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Maya Message: World won't end in 2012, but it may be destroyed by environmental neglect
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Published: November 11, 2009
Breaking news -- the world won't be ending soon.
So then, what's with all the 2012 fretting? It's all hocus-pocus, and a little good old capitalist hustling. But nothing to worry about.
So says Duncan Earle, an applied cultural anthropologist who has spent 10 years living among Maya communities. Earle will be at Wake Forest University on Nov. 12 to debunk the pop culture myth that the world will come to a dramatic, shattering finale worthy of Hollywood three years from now. His talk, "2012: What's the Story?" is presented in conjunction with a current exhibit at WFU's Museum of Anthropology, "Art of Sky, Art of Earth: Maya Cosmic Imagery."
Earle lives in El Paso, Texas, and works with Jadora International, an environmental consulting company.
Dec. 21 or 23, 2012 -- the date depends on whom you ask -- will mark the end of the Maya's "long-count" calendar, an approximately 5,125-year calendar that started in 3,114 B.C. It was created to coordinate time among large Maya city-states -- just like our Georgian calendar means Americans are on the same page about time with other countries -- and was likely developed during their "Classic" period, the Maya heyday, which lasted from about A.D. 250 to 900.
The Maya had several calendars, including one based on the sun that is similar to our definition of a year, and another that was based on human gestation and lasted about 260 days.
The long count calendar has not been used since the 10th century, and the Maya have not considered it until recently, Earle said.
"Had we not invaded five centuries ago, no one would know it is happening," he said. "Nonlinear thinking does not ‘look forward to' things, that is what we do in the West."
The idea that Doomsday will be arriving shortly before Christmas 2012 is perpetuated by hoaxers, scammers, pseudo-scientists, New Agers and likely people who want to sell books and movies. The temptation to rely on an ancient civilization is an easy one to fall into, Earle said. "We see from them some long-term vision or wisdom that we don't have."
Do we ever. A quick hunt on Amazon turns up hundreds of hand-wringing titles, including Planet X Forecast and 2012 Survival Guide and 2012: What the Government Knows and What You Need to Do to Prepare. Luckily, both are available in paperback.
Hollywood has jumped on the 2012 bandwagon, too. 2012, a big-budget action film, will open Friday from Roland Emmerich, the director of Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow -- so you know he has disaster chops.
There are waves, big, big waves. There are asteroids and earthquakes. There is John Cusack and Danny Glover.
"Find out the truth," the trailer ends. "Search: 2012." Sounds like a clever way to drum up Web traffic.
Part of the hype has been attributed to Planet X, or Nibiru, a planet that some think is on track to collide with Earth on the winter solstice in 2012 -- hype that David Morrison, a NASA astrobiologist, has been busy debunking, recently in an article in Skeptic magazine. The Nibiru myth is unrelated to the Mayas, but has been overlaid on top of it, Morrison writes.
There are about 10 million Maya living today in southern Mexico, Guatemala and Belize, Earle said, and among them 2012 is a topic of conversation.
But they don't have the same thing on their minds that John Cusack's character does. Modern Maya think the end of the long-count calendar is a time to mark and celebrate -- much like we ring in new years and especially new centuries and millennia -- only Earle said it will be with prayers, altars and offerings, not Dick Clark, hangovers and noisemakers.
Maya have strong beliefs that tie them to nature, and that's why they think 2012 is also a time to draw attention to the environment, Earle said. "I think the irony is what the environmental scientists are worried about is exactly what the Maya are worried about. There's no hiding from our planet.
"It's not going to be an apocalypse from the 22nd to the 23rd. It's just that 2012 is a very good time to focus with concern on the global tipping point. The world is ours to lose -- but not immediately. That's what my Maya friends are telling me. In more ways, it's worse than these accoplyic movies. It's slow and drawn out."
lgiovanelli@wsjournal.com
727-7302
If you go
Duncan Earle, an anthropologist who has studied and lived with Maya communities, will present "2012: What's the Story?" at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Wake Forest University's Museum of Anthropology. He will also speak on "Microfinancial Alternatives to Rain Forest Destruction in the Congo" at 4 p.m. today. Both talks are free and open to the public.
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