Yucatec Maya

The Yucatec Maya Summer Institute

June 7 - July 17, 2010

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill / UNAM / Yucatan

The Yucatec Maya Summer Institute offers three courses in modern Yucatec Maya, a living language spoken by one million people living in the Yucatan Peninsula and northern Belize.

FIELD STUDY
For too many years the Yucatan has only been known as a vacation spot teeming with beach-goers. Students in the Intensive Yucatec Maya Courses will have the unique opportunity to take a comprehensive look at the Yucatan by visiting a range of important historic and cultural locations. Trips to archeological and colonial sites as well as other Mayan villages are led by Mayan scholars and anthropologists, who will introduce them to the cultural importance of each site. Throughout their stay in the Yucatan, students may use their free time to travel to other areas of interest. Merida, the beautiful capital of the Mexican state of Yucatan, offers its visitors both modern and historic aspects of city life. Merida is an excellent base from which to explore the Yucatan, close to both Caribbean beaches and Mayan archeological sites. Valladolid is a charming historic city and a wonderful place to be based. The UNO, Universidad del Oriente in Valladolid is a new upcoming university which offers an undergraduate degree in Maya culture and language. Xocen, situated twelve kilometers southeast of Valladolid and about 200 kilometers southwest of Cancun, is located in the milpa area of the Mexican state of Yucatan. Xocen is an ancient town that played a key role in the Caste War and was the original home of the Talking Cross.

LEVEL I
Weeks 1-3 –University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 6 credit hours, 160 contact hours
The program begins with intensive classroom instruction six hours a day, for three weeks on the UNC campus followed by three intensive weeks in Mexico. Throughout the six weeks, Level I students will receive six hours of intensive classroom instruction daily. The course is taught by Dr. David Mora Marin from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Miguel Guemez Pineda from the Universidad Autónoma de Yucatan.
For the three weeks that Level I students are in Chapel Hill, they must find their own housing. Incorporated into the program at UNC are films, special lectures and a workshop on Mayan hieroglyphics. At the end of the third week, students in Level I will travel to Valladolid where they will stay for the next three weeks.

Week 4,5,6– Valladolid and Xocen
During the final three weeks Level I students will stay at the Quetzal, a small bungalow style hotel in the historical San Bernardino neighborhood. They will go daily to the UNO for classes, lectures by historians, linguists and anthropologist. They will also have contact with young Maya university students who are attending the UNO. During the week in Xocen students will join in the daily activities of Mayan families in the village. There will be opportunities to visit in homes and interact with families who enjoy talking and getting to know the students each year. While in Xocen, Level I students will carry out a project proposed earlier in the field study. During the 3 weeks there will also be visits to neighboring villages, the archeological sites of Ek Balam, Coba and several cenotes in the area. In many of the communities the majority of the villagers only speak Maya, offering students an excellent environment in which to practice their language skills.

LEVEL II
Weeks 1-3 –Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico UNAM 6 credit hours, 140 contact hours
This course begins with three weeks of intensive classroom instruction in Merida, Mexico. Students will attend class six hours a day, five days a week taught by the linguist Ismael May May, who has over fifteen years experience teaching Yucatec Maya. He is presently a faculty member at the UNAM in Merida. Students will also work with US-based Dr. John Tuxill, a Yale graduate and a member of the faculty at Western Washington University. The course will incorporate Mayan texts and literature appropriate to this level. For the three weeks, Level II students will live with Mexican host families. The UNAM in Merida gives Maya students a new place to do research, attend lectures, and collaborate with academics who have similar interests.

Weeks 4 ,5 and 6 –Valladolid and Xocen
During the final three weeks of the program Level II students will stay at the Quetzal, a small bungalow style hotel in the historical San Bernardino neighborhood in Valladolid. They will go daily to the UNO for classes, lectures by historians, linguists and anthropologist and will work on a class project with students from the UNO. They will also have direct contact with young Maya university students who are studying Mayan linguistics there. Each Level II students will be paired with a Maya university student and will have the opportunity to experience more fully the life of a student as well as practice speaking Maya in an informal setting. During the week in Xocen students will join in the daily activities of Mayan families in the village. There will be opportunities to visit in homes and interact with families who enjoy talking and getting to know the students each year. During the 3 weeks, there will also be visits to neighboring villages, the archeological sites of Ek Balam, Coba and several cenotes in the area. In many of the communities the majority of the villagers only speak Maya, offering students an excellent environment in which to practice their language skills.

LEVEL III
Weeks 1-6
Level III was offered for the first time in summer 2008. It has evolved into a course which prepares students to carry out fieldwork and to achieve fluency in the target language. Students in the third level of the Summer Intensive Course will be taught by Mayan native speaker and linguist Fidencio Briseno Chel, one of the best known and respected linguists in Mesoamerica. Students will live in Merida and use as their home base the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Yucatan for the first two weeks of the course. There they will attend formal classes four hours daily as well as work with native speakers on site. After two weeks at the UNAM, the students, who will have already chosen the village or villages for their fieldwork, will carry out their work under the supervision of Briseno Chel. The final week will be spent at the Universidad del Oriente in Valladolid in formal language review and working together to analyze their projects. Students will be evaluated on their projects as well as their Yucatec Maya writing, reading and comprehension skills. Students will be constantly exposed to native speakers and will be invited to participate in workshops, radio programs and conferences held during their stay in Merida and Valladolid.

Course Materials
The Yucatec Maya Institute will provide the books and CD’s for Spoken Yucatec Maya, by Robert Blair and Refugio Vermont Salas, along with colorful vocabulary flashcards and the supplementary reader Maaya Ts’iibo’ob-Yucatec Maya. Students will also use the Maaya T'aan series developed in 1994 by the Mexican Secretariat of Education for use in Maya classes in Mexico and the documentary in Yucatec Maya, Saastal: The Children of the Sacred Grace. The DVD will be an innovative learning tool and will enhance the students’ knowledge of the people and culture.
NOTE: This is a rigorous course held in an intense climate (averaging around 100 F a day). Students should be flexible and be able to cope with heat.

Information on Registration and Fees:

APPLICATION & ENROLLMENT
Total combined enrollment for all three levels is limited to twenty
students, so students are encouraged to apply early. Applications are invited from anyone who wishes to study Yucatec Maya. Application deadline is Friday, March 15.

Cost
The program fee will cover instructional fees, accommodations, some meals, most site and museum fees, and transportation for all excursions. It does not include airfare to Mexico, passport fees, most meals, housing for three weeks in Chapel Hill for those in the beginning level course, laundry service or personal expenses. Please contact the Institute for more information. FLAS and other funding is available for many qualified graduate and undergraduate students. Please contact the Institute for additional information about funding.

FOR APPLICATIONS CONTACT:
The Study Abroad Office
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
FedEx Global Education Center CB# 3130
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3130
Phone: 919-962-7002, Fax: 919-962-2262
http://studyabroad.unc.edu/programs.cfm?pk=1883

Sponsored by the Consortium in Latin American and Caribbean Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University

Please, visit the official website:
http://isa.unc.edu

For further inquiries, please contact:
Sharon Mujica at: The Yucatec Maya Summer Institute
Consortium in Latin American and Caribbean Studies
FedEx Global Education Center CB#3205
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3205
Phone: (919) 962-2414, Fax: (919) 962-0398
Email: smujica@email.unc.edu

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