Middle American Research Institute

09/25/2026

Registration is OPEN!

Join us for three days of conversations, workshops, and discoveries centered on the ancient Maya.

8 scholars
5 workshops
1 keynote at NOMA — FREE and open to everyone

The full program is now live! Explore who’s speaking, what they’re presenting, and which workshops you can join. Open to researchers, students, educators, and anyone interested in Maya studies.

February 18–20, 2027
Super Early Bird Registration through November 18
Register now through the link in our bio.
tms.tulane.edu

09/17/2026

A project that began at MARI is becoming a book!

In August 2017, scholars gathered at Tulane's Middle American Research Institute for a Wenner-Gren Workshop to discuss the diversity of political systems in the ancient Maya world.

That meeting brought researchers whose shared goal of understanding Indigenous Maya politics grew over the years. Now, nearly a decade later, their conversations and discoveries have been published in Regimes of the Ancient Maya, edited by Maxime Lamoureux-St-Hilaire and MARI’s Marcello A. Canuto.

The volume, to be published by Oxford University Press in November 2026, includes 19 chapters by 37 authors and will be available as a fully open-access publication thanks to Mount Royal University and Oxford University Press.

We’re excited to see a project that began at MARI reach this next chapter.

Link in bio!

Regimes of the Ancient Maya
Edited by Maxime Lamoureux-St-Hilaire & Marcello A. Canuto
Oxford University Press
November 2026

Cover art by Aaron Alfano.

09/16/2026

Meet the speakers of the 21st Annual Tulane Maya Symposium & Workshops

In the 1960s, carved panels started showing up on the art market from a city nobody could name.

Scholars called it Site Q, from the Spanish ¿qué?, meaning "what?"

Decades later, the mystery was solved. This February, the symposium will feature scholars whose work continues to illuminate the history, writing, archaeology, and art of the ancient Maya.

February 18–20, 2027
Registration opens September 23

09/09/2026

From the forests of Petén to Tulane University, the story of La Corona, or Sak Nikte’, continues to unfold.

A new feature and interview in Prensa Libre highlights the remarkable archaeological record of La Corona, where more hieroglyphic inscriptions have been recovered in recent decades than at any other Maya site. These texts are helping reconstruct the history of Tikal, the Kaanul “Snake” dynasty, and the alliances, conflicts, and marriages that shaped the Classic Maya world.

At the center of this ongoing work is archaeologist Dr. Tomás Barrientos, one of the directors of the La Corona Regional Archaeological Project. For more than two decades, Dr. Barrientos and his colleagues, including Tulane’s own Dr. Marcello Canuto, have worked to uncover the history preserved at this extraordinary site.

The story continues at the 21st Annual Maya Symposium and Workshop, February 18-20, 2027, where Dr. Barrientos will serve as the Keynote Speaker, sharing 20 years of research at La Corona and continuing the conversation about Sak Nikte’, its people, and its place in the wider Maya world.

Read the interview with Dr. Barrientos in Prensa Libre here: https://tinyurl.com/dfxkft6h

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09/08/2026

Join us for our next Lunch Talk on September 11th at 12 pm!

We’re pleased to welcome Dr. Marcello Canuto, Director of the Middle American Research Institute and Professor of Anthropology at Tulane University.

Political Centrality without Territorial Integration: Hegemony on the Ground at La Corona (Sak Nikte’)

Since 2005, the Proyecto Regional Arqueológico La Corona has investigated the Classic Maya center of La Corona, or Sak Nikte’, in northwestern Guatemala. Between 2016 and 2025, two airborne lidar campaigns documented 690 km² surrounding the site. This presentation combines these lidar data with two decades of archaeological excavation, reconnaissance, mapping, and epigraphic research to examine how La Corona’s long-standing incorporation into the Kaanul hegemonic network was expressed in the organization of its population and landscape.

Join us to learn more about how archaeology, lidar, and epigraphic research are revealing the organization of Maya communities and the nature of political authority at La Corona.

08/26/2026

For decades, this city existed only in fragments.

Looted stone panels, scattered across museums and private collections worldwide. No record of where any of it came from.

Then in 1996, someone found the place it came from.

Sak Nikte' (La Corona, Guatemala) turned out to be one of the most historically rich sites in the Classic Maya world — a key node in the powerful Kaanul (Snake) dynasty, full of hieroglyphic records, royal burials, and political intrigue.

This February, the people who pieced it back together come to New Orleans.

21st Annual Tulane Maya Symposium & Workshops
Feb 18–20, 2027 · tms.tulane.edu
tulane ·

08/18/2026

Join us Friday, August 28th at noon in 305 Dinwiddie Hall for our first Lunch Talk of the semester!

About the speaker:
Nathanael Heller, M.A., R.P.A. has worked for the past 30+ years as a professional archaeologist. Although originally trained in the Near East and having worked on archaeological sites of Jezreel and Dothan in Israel, Nathanael has since shifted his focus to the archaeology of the southeastern United States. His first experiences with U.S. archaeology came in 1994 when he participated in a series of large excavations in Mississippi and Florida for the FGT Phase III pipeline project. After stints with the Louisiana Division of Archaeology and the Louisiana State Museum and completion of his Master's degree, Nathanael was hired by Goodwin & Associates to run their New Orleans archaeology lab. Nathanael now serves as Senior Research Archaeologist for Goodwin and oversees projects across the eastern U.S. Nathanael grew up in Kenner and lives in Metairie with his family.

Abstract:
Between 2011 and 2013, R. Christopher Goodwin & Associates, Inc. completed a two-year study of the Tchefuncte culture in coastal Louisiana. This effort included the analysis of previously excavated materials from the Bayou Jasmine (16SJB2), Tchefuncte (16ST1), Little Woods (16OR1-4), and Lafayette Mounds (16SM17) sites. Much of the material examined for this study originated from Depression-era excavations conducted by the FERA and WPA between 1934 and 1942, which formed the basis for James Ford and George Quimby's classic 1945 WPA monograph on the Tchefuncte culture. The study also included materials from the Bayou Jasmine Site that were recovered by an LSU field crew in 1975, and a small collection of materials from an LAS field school excavation at the Tchefuncte Site in 1986.
Foremost of the accomplishments of this study was to provide comprehensive descriptions of the Tchefuncte, Bayou Jasmine, Lafayette Mounds and Little Woods sites, and analyses of the data from the excavation of these sites. The discussions of these individual sites included examinations of excavation histories, site structure, stratigraphy, chronology, and artifact distribution, whenever possible. Some of the more important results included recognition of discrete activity areas within Midden A at the Tchefuncte Site, a proposed resolution of site chronology at the Bayou Jasmine Site, and confirmation of an Early Woodland date for Mound 1 at the Lafayette Mounds Site.

05/09/2026

Interested in archaeological science but not sure where to start?

The Archaeometry Laboratory at the University of Missouri Research Reactor (MURR) is excited to announce our Archaeometry Workshop for Mesoamerican Archaeologists, taking place November 9–13, 2026 in Columbia, Missouri.

This hands-on workshop introduces participants to archaeological science methods including:
• Neutron Activation Analysis (NAA)
• XRF
• Mass Spectrometry
• Raman Spectroscopy
• Petrography

Through lectures, lab tours, and practical activities, participants will explore how these methods can support their own archaeological research.

• Open to graduate students and early-career scholars in Mesoamerican archaeology
• International applicants are encouraged
• No registration fee
• Selected participants receive travel support, housing options, and meal stipends

Applications due: May 30, 2026

Scan the QR code in the flyer to apply or use this link: https://forms.gle/AhZLQEXV1xPP3q5p7

Contact Whitney Goodwin at [email protected] for more information.

04/22/2026

Don't forget to submit your application for internships at MARI! Due April 27th!

Internship applications for Fall 2026 are OPEN!
Our M.A.R.I Internship program offers students a chance for hands-on research specific to their interests across a range of disciplines! Our application deadline for Fall semester is April 27th, make sure you get your application in before then! We look forward to working with you
https://liberalarts.tulane.edu/mari/outreach/get-involved

04/09/2026