Re: Amerindian navigators and Eurocentrism in scholarship

[Jeffrey L Baker <jbaker@U.Arizona.EDU>]

On 9 Sep 1997, Yuri Kuchinsky 17784 wrote:

> > So when do you claim the contact started, how was the contact
> > maintained, and when did it stop?
> 
> Now you're asking very difficult questions. If I try to answer them in
> this politically charged context, going of necessity into some
> controversial areas of research, I will open myself to attack from these
> highly negative people. You see, I care about finding the truth, but they
> only care about proving me wrong. They often use questionable tactics. 
> Their allegiance to the historical truth is close to non-existent, IMHO.

I don't see anything difficult about these questions.
> 
> The fact is that the Natives had those skills. This is beyond doubt. Even
> the brutal Spanish colonialists accepted this! And what our enlightened
> professors object to? That in my post I gave no footnotes -- and therefore
> this didn't happen! What kind of logic is this? Whole reams of footnotes
> have been posted already -- did they pay attention. Noooo!
> 

When has anyone on this group ever said the natives didn't have very
advanced capabilities. We are arguing that native groups developed
indigenous agricultural systems, built monumental constructions, all
without outside influence.

You are continually arguing that one group or another developed part of
all of the above based upon contact with chinese or polynesians or some
other group. 

> 
> When did they begin? This is more difficult. I'm reading now EASTER
> ISLAND: THE MYSTERY SOLVED, 1989, by Heyerdahl. All kinds of primary
> sources and beautiful illustrations of relevant artifacts are given there. 
> There's no doubt in my mind now that there were links between S. America
> and Easter Island very early on, in pre-Inca times. The evidence given in
> this book is plentiful and rock solid. It's a fascinating story of unusual
> and talented people who lived on this isolated island from very ancient
> times. So read this book if you want to know more. 

If Heyerdahl gives primary sources, why don't you look at them and cite
the primary sources rather than citing Heyerdahl?



Jeff Baker