A Bit More Detail

• Japan Today notes that the Ainu, the indigenous people of the northern island of Hokkaido, are set to be recognized by the Japanese government as indigenous.


• Atlas Obscura looks at the decks of Mayan playing cards created by the Soviet Union.


• The Conversation reports on how Indigenous food cultures in Canada can be used to better understand the environment and its changes.


• Brielle Morgan at The Discourse reports on the Indigenous, political hip-hop of Diana Hellson.


• CBC reports on the experiences of Priscilla Bosun, official Cree-language translator in the House of Commons.

• The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly considers the quiet power of the candle.


• The Dragon's Gaze links to a paper examining horseshoe patterns in protoplanetary disks.


• The Dragon's Tales looks at the impact of human civilization on the Amazonian rain forest and looks at the negative impact of a 6th century volcanic eruption on the Maya.


• Language Log notes that "dumpster fire" is the American Dialect Society's word of the year for 2016.


• Towleroad notes Kiesza's new single.


• Transit Toronto notes service changes for the TTC.


• Understanding Society looks at the Black Panther movement.


• Yorkshire Ranter Alex Harrowell examines the irresistible force of negative campaigning.

• blogTO notes that April has been the snowiest month this year.


• D-Brief notes that we are on the verge of a literal explosion in gravitational wave astronomy detection.


• The Dragon's Tales examines Maya water management.


• Far Outliers notes the 1709 rescue of Alexander Selkirk from a desert island, one of the inspirations behind Robinson Crusoe.


• Geocurrents speculates that Crimean Tatars may follow North Caucasians in supporting radical Islam.


• Joe. My. God. notes that a Republican co-sponsor of an anti-trans law has been quarantined as a danger to female co-workers.


• Language Hat examines how one language deals with the representation of time.


• The Map Room Blog links to a beautiful topographic map of Mars.


• Marginal Revolution links to a new book by Joel Kotkin that seems somewhat anti-cities.


• The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer wonders if Irish independence could have been avoided.


• Peter Rukavina contrasts and compares public spending and revenues on Prince Edward Island in 1915 versus 2015. The changes--particularly the increases--are notable.


• Une heure de peine looks at the idea of the insider, in French.


• Window on Eurasia notes that Eastern religions are now seen as threatening by some Russians and looks at the construction of Russian influence networks in France.

Anastasio Gomez, a Tzotzil Mayan from Mexico, fondly remembers his pilgrimage to Mecca. He circled around the Kaaba, the highest sanctuary of Muslims, seven times. At Mount Arafat he prayed to Allah and then he, together with 15 other Indians, sacrificed a sheep before boarding the flight back to their Mexican home.

"In Islam, race plays no role," the young man says joyously. His enthusiasm is understandable. After all, in his home state of Chiapas, Mexico's poorest, the indigenous people are viewed as second class humans, and whites and Mestizos treat the Indian majority as if they weren't there. In the southern Mexican provincial metropolis San Cristóbal de las Casas, the descendants of the Maya even have to move onto the street if a white person approaches them on the sidewalk.

Gomez, 23, converted to Islam eight years ago; ever since then, he has called himself Ibrahim. On his first pilgrimage seven years ago, the Indian was still something of an anomaly. Today, however, Muslim women in headscarves have become a common sight on the streets of San Cristobal.

About 300 Tzozil-Indians have converted to Islam in recent years and it's a development that is beginning to worry the Mexican government. Indeed, the government even suspects the new converts of subversive activity and has already set the secret service onto the track of the Mayan Muslims. Mexican President Vincente Fox has even gone so far as to say he fears the influence of the radical fundamentalists of al-Qaida.

But the Indians have no interest in political extremism. Rather, they belong to the Sunni, Murabitun sect that was founded by the Scotsman Ian Dallas and is seen as an offshoot of a Moroccan religious order. The Murabitun followers represent a sort of primal Islam: Earning interest profits through money lending is a no-no and they preach a literal interpretation of the Koran.

Evidence from the tropical lowlands of Central America reveals how Maya activity more than 2,000 years ago not only contributed to the decline of their environment but continues to influence today's environmental conditions, according to researchers at The University of Texas at Austin.

Synthesizing old and new data, researchers were the first to show the full extent of the "Mayacene" as a microcosm of the early anthropocene -- a period when human activity began greatly affecting environmental conditions.

"Most popular sources talk about the anthropocene and human impacts on climate since the industrial revolution, but we are looking at a deeper history," said lead author Tim Beach, the C.B. Smith Sr. Centennial Professor of Geography and the Environment. "Though it has no doubt accelerated in the last century, humans' impact on the environment has been going on a lot longer."

By looking at Maya impacts on climate, vegetation, hydrology and lithosphere from 3,000 to 1,000 years ago, researchers propose that the Maya's advanced urban and rural infrastructure altered ecosystems within globally important tropical forests.

The researchers identified six stratigraphic markers -- or "golden spikes" -- that indicate a time of large-scale change, including: "Maya clay" rocks; unique soil sequences; carbon isotope ratios; widespread chemical enrichment; building remains and landscape modifications; and signs of Maya-induced climate change.

Wander into Cafe Rex in Oxkutzcab, Mexico, deep in the interior of the Yucatan Peninsula, and some odd things pop out on the menu. For one, there’s red curry and other Thai food. It might seem like a culinary aberration, but it isn’t.

Across town at the Limba Restaurant, the menu carries an assortment of dishes from Thailand, created by a chef who spent a decade in kitchens in San Francisco, where Asian food is prevalent.

“I was chief cook in three Thai restaurants,” said Eduardo Dzib Vargas, listing venues on Potrero Hill, the Embarcadero district and Ghirardelli Square. Back in his hometown, he’s broadened the menu at Limba beyond Thai. “I modified it because there are five or six restaurants with Thai food.”

Like towns across southern Mexico and Central America, migration has changed the face of Oxkutzcab (pronounced OHSH-kootz-CAHB), which lies a three-hour drive south of Merida, Yucatan’s state capital. The ethnic Mayan town has sent thousands of migrants to the San Francisco Bay Area, most of them to work in the food service industry.

[. . .]

The great migrant wave from the state of Yucatan to the United States occurred later than in other parts of Mexico and Central America.

“Between 2000 and 2005, the migration to the U.S. shot up between 400 and 500 percent,” said Angel Basto Blanco, the deputy director of migrant affairs at Indemaya, a state-run agency that assists native Maya.

Some 70,000 Yucatecans reside in the Bay Area, Basto said, with smaller concentrations in and around Los Angeles and Portland, Ore. Many speak mainly Mayan, and only passable Spanish.

• Crooked Timber's Chris Bertram writes about the racist raids against immigrants in the United Kingdom.


• Charlie Stross fears revolution against increasingly xenophobic and increasingly police states in the West.


• Eastern Approaches touches upon the still-vexing question of how to deal with Romania's Communist past and its perpetrators.


• A Fistful of Euros' Alex Harrowell notes that the United States really has largely recovered from the 2008-2009 recession.


• Geocurrents describes the awkward position and questionable future of Burmese migrants in Thailand.


• GNXP's Razib Khan notes that a crowd-sourced South Asian DNA project suggests interesting things about South Asian history, apparently confirming--among other things, to my eyes--Indo-European migrations.


• Language Hat notes a Mexican telenovela broacast in Yucatec Maya.


• New APPS Blog notes that Detroit's bankruptcy is a consequence of too-limited frames--for instance, the self-exclusion of prosperous suburbs from the city they are part of.


• Registan's Kendrick Kuo argues that Russia and China need to be engaged by the United States as stakeholders in Central Asia.


• Strange Maps maps lactose tolerance in Old World populations. Conquering groups are quite ready to take to milk.


• Understanding Society links to description of a fascinating-sounding project analysing populations in Eurasia for differences and similarities in their evolution over time.

• At A (Budding) Sociologist's Commonplace Book, Dan Hirschman wonders why "traditional" religions--to use the nomenclature--aren't given respect. One answer might be related to the fact that practitioners of traditional religions are almost always minorities in their own countries.


• blogTO lists 12 different Mayan-apocalypse themed bar events around Toronto.


• Eastern Approaches notes the efforts of Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin's desires to improve the quality of life in the Russian capital.


• Geocurrents observes the mining boom that is populating a desert stretch of Western Australia.


• The Global Sociology Blog crunches the numbers and notes the many ways in which the United States stands out among countries for its gun violence, and factors leading to said.


• Marginal Revolution links to a paper suggesting that, for relatively less developed countries, the investments of Communism in human capital and assorted subsidies did give many of these an advantage. (Turkmenistan, yes; Estonia, East Germany and Czechoslovakia, not so much.)


• The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer predicts rising gas prices and relatively low oil prices.


• Window on Eurasia notes problems integrating Muslim conscripts in the Russian army.

Guatemala’s Mayan people accused the government and tour groups on Wednesday of perpetuating the myth that their calendar foresees the imminent end of the world for monetary gain.

“We are speaking out against deceit, lies and twisting of the truth, and turning us into folklore-for-profit. They are not telling the truth about time cycles,” charged Felipe Gomez, leader of the Maya alliance Oxlaljuj Ajpop.

Several films and documentaries have promoted the idea that the ancient Mayan calendar predicts that doomsday is less than two months away, on December 21, 2012.

The Culture Ministry is hosting a massive event in Guatemala City — which as many as 90,000 people are expected to attend — just in case the world actually does end, while tour groups are promoting doomsday-themed getaways.

Maya leader Gomez urged the Tourism Institute to rethink the doomsday celebration, which he criticized as a “show” that was disrespectful to Mayan culture.

[. . .]

Gomez’s group issued a statement saying that the new Maya time cycle simply “means there will be big changes on the personal, family and community level, so that there is harmony and balance between mankind and nature.”

Oxlajuj Ajpop is holding events it considers sacred in five cities to mark the event and Gomez said the Culture Ministry would be wise to throw its support behind their real celebrations.