayan communities in the Peninsula of Yucatan, especially for young children who learn to appreciate the importance of their territory and language through Fidencio’s workshops. Many Mayan people have taken advantage from Fidencio’s workshops, including Mayan rapper Pat Boy who raps entirely in Maya, and who is featured this year in the Marvel film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (Morse 2022). Equally important, to talk about land dispossession and the relationship between Indigenous peoples and their ancestral territories, I turn to the words of my teacher and colleague Pedro Uc Be.

In Terms of Language Reclamation

It must be noted that, as a result of government policies implemented since colonial times, the language of minority, or rather, the language of minoritized groups, has been undermined because since then Spanish, Europeans, and other Mexicans have sought linguistic homogenization.

In terms of learning the language, the Writing Standards for the Mayan Language (U nu’ukbesajil i ts’íibta’al maayat’aan) seeks to strengthen the initiatives and decisions of Indigenous peoples to enrich their languages, knowledge, and all the elements that constitute their culture and identity. The writing standards of the national Indigenous languages facilitate the generation of knowledge, recognition, and appreciation of the linguistic diversity in Mexico, as well as the dissemination and revitalization of national Indigenous languages. This important manual to Mayan writing standards was published in 2014 by INALI (National Institute of Indigenous Languages) and was coordinated by Fidencio Briceño Chel and Geronimo Ricardo Can Tec (Briceño Chel, Can Tec 2014)

The book offers information about the use of vowels and consonants, one of the most important aspects to Mayan language. The use of vowels and their variations are shown in the table below:

The Writing Standards go deep into explaining the composition of morphemes, words, nouns, verbs, adjectives, pluralization, questions, and locatives among the most important grammar rules to Mayan language (Briceño Chel, Can Tec 2014). This is an introduction to grammar structures and offers a better understanding of the structure of the required elements in a Mayan sentence as well as the elements needed to differentiate time, noun, and the type of verbs (transitive or intransitive) in each sentence.

Many scholars such as Lyle Campbell, Yuri Knorosov, Terrance Kaufman, and Nora C. England have done outstanding work to document Mayan linguistics. While briefly recognizing their significance in Mayan language, my intention is not to diminish their importance within Mesoamerican languages but to shed light onto what every day native Mayan people, linguists, poets, and activists do to strengthen their languages, cultures, communities, and territories in spite of the limited resources provided by their local governments and the never-ending cultural and linguistic discrimination encouraged by language ideologies. It is also worth noting that foreign researchers tend to prefer Western methodologies that do not always reflect the Indigenous reality. Talking about Mayan languages, many other topics must be studied alongside language, for example, numerology, mystery, transcendence, and the metaphysical plane.

In terms of learning Indigenous languages, it becomes essential to recognize their descriptive nature and their close ties with the natural world, including local animals and plants (Battiste 499). I recognize that Indigenous culture is, indeed, a way of communicating (Hall 93-8). Scholars document that Indigenous language would not exist without culture (Jian 328-34, Nida 29-33). Languages reflect communities’ cultural components; they carry important information about a speaker’s background, both historical and cultural. For Indigenous peoples worldwide, language is a place of resistance, as it speaks to their struggles in a monolingual dominant society.

Regarding a deeper understanding of Mayan worldview, it is worth mentioning the Madrid, Paris, Grolier, and Dresen codices. This collection of essays contains outstanding information related to Mayans’ relationship with the natural world as well as the celestial sphere (Aveni 1992). The civilization’s deep knowledge of mathematics, architecture, numbers, and astrology becomes evident in the pages of such codices.

Finally, because we cannot separate culture from language, I believe it is important to mention the efforts made jointly between academia, the not-for-profit sector, and community members to offer language instruction and create cultural sensitivity. When visiting Indigenous communities, it is crucial to orientate outsiders regarding the importance of following protocols put in place by Indigenous communities as a way to create a relationship of respect to their ways of knowing and reciprocity. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, for example, has a longstanding relationship with Dr. Fidencio Briceño Chel. Together, every summer, they run the Yucatec Maya Institute sponsored by the UNC-Duke consortium. The program runs annually for six weeks and combines language immersion activities, lectures, demonstrations, and guest speakers (ISA 2022). Fidencio takes the words of his grandfather as his driving force to continue his works as cultural promoter Ma’ su’utsil a t’anik maayai’, su’utsil ma’ a t’anik (it is not embarrassing to speak Mayan, it’s embarrassing not to speak it) (Briceño Chel 1012). As a lifetime defender of the Mayan language, he has developed books documenting tongue twisters, songs, stories and, in addition, has offered over 1,000 workshops in many Mayan communities across the Peninsula of Yucatan.

In the case of Guatemala, the Mayan Institute “Padre Guillermo Woods” is another example of a center that seeks to strengthen Mayan culture and spirituality from a community perspective. Given the descriptive nature of Indigenous languages, printed texts alone fall short in covering all cultural aspects embedded in the language. Therefore, learning from Mayan speakers in a community context becomes the best way to learn language, culture, and all the knowledge living in Mayan territories.