Dr. Adam T. Sellen
BA (Latin American Studies) U of T
MA (Mesoamerican Studies) UNAM
PhD (Mesoamerican Studies) UNAM
The general focus of my adademic studies had been Mesoamerican graphic ststems, from codexes to heiroglyphic writing. In particular I am interested in the iconography present on Zapotec funerary urns from Oaxaca. The focus of my PhD dissertation is to analyze these effigy vessels as objects with multiple layers of meaning, to address issues concerning Zapotec historiography and the nature of their ancient religion and cosmology. The thesis is entitled: Zapotec Effigy Vessels: a Dynastic Register of Deity Impersonators and Venerated Ancestors".
I am founding member of an interdisciplinary project funded by CONTACYT in Mexico. The participating institutions are the Institue of Anthropological Research and the Institute of Physics, both of the UNAM. The purpose of the project is to characterize ancient Oaxacan ceramics using nuclear and chemical techniques. Using these techniques we hope to be able to pinpoint provenience and determine antiquity in ceramic material. In Canada we have worked closely with the Royal Ontario Museum and the Gardiner Museum of Ceramic Art, where we have analyzed pieces in their Zapotec urn collections for anthenticity.

Recent publications:

an article on Oaxaca and the Zapotec culture in the Royal Ontario Museum Archaeological Newsletter Series III no. 8, Sept. 1999.

Is This the Face that Launched a Thousand Fakes? Rotunda 36 (3): 32-29, Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, 2004.

Cartografia de tradicion Hispano-Indigena: Mapas se Mercedes de tierra, siglo XVI y XVII. Instituto de Investigaciones Hitoricas y el Archivo do la Nacion, UNAM, Mexico (co-authors Miguel Leon-Portilla, mercedes Montes de oca, Dominique Raby y Salvador Reyes, 2003.

present position:

Investigador; Unidad Academica de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades en Merida (UACSHUM), Ex-Sanatorio Rendon Peniche, Calle 43 por 44 y 46, Coo. Industiral, C.P. 97150, Merida, Yucatan, Tel. 922-8446 al 47-48 (ext 116), e-mail address : sellen@servidor.coord-hum.unam.mx.

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