Aliens archaeology why do we get history wrong on purpose

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a few years ago

a stranger sitting next to me on a plane

asked what i did for a living

i told him that i’m an archaeologist and

i study the ancient maya

he said wow i love archaeology

and told me how excited he gets when

hearing about new finds

then he told me how amazing it is that

aliens from the planet nibiru had come

to earth and established the ancient

sumerian culture in mesopotamia

i have these conversations a lot

on planes in bookstores and in bars

people want to talk with me about

pseudo-archaeology

something that seems like archaeology

but isn’t

it involves making wild and unproven

claims about the human past

things like aliens built the pyramids or

survivors from the lost continent of

atlantis

invented hieroglyphic writing

now most of us know that claims like

these

are unfounded and frankly absurd

yet they’re everywhere they’re on tv

shows

in movies and in books

think of the history channel series

ancient aliens

currently in its 15th season

or of the most recent indiana jones

movie about the kingdom of the crystal

skull

or eric von danigan’s classic book

chariots of the gods which has sold over

70

million copies

here’s the crucial question who cares

it’s just entertainment right isn’t it a

nice escape from reality and a fun way

to think about the world

it’s not most pseudo-archaeology is

racist and xenophobic and like other

forms of entertainment

it influences our culture in real ways

let me give you an example it’s

common to hear pseudo-archaeologists

claim that groups like the ancient

egyptians

or the ancient maya accomplished

incredible things

but only with the help of outside groups

like aliens or people from atlantis what

you

rarely hear is pseudo-archaeologists

claiming

that say romans had help building the

coliseum

or that greeks had help building the

parthenon

why is that for pseudo-archaeologists

europeans could have accomplished their

feats on their own

but non-europeans must have had outside

guidance

claims like these are not just

outrageous

they are offensive here and in

so many other instances

pseudo-archaeology

sustains myths of white supremacy

disparages non-europeans

and discredits their ancestors

achievements

i’ve spent the last 12 summers doing

archaeological field work in the maya

area

several years back i was staying in a

small village along the belize

guatemala border i spent

day after day in the lab staring at tiny

brown eroded pieces of ceramics

the maya man who lived across the street

made slate carvings

to sell to tourists he’d stopped by

every once in a while to chat and one

day he brought

over a slate carving and it was this

image

the image carved into the sarcophagus

lid of the maya king pakal

around his death in 683 a.d

this image is incredible and it’s

complex

it shows the deceased king rising from

the jaws of the underworld

to be reborn as a deity in the center is

a stylized world tree

that extends from the underworld through

the realm of the living

into the upper world around the edges is

a sky

band with symbols for the sun moon

and stars i was

so excited to talk with my neighbor

about

ancient maya religion cosmology

and iconography instead

he wanted to talk about an ancient

aliens episode he had seen

the one about the maya and he told me

that this image was of an astronaut at

the controls of a rocket ship

i was shocked instead of marveling at

his

own ancestors he was in awe of a

fictional alien

he even told me that one day he hoped to

give this carving to eric von daniken

father of the ancient aliens phenomenon

pseudoarchaeology undoubtedly harms its

subjects

often indigenous people like the maya

but it also harms its viewers it harms

all of us like other forms of racism

it exacerbates inequality and prevents

us from appreciating

and benefiting from human diversity

what’s really scary is that

pseudo-archaeology

is a small part of a much bigger

problem it’s just one example of people

getting history wrong

on purpose of people knowingly

changing historical and archaeological

facts

why would anybody do that

often the past is knowingly changed

either to justify racism

in the present or to present a nicer

version of history

a version of history that we can all

take pride in

six years ago jefferson county colorado

became a battleground over how to teach

american history

to high school students the advanced

placement curriculum had

been expanded to include things like

the removal of native americans to

reservations

and the rise of extreme economic

inequality

members of the local school board were

upset

they vigorously protested the changes

arguing that the new curriculum

didn’t do enough to promote capitalism

or american exceptionalism

right now we are in the midst of a

heated debate

over public monuments to controversial

figures

people like robert e lee and christopher

columbus

should these monuments be left as they

are

destroyed or put in museums

and what should happen to the protesters

who deface these monuments

should they be praised for helping

debunk myths of white supremacy

or should they be punished for

vigilantism

and lawlessness what do we make of

scenes

like this for me

debates about history curricula and

public monuments suggest

similar messages first the past

is political what we choose to remember

and forget relates directly to current

political concerns

second we need to consider who presents

the past

who chooses the content of history

textbooks

and the subject matter of public

monuments

imagine how our understanding of history

might be different

if it was told by the marginalized

rather than the powerful

we can help combat racism and xenophobia

today

by changing how we think about the past

archaeologists need to do two things

first we need to make our discipline

more inclusive

we need to work with and for the

descendants of the people we study

richard leventhal’s work at tiasuco

mexico

is groundbreaking pun intended for

over a century foreign archaeologists

have traveled to the maya area

to excavate the things they thought were

interesting

mostly temples and pyramids

leventhal took a different approach

instead

he asked the contemporary maya of

tiasuko

what they thought was interesting and it

turns out they didn’t particularly care

about

temples or pyramids they were interested

in the cast

war a major but understudied

colonial period maya rebellion

second we need to make archaeology more

accessible

the last time i walked into a bookstore

i asked where i could find the

archaeology books

the clerk took me to a section labeled

ancient mysteries and

lost knowledge it had books with titles

like extraplanetary experiences

and what is absolutely absurd about this

is that real archaeology archaeology

based

in scientific facts and historical

context

is fascinating you don’t need aliens to

make it interesting

it’s up to us archaeologists

to find new ways to share our work with

the public

and this used to be the norm in the

1950s there was a game show

on cbs called what in the world

the host would present an object an

artifact

and the archaeologists contestants would

try to figure out

what this thing was and where it was

from

the show was funny and interesting

and exposed viewers to the diversity of

human cultures

beginning in the mid to late 1960s

archaeology changed focus instead of

concentrating on public

engagement archaeologists began working

together

to professionalize the discipline

on the plus side we now have things like

bayesian analysis of radiocarbon dates

and theoretical approaches like the new

materialisms

but in the process archaeology left the

public behind

shows like what in the world became less

common

and pseudo-archaeology emerged to fill

the void

but we can all contribute to changing

how we think about the past

when you see a pseudo-archaeological

claim

be skeptical and know that if you

post about atlantis tweet about

ancient aliens or forward a clip from a

pseudo-archaeology tv show

even if it’s not your intention you may

be promoting

racism and xenophobia also know that the

past is alive it is political

it is ever changing and it influences

our daily lives in meaningful ways

so the next time that you watch the

history channel

read an archaeology book or view a

public monument

remember that every statement about the

past

is a powerful statement about the

present

thank you

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