Re: Amerindian navigators and Eurocentrism in scholarship

[gdwill@earthlink.net (Garry Williams)]

yuku@globalserve.net (Yuri Kuchinsky 17784) wrote:

>
>Jeffrey L Baker (jbaker@U.Arizona.EDU) wrote:
>: On 9 Sep 1997, Yuri Kuchinsky 17784 wrote:
>
>: > 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.
>
>Well, they're saying that the Natives didn't have these skills to build
>ships and to navigate the ocean. This is false and diminishes Amerindian
>achievements. 
>
>	...
>
>: 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. 
>
>Yes, I believe that there was cooperation and sharing across the ocean. 
>The exchange went both ways. This was a multicultural exchange. But you
>propagate a myth of cultural uniqueness. So what is exactly your point?
>Trying to change the subject?
>
>The problem with your point of view is that in order to maintain your
>false myth of uniqueness, you have to portray the Natives as less advanced
>than they in fact were! So in fact you're diminishing their cultural
>accomplishments.
>
>Besides, in order to explain the numerous cultural parallels you will have
>to resort to some sort of an updated version of the Psychic Unity of Man
>theory, which is nothing but mumbo-jumbo. 
>
>: > 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?
>
>He gives plenty of primary sources. And, in case you didn't know, he
>organized the first modern achaeological excavations there in 1955. So he
>himself happens to be a primary source. And then he organized another set
>of excavations in 1986. 
>
>The great achievements of Heyerdahl in advancing archaeological knowledge
>in this area can be doubted only by those who are completely clueless
>about this whole issue.
>
>Regards,
>
>Yuri.
>
>Yuri Kuchinsky in Toronto -=O=- http://www.io.org/~yuku
>
>It is a far, far better thing to have a firm anchor in nonsense than
>to put out on the troubled seas of thought -=O=- John K. Galbraith
>

I'm glad to see that you finally retract your claims about the C.
moneta cowrie shells in the Adena mounds. 

What retraction? Why the one you made above, of course. As you will
recall, you agreed that you would either cite the primary sources that
Bernard has repeatedly asked for, or that if you changed the topic
and/or failed to cite said primary sources in your next post, that it
would mean that you retracted your claim, so thanks again for
retracting your claims about the C. moneta cowrie shells. Now we can
get on with real life again.  :-)

Everyone take note! Yuri has retracted all his claims concerning the
C. moneta cowrie shells supposedly found in an Adena culture mound!


--
Garry Williams
 gdwill@earthlink.net or
 gdwill@william.salzo.cary.nc.us