Gerardo Aldana | University of California, Santa Barbara (original) (raw)
Speculative Fiction by Gerardo Aldana
Berggruen Institute, 2024
Piece of 'alternate historical future' fiction for the Berggruen Institute's project on "Future H... more Piece of 'alternate historical future' fiction for the Berggruen Institute's project on "Future Histories" and "Life, Otherwise."
https://futurehistories.berggruen.org/citlalli
The Maya Calendar Correlation Problem by Gerardo Aldana
Calendars and Years, Volume II, 2011
Archaeometry, 2015
ABSTRACT
The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies ... more The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies and related themes published for the purpose of quick distribution among interested scholars and students working in the field. The series is published by the Mayan Hieroglyphic Astronomy Collaboratory, affiliated with the
Mayan Astronomy by Gerardo Aldana
Institute for Maya Studies, 2022
(Online Presentation) In Calculating Brilliance, I follow up on arguments that there is a relatio... more (Online Presentation) In Calculating Brilliance, I follow up on arguments that there is a relationship between the Central Mexican deity Quetzalcoatl, the Mayan K’uk’ulkan and the treatment of Venus in the Dresden Codex — but, as Forstemann and Seler deduced over a century ago, the references are implicit. In this presentation, I offer a new interpretation of the Borgia Codex pages 29 through 54 and how they speak to a complex interweaving of astronomy and politics during the Terminal Classic and Postclassic periods across Mesoamerica.
University of Arizona Press, 2022
Encyclopedia of the History of Science, 2022
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MAYA TIME The Mayan communities of present-day Mexico and Central America deve... more A BRIEF HISTORY OF MAYA TIME
The Mayan communities of present-day Mexico and Central America developed an intricate calendar with origins as early as the eighth century BCE. Though many today first encounter it through tabloid coverage of supposed predictions the calendar makes about the “end” of time, its fame in the history of science rests in part on the technological, social, and political sophistication the calendar reveals was required to reliably track historical time. Ancient Mayan cultures are best known in contemporary popular culture by representations of the archaeological sites of Tikal, Palenque, Copan and Chich’en Itza. Alongside their “pyramid temples” these sites are often recognized for the calendric records found in numerous hieroglyphic inscriptions. And while Mayan communities still thrive and struggle in southern Mexico and Central America, and while the content of the inscriptions is now understood to comprise multiple literary genres, this is likely all overshadowed in modern popular culture by the apocryphal interpretations of the “end of the Mayan calendar” in the year 2012. When we get past these straw man interpretations, however, and consider the calendar and its complexity within its historical contexts, we encounter a rich history of science, influenced by politics, religion, and social change over time.
Archaeoastronomy and the Maya, 2014
Archaeoastronomy and the Maya, 2014
A new reading of Dresden Codex Page 24, the “Preface” to the Venus Table, is presented, demonstra... more A new reading of Dresden Codex Page 24, the “Preface” to the Venus Table, is presented, demonstrating a much-improved overall coherence. This reading of hieroglyphic text, mathematical intervals, and calendric data specifically identifies the Mayan Long Count dates of the Venus Table’s historical correction. The resulting Long Count placement of the manuscript’s Venus Table suggests that it was an indigenous astronomical discovery made at Chich’en Itza, possibly under the patronage of K’ak’ U Pakal K’awiil — one of the most prominent historical figures in the inscriptions of the city during its “epigraphic florescence.” Revealing the logic underlying the construction of the page, the revised reading suggests a slightly less-accurate approximation to Venus’s synodic period than the traditional interpretation allows, but introduces a justification for the graphical layout of Page 24 that is more straightforward than traditional interpretations.
Ancient Mesoamerica, 2005
... Gerardo Aldana Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies, University of California, Santa Bar... more ... Gerardo Aldana Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106-4120, USA Abstract ... the recovery of the type of astrology most commonly attributed to the ancient Maya: that concerning the star war. Popularized by Linda Schele ...
Journal for the History of Astronomy Supplement, 2002
Journal For the History of Astronomy Supplement, 2002
Journal for the History of Astronomy, 2003
The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies ... more The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies and related themes published for the purpose of quick distribution among interested scholars and students working in the field. The series is published by the Mayan Hieroglyphic Astronomy Collaboratory, affiliated with the
STEM Outreach by Gerardo Aldana
Proceedings of the 42nd ACM technical symposium on Computer science education - SIGCSE '11, 2011
Berggruen Institute, 2024
Piece of 'alternate historical future' fiction for the Berggruen Institute's project on "Future H... more Piece of 'alternate historical future' fiction for the Berggruen Institute's project on "Future Histories" and "Life, Otherwise."
https://futurehistories.berggruen.org/citlalli
Calendars and Years, Volume II, 2011
Archaeometry, 2015
ABSTRACT
The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies ... more The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies and related themes published for the purpose of quick distribution among interested scholars and students working in the field. The series is published by the Mayan Hieroglyphic Astronomy Collaboratory, affiliated with the
Institute for Maya Studies, 2022
(Online Presentation) In Calculating Brilliance, I follow up on arguments that there is a relatio... more (Online Presentation) In Calculating Brilliance, I follow up on arguments that there is a relationship between the Central Mexican deity Quetzalcoatl, the Mayan K’uk’ulkan and the treatment of Venus in the Dresden Codex — but, as Forstemann and Seler deduced over a century ago, the references are implicit. In this presentation, I offer a new interpretation of the Borgia Codex pages 29 through 54 and how they speak to a complex interweaving of astronomy and politics during the Terminal Classic and Postclassic periods across Mesoamerica.
University of Arizona Press, 2022
Encyclopedia of the History of Science, 2022
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MAYA TIME The Mayan communities of present-day Mexico and Central America deve... more A BRIEF HISTORY OF MAYA TIME
The Mayan communities of present-day Mexico and Central America developed an intricate calendar with origins as early as the eighth century BCE. Though many today first encounter it through tabloid coverage of supposed predictions the calendar makes about the “end” of time, its fame in the history of science rests in part on the technological, social, and political sophistication the calendar reveals was required to reliably track historical time. Ancient Mayan cultures are best known in contemporary popular culture by representations of the archaeological sites of Tikal, Palenque, Copan and Chich’en Itza. Alongside their “pyramid temples” these sites are often recognized for the calendric records found in numerous hieroglyphic inscriptions. And while Mayan communities still thrive and struggle in southern Mexico and Central America, and while the content of the inscriptions is now understood to comprise multiple literary genres, this is likely all overshadowed in modern popular culture by the apocryphal interpretations of the “end of the Mayan calendar” in the year 2012. When we get past these straw man interpretations, however, and consider the calendar and its complexity within its historical contexts, we encounter a rich history of science, influenced by politics, religion, and social change over time.
Archaeoastronomy and the Maya, 2014
Archaeoastronomy and the Maya, 2014
A new reading of Dresden Codex Page 24, the “Preface” to the Venus Table, is presented, demonstra... more A new reading of Dresden Codex Page 24, the “Preface” to the Venus Table, is presented, demonstrating a much-improved overall coherence. This reading of hieroglyphic text, mathematical intervals, and calendric data specifically identifies the Mayan Long Count dates of the Venus Table’s historical correction. The resulting Long Count placement of the manuscript’s Venus Table suggests that it was an indigenous astronomical discovery made at Chich’en Itza, possibly under the patronage of K’ak’ U Pakal K’awiil — one of the most prominent historical figures in the inscriptions of the city during its “epigraphic florescence.” Revealing the logic underlying the construction of the page, the revised reading suggests a slightly less-accurate approximation to Venus’s synodic period than the traditional interpretation allows, but introduces a justification for the graphical layout of Page 24 that is more straightforward than traditional interpretations.
Ancient Mesoamerica, 2005
... Gerardo Aldana Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies, University of California, Santa Bar... more ... Gerardo Aldana Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106-4120, USA Abstract ... the recovery of the type of astrology most commonly attributed to the ancient Maya: that concerning the star war. Popularized by Linda Schele ...
Journal for the History of Astronomy Supplement, 2002
Journal For the History of Astronomy Supplement, 2002
Journal for the History of Astronomy, 2003
The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies ... more The MGA Notes are a running series of commentaries and small reports on Mesoamerican astronomies and related themes published for the purpose of quick distribution among interested scholars and students working in the field. The series is published by the Mayan Hieroglyphic Astronomy Collaboratory, affiliated with the
Proceedings of the 42nd ACM technical symposium on Computer science education - SIGCSE '11, 2011
Proceeding of the 44th ACM technical symposium on Computer science education - SIGCSE '13, 2013
ABSTRACT Many institutions have created and deployed outreach programs for middle school students... more ABSTRACT Many institutions have created and deployed outreach programs for middle school students with the goal of increasing the number and diversity of students who later pursue careers in computer science. While these programs have been shown to increase interest in computer science, there has been less work on showing whether participants learn computer science content. We address two questions, one specific, and the other more general: (1) "What computer science did our middle school students learn in our interdisciplinary two-week summer camp?" (2) "How can computer science concepts be assessed in the context of Scratch-based outreach programs"? We address both questions by presenting the design of our summer camp, an overview of our curriculum, our assessment methodology, and our assessment results. Though the sample size is not statistically significant, the results show that a two-week, interdisciplinary, non-academic summer camp can be effective not only for engaging students, but also for imparting CS content. In just two weeks, with a curriculum not entirely focused on computer science, students displayed competence with event-driven programming, initialization of state, message passing, and say/sound synchronization. We have employed assessment methodologies that avoid written exams, an approach both outreach and classroom-based programs may find useful.
Many institutions have created and deployed outreach programs for middle school students with the... more Many institutions have created and deployed outreach programs for middle school students with the goal of increasing the number and diversity of students who later pursue careers in computer science. While these programs have been shown to increase interest in computer science, there has been less work on showing whether participants learn computer science content. We address two questions, one specific, and the other more general: (1) " What computer science did our middle school students learn in our interdisciplinary two-week summer camp? " (2) " How can computer science concepts be assessed in the context of Scratch-based outreach programs " ? We address both questions by presenting the design of our summer camp, an overview of our curriculum, our assessment methodology, and our assessment results. Though the sample size is not statistically significant, the results show that a two-week, interdisciplinary, non-academic summer camp can be effective not only for engaging students, but also for imparting CS content. In just two weeks, with a curriculum not entirely focused on computer science, students displayed competence with event-driven programming, initialization of state, message passing, and say/sound synchronization 1. We have employed assessment methodologies that avoid written exams, an approach both outreach and classroom-based programs may find useful.
Journal of Open Source Software
Journal of Open Source Software
A popular approach to introducing students to computer science is to involve middle-school studen... more A popular approach to introducing students to computer science is to involve middle-school students in engaging programming activities. One challenge in such a program is attracting students who are not already positively predisposed to computing. In order to attract a diverse audience, we developed a summer program based on culturally-relevant themes that appealed to our two target audiences, females and Latina/os. This paper describes our success in developing and implementing a computing curriculum and recruiting materials for a 2-week summer camp integrating two themes, animal conservation and Mayan culture. Scratch programming was used to engage students in creating animations about animals and Mayan culture, allowing them an interdisciplinary experience that combined programming, culture, biology, art, and storytelling. Our recruiting efforts resulted in an application pool that was 73 % female and 67 % Latina/o, with only 6.5 % in neither group. We had 34 students complete th...
A new reading of Dresden Codex Page 24, the “Preface” to the Venus Table, is presented, demonstra... more A new reading of Dresden Codex Page 24, the “Preface” to the Venus Table, is presented, demonstrating a much-improved overall coherence. This reading of hieroglyphic text, mathematical intervals, and calendric data specifically identifies the Mayan Long Count dates of the Venus Table’s historical correction. The resulting Long Count placement of the manuscript’s Venus Table suggests that it was an indigenous astronomical discovery made at Chich’en Itza, possibly under the patronage of K’ak’ U Pakal K’awiil — one of the most prominent historical figures in the inscriptions of the city during its “epigraphic florescence.” Revealing the logic underlying the construction of the page, the revised reading suggests a slightly less-accurate approximation to Venus’s synodic period than the traditional interpretation allows, but introduces a justification for the graphical layout of Page 24 that is more straightforward than traditional interpretations.
Journal for the History of Astronomy, 2009
Proceedings of the 42nd ACM technical symposium on Computer science education - SIGCSE '11, 2011
rEvista: A Multi-media, Multi-genre e-Journal for Social Justice, 2017
rEvista: A Multi-media, Multi-genre e-Journal for Social Justice, 2017
Nerter Revista Dedicada a La Literatura El Arte Y El Conocimiento, 2003
Encyclopedia of Global Religion, 2012