Richard D. Hansen

Richard D. Hansen is an American archaeologist who is an adjunct professor of anthropology at the University of Utah

Hansen in 2017

Career

Hansen is a specialist on the ancient Maya civilization and directs the Mirador Basin Project, which investigates a circumscribed geological and cultural area known as the Mirador Basin in the northern Petén, Guatemala.[1][2] He has previously held positions at the University of California, Los Angeles and Idaho State University. He is also the founder and president of the Foundation for Anthropological Research and Environmental Studies (FARES). His work has been featured in 36 film documentaries and was the principal consultant for the movie Apocalypto (Mel Gibson) (Hansen 2012a), CBS Survivor Guatemala, and National Geographic's The Story of God with Morgan Freeman.

Hansen has worked in the Mesoamerican region and early Maya civilization since 1978. Since 1980, discoveries by Hansen and his colleagues established the idea that ancient Maya societies had centralized governments and early state formations far earlier than once supposed, building numerous massive centers as early as 1000–600 BC that are connected by a complex web of intersite causeways. Hansen has also identified evidence for an extensive collapse of the Preclassic Maya civilization around 150 AD.

Hansen was awarded the Guatemalan National Order of Cultural Heritage in 2005, the Environmentalist of the Year by the Latin Trade Bravo Association in 2008, and the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres of the "Ordre des Arts et Lettres in Paris in 2012. He was awarded the Orden del Pop from Francisco Marroquin University (Guatemala) in 2012, and the highest civilian award in Guatemala, the Order of the Quetzal in 2017. He was also awarded the Orden de la Monja Blanca by the Guatemalan Ministry of Defense in 2019. He was named as "one of the 24 individuals that changed Latin America[3] and his work has been an important contribution to the understanding of the development of Maya civilization.[4]

References
  1. Archeological Research in the Petén, Guatemala - NASA
  2. Mirador Basin National Monument: The Cradle of Maya Civilization
  3. Latin Trade Magazine, Dec. 2013, p. 72, www.latintrade.com
  4. Prensa Libre, 10 Marzo 2017: 12,35 http://www.globalheritagefund.org/apocalypto.html Global Heritage Fund Archived 2007-11-02 at the Wayback Machine
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.