Specializing in Maya Spirituality, Natural Medicine,
and the Maya Languages of K'iche', Mam, Tzutujil

Mayan Culture and Language Studies

Jaime Garcia, from Cantel, Quetzaltenango, works with a student from the United States. Jaime completed a teaching certification in K'iche' Maya from the University of San Carlos in July of 2007. Meanwhile, continues to be q first class and highly qualified teacher of Spanish as a Second Language for the students at Mesoamerican Academy

Guatemala is one of the most linguistically and culturally diverse countries of anywhere in the Americas. The MesoAmerica Academy's administration is no exception in this regad. Pictured here is Jaime Garcia, the Academy's Asistant Director in Charge of Maya Studies. Like many Indigenous Maya, he spoke his native tongue - in Jaime's case K'iche' - before he spoke Spanish. But unlike a great number of Mayans, he became literate in his first languge, and, like very few Mayan students, went on to get a school to earn a university diploma in Maya K'iche' linguistics.

Jaime takes an active role in the management of the Academy, working with students of Spanish and Maya languages. His role is not merely that of language teacher, but as a commentator on Guatemalan culture and in the planning and implementation of projects supported by the MesoAmerican Academy. In this function, he works with scholarship recipients and teachers in the pueblos of Cantel, Quetzaltenango, and Chichicastenango, El Quiché, while dealing directly with donors and supporters in the United States.

It is his function of accompanying students to sites of cultural interest that most language students will come to know Jaime. It makes no difference in this respect whether the student is struggling to learn Spanish verb conjugations, exploring the meaning of Latin American literature, or making gurgling noises in search of the perfect glottal stop while trying to learn K'iche', all visitors to the Academy will want to explore the Mayan history and visit some of the many altars on hillsides, down inside craters and caves, or along the edge of massive cliffs or the shores of beautiful lakes.

South of Quetzaltenango on the road toward the coast, is the town of San Martin Sacatepequez. Overlooking the town is a volcano, at the top of which is Laguna Chikabal, a small crater lake down inside the dormant volcano. The Laguna is a holy site, often attended by Maya who come here to pray at altars along the shore of the little lake. The quietness and frequent fog and mist of the site emphasize the mystery and sacredness of the location.

To this day, the indigenous Maya still come to these holy places to offer their supplications and thanks to the natural spirits that guide their lives, and to construct beautiful ceremonies in which offerings of incense, food, and various aromatics are offered first to the fire, then to the winds and the abuelos who came before. As the child of an evangelical Christian family, and a resident in a largely Catholic culture, and now an afficionado and believer in Mayan spirituality, Jaime offers his own explanations of Maya cosmovision, commenting with both reverence and humor on the history and the truth and the ironies of the ceremonies and sites he visists with students.

Perhaps most refreshingly, as with the rest of the Academy's staff Jaime is the first to admit that his knowledge is limited by the Maya culture in which he was raised and what he has learned in his studies and experience. By no means, however, does he pretend to fully understand the culture of pueblos just a few kilometers down the road, or that his own view of Maya spirituality represents some sort of proper (and nonexistent) orthodoxy of Maya religion. Indeed, to explore with Jaime is exactly that ... to explore, rather than to be led by a tour guide. Always the exuberant student himself, Jaime seems not to have the least reservation about approaching an aq' q'ij, a day counter or Maya priest, to ask for an explanation of some aspect of a ceremony; or to engage in a highly academic discussion of sociolinguistic points with a local scholar on behalf of a student.

In the end, visitors inevitably know after a fieldtrip with Jaime that the learning experience was mutual, that Jaime himself came away with some new understanding, some new appreciation of his own remarkable culture and country; and that to be able to share it with Academy students was a genuine pleasure for him.