A final investigation must be made of the spiritual associations of Teotihuacan. As alluded to in this chapter’s introduction (see ‘Teotihuacan as gathering’), practices oriented towards a religious or spiritual sentiment abound at the cosmopolis. A few other studies have lumped these practices under the burgeoning concept of ‘heritage’ and included discussion of the visibility of these types of practices at archaeological sites (Bender 1998, Castañeda 1996, Dowdall 2003, Hodder 2004, Meskell 1995). This has been an important step for the discipline in acknowledging alternate traditions of knowing archaeological sites. Indeed, some of these practices have considerable historical depth, taking precedence over relatively recent archaeological identification and research. This is particularly the situation in those litigious contexts discussed in Chapter 1, particularly Native North American, Australia and New Zealand. Other practices, such as at Teotihaucan, are loosely and contentiously linked to prehispanic traditions discussed in Chapter 4, but lack the cultural continuity to bolster these claims. And really may be impelled by archaeological research and restoration of the past century. Legitimacy, then, is often a prerequisite standard for archaeologists to consider such traditional and spiritual activities at sites such as Teotihuacan. But archaeologists both define what constitutes legitimacy for the practices and hold themselves as the arbiters of the assembled evidence (such as the conjunction of oral history and archaeological data; see Chapter 1’s discussion of this ethics-epistemology dilemma). So the ‘cards are stacked’, as it were, against those individuals and groups who base both their spiritual practices at archaeological sites and their reasoning validating the ‘legitimacy’ of such practices upon ‘irrational’, and so non-archaeological, logic. Nevertheless, while no quantitative assessments exist on the subject, the general climate of cultural heritage, as argued in Chapter 5, is that these practices and participation in them by a diverse background of individuals, are increasing rather than attenuating. At Teotihuacan this is certainly the case. And in an ironic respect, these practices may actually hold greater legitimacy, simply in terms of historical precedent, than archaeological management of the site.
This section, which like economics could similarly have been the focus of an entire monograph, adumbrates the situation at Teotihuacan. And in one important respect, progresses past the previous studies mentioned above in giving a quantitative report of the prevalence and significance of this type of association in comparison to the whole network of associations that are a world heritage site. Moreover, an attempt is made to specify what is meant by ‘new age’ beliefs and practices.
Pre-field participant observation with ‘new age’ groups, whether comprised of Mexican nationals or international tourists, who frequent the archaeological zone, at the anti-Walmart protests infused with copal burning and ‘prayers’, and through interviews with traditional ‘spiritual leaders’ of the valley (Figure 6.2) and visiting ‘toltec shamans’ (Figure 6.3), identified a series of associations which could for categorical simplicity be termed ‘non-archaeological’. A description of some of these practice have already been presented in the previous chapter (‘Teoithaucan as gathering’). These ‘non-archaeological’ understandings are self-identified as ‘spiritual’ by practitioners. “The people of Mexico cannot have ‘lifeblood’ if they didn’t possess a deep origin [no puede tener sustento si no posee una raíz profunda] and the deepest origin, the most fertile, is this Teotihuacan culture that is represented today in its pyramids. Which, although for many are mountain of stones [montón de piedra], have created the national spirituality [plasmado la espiritualidad nacional]” (local leader of Civic Front).
Figure 7.57: Aztec dance troop (bailadores) in the Pyramid of the Sun plaza
The pyramids and monuments of Teotihuacan serve as an important focal point for many regular dance rituals, often accompanied by ‘offerings’ and burning of copal for purification. Often, as with the ‘Toltec shaman’ in Figure 6.34, these rituals are conducted by one individual or a small group of individuals (such as the shaman with his apprentice). “I come to offer tobacco as a gift to the Toltec gods (many ‘new age’ beliefs attribute Teotihuacan to the later and mythologized Toltec culture), because this is their place of birth. This is where they came into being and brought the world into existence [dieron existencia al mundo]. It is a sacred place and a place of wisdom [sabiduría]. . .so I burn copal to purify myself before I do this. . . you have been in contact with the spirits of this place (unbeknownst to the ‘shaman’ I had just come from the excavated burials beneath the Pyramid of the Moon) and so are in need of cleansing [te hace falta de purificación]” (‘Toltec shaman). At one of the event (Figure 7.57) on the 25th of September, a contingent of several dozen ‘Aztec dancers’ performed in the Pyramid of the Sun plaza accompanied by drumming and offerings. During the performance, one individual spoke during the brief interludes in the dancing and music about the prupsose of the event. “We ask forgiveness [perdón], mother earth, for what man is doing to you with pavement, buildings, trash and contamination” (participant). Afterwards, another participant described the offerings, stressing the distinction between Catholic beliefs (the dominant religion of Mexico) and these traditional or prehispanic practices. “The prehispanic offerings are only to honor mother earth and do not bear any element of Catholic syncreticism [ningún elemento del sincretismo católico]. With these more traditional offerings, like those which are put in houses these days, we are not placing crosses or images of the virgin out of respect for that religion, to not alter those (Catholic) beliefs [para no alterar las creencias]” (local spiritual participant).
Figure 7.58: Typical group of ‘pilgrims’ to the apex of the Pyramid of the Sun to collect ‘energy’
Other regular, though less ostentatious, spiritual practices at Teotihuacan include the pilgrimages on Sundays to the apex of the Pyramid of the Sun. “This pyramid is a conduit [un canal between the worlds. That is why it was build and why it has an astronomical orientation. . . and the energy, the good energy, of the universe collects at the spot over there at the center of the summit [acá en el punto de la cumbre]. . . this is why we come Sundays to climb the pyramid and collect [acumular] this spiritual energy” (Sunday pilgrim to the Pyramid).
These type of activities which are a routine occurrence at the zone do not even begin to account for the many beliefs and practices of foreign ‘new agers’ who come to Teotihuacan for one reason or another. Important examples of these groups include guided tours by internationally known authors and ‘Toltecs’ such as Don Miguel Ruíz and followers of the writings of Carlos Castañeda. Indeed, these two renown authors represent just the more famous examples of an entire ‘new age’ literature that involves Teotihuacan. Other groups, placing credence in the once reputable interpretations of a ‘Great Goddess’ of Teotihaucan, supposedly depicted in the Tepantitla murals, come for feminist oriented ‘Gaia celebrations’. While these individuals are mostly non-Mexicans, all rely upon local guides who take the groups around the site and valley. As one guide for a group of a dozen Americans with Don Miguel Ruiz explained, “I grew up here so I know where all the caves are, on the site and to the east of the fence. . . there are many that archaeologists don’t even know about, and most have star signs and the remains of ancient rituals. I take them to these so they can find their ‘black light’. . . ‘black light’ is a type of spiritual awareness that comes to people in special places and lets them see past the illusions of this world to the real world of spirit. Don Miguel Ruiz talks about these places here at Teotihuacan. Tomorrow, I am taking them to a few of these places on the site in the morning. . . they are up by the Pyramid of the Moon in the guarded areas of the feathered butterfly palace. . . we come early and give the guards a tip to let us in, it’s no big deal. Then I’ll take them to some other places near Cerro Gordo, by where I have family” (local guide for foreign ‘new age’ group).
All told, there is a very evident presence of spiritual associations with the archaeological zone. These extend beyond local and Mexican activities and beliefs, to include a range of global, ‘new age’ associations attendant with a vast ‘new age’ literature spun around the archaeological site. But to what extent are these associations shared by the more general Mexican public? And how strong, relative to the other associations, is this spiritual-side (part of which is literally and metaphorically ‘underground’) of Teotihuacan?
As with the other explanatory concepts, I developed a set of questions for the questionnaire informed by these interviews and participant-observations. Initially, while the content of the questions differed with respect to general opinions versus personal reasons and practices, I did not categorize the responses into distinct ‘types’ or ‘definitions’ of spirituality. This emerged when the responses were submitted to a rotated factor analysis (Table A2.1). The responses loaded onto two distinct factors identified by the question content: understanding Teotihuacan in non-archaeological terms; visiting the zone for perceived healing benefits or for traditional reasons. Such a content analysis breaks the two scales down along lines not dissimilar to that of the economic scale: personal involvement or practices and more abstract or conceptual beliefs. Subsequently, the questions were divided into two weighted factor-based scales: a ‘irrational’ spiritual scale; a healing spiritual scale. The questions included on the respective scales are listed below (see Appendix 1, Figure 3, questions 1.1, 1.10, 13, 18, 21, 22, 23).
Healing spiritual scale questions:
’Visiting Teotihuacan is for health’
‘Reason for Visit-energy’
‘Reason for Visit-honor tradition’
‘Irrational’ spiritual scale questions:
‘Visiting Teotihuacan is not educational’
‘Archaeology best manner of understanding Teotihuacan’
‘Teotihuacan should be respected as place of ancestors’
‘Teotihuacan is part of what heritage’
As alluded to above, ‘energy’ in the question 1.1 is based upon the widely held belief that healing or spiritual energy collects at the top of the pyramid of the sun, which is scaled by thousands on Sundays in order to stand at the epicenter of the apex where this energy is most condensed. ‘Visiting Teotihuacan is non educational’ is the reverse coding of the original question number thirteen (Appendix 1, Figure 3). ‘Teotihuacan is part of what heritage’ was included as the responses to this scale progressed from past to present to future to ‘all three’, indicating the belief in a ‘living’ quality to the site, or at the very least, a non-archaeological, non-chronometric appraisal of Teothuacan’s place in history (Appendix 1, Figure 3, question 18). A high score on this question, then, intimates a belief in the ‘living’ quality of the site independent from an archaeological perspective that the site is studied to understand events and people in the past. This question was only included after the factor analysis (Table A2.1) loaded it upon factors shared by the other more explicitly non-archaeological questions.
As with the other associations, these scales were both standardized (see Chapter 6 ‘factor analysis’) so that scores fell between a range of zero to ten. The resulting frequency distributions for both scales are presented in Figures 7.59 and 7.60.
Both associations held low values relative to other scale scores, with the exception of the personal economic scale, with means of 2.25 (healing) and 2.58 (‘irrational’). Furthermore, the positive skewness for both scales and moderately large standard deviations indicate a clustering towards the lower values of the scale. Indeed, 70.1% of the healing scores fell below a score value of 1.64, and 80.8% of the ‘irrational’ scores were lower than a score of 3.36. Yet both scales, particularly the ‘irrational’ scale, included several ‘outlying’ respondents who scored extremely high on the scales. Nonetheless, despite these irregularities, Chi square analyses (Tables A2.43-44) support the distributions of these frequencies as not likely due to sampling error.
While both of these associations of Teotihuacan were relatively weak, the factors accounting most significantly for individuals holding these associations diverged widely. Rating higher on the healing spiritual scale score came down to more predictable background factors. Interpreting the partial correlations in Table A2.45 leads to the formulation of an indirect causal relationship between education level and the scale score, accounting for the intervening relationships with income level and whether or not the respondent visits museums. Expressing this interpretation in Figure 7.61 corroborates the conceptual linking of the variables and scale.
Figure 7.61: Indirect causal relationship: education with healing spiritual scale score controlling for income and visits museums
No other significant covariance, linear or nonlinear, was detected for the spiritual healing scale score. Indicating that, as may be expected, this association is inversely related to education level. Income and whether or not the respondent visits the museums also exhibited inverse relationships to the score: lower income and less frequent visits to museums showed consistent relationships with a higher scale score. Accounting for the common sense links and supported by the partial correlations, education held the strongest relationship. So that a lower education affects both the interest in attending museums and income; and that overall these three variables causally influence a strong spiritual (healing) association with Teotihuacan.
However, as the means for the various subgroups on the healing spiritual scale score varied somewhat (2.24 for ‘workers’, 2.45 for ‘visitors’), particularly for ‘students’ who held the lowest overall score (mean of 1.87, Figure A2.27), a look at the factors involved with each subgroup’s scale score exhibits some differences. These factors with their correlations are listed below.
‘Workers’: income (-0.266); education (-0.203)
‘Visitors’: income (-0.214); education (-0.200); gender (0.140); read signs (-0.179)
‘Students’, however, exhibited no significant relationships between their background variables and the scale score. These correlations for ‘workers’ and ‘visitors’ augment the overall causal relationship displayed in Figure 7.61, highlighting the roles of income and education. As both the income and educational level of ‘students’ are, respectively, homogenously low and high, this explains why these factors do not co-vary with their healing spiritual scale score. Indeed, as higher education and income levels contribute to a lower spiritual healing association, we would expect ‘students’ to form a weaker association. Interestingly, however, while the roles of education and income are also augmented for ‘visitors’, the correlations with gender indicate that females tend to have slightly higher scale scores. As the education levels for women tend to be, on average, slightly lower, gender would constitute, for ‘visitors’, the primary directly causal variable influencing the spiritual healing association with education serving as an intervening variable (that is, dependent upon gender). But this correlation is only weak (0.140), so the influence of gender on the association should be taken as a trend and not overstressed. Finally, those ‘visitors’ exposed to archaeological information while on-site also tend to associate Teotihuacan less strongly with a healing spiritual association.
The ‘irrational’ spiritual association (Figure 7.60) with the zone proves more difficult in ascribing direct or indirect influencing variables. Aside from age (correlation of -0.147), all of the significant variables are behavioral aspects. Contrary to expectations, neither income nor educational level co-varied with the ‘irrational’ scale score. This is due to the moderately strong, inverse relationship for the sample as a whole between age and education level (correlation of -0.451). An average, younger individuals tend to have more formal education. So despite having more education, younger individuals more strongly associated Teotihuacan with ‘irrational’ spirituality (Figure A2.5). Cross-tabulating the scale score by how respondents learned about Teotihuacan, 63.4% had learned about the site at school. Thus, contrary to expectation, the intuition that those who possess a higher formal education status should hold lower ‘irrational’ associations with archaeological site is not borne out in this analysis. This is further confirmed by the behavioral variables that relate to the scale (Table A2.46). Despite higher, on average, education, these younger respondents also tended not to visit the zone as much, and when they did, they tended to read the information signs with less frequency, visit the on-site museums with less frequency, visit the center for Teotihuacan studies will less frequency, and were more interested in visiting or knowing about only the central, ‘ceremonial’ area of the site (as opposed to the numerous apartment compounds, the museums or ‘all of the site’). This inter-related set of factors, based upon younger age, is sketched in the graphic in Figure 7.62.
Figure 7.62: Indirect causal relationship of age on spiritual (‘irrational’) scale score
Dividing the sample into subgroups by their scale score produced some differences. These factors with their correlations are listed below.
‘Workers’: age (-0.244); visit Center for Teotihuacan Studies (-0.224)
‘Visitors’: age (-0.199); visit Center for Teotihuacan Studies (-0.198); what visit/interested in (-0.162); gender (-0.189); type of job (-0.220); age (-0.199); read signs (-0.148); visit museums (-0.165)
‘Students’: age (0.263); education (0.241)
The dominant role of age in influencing the association is further accentuated when students are removed from the analysis. The correlations for ‘workers’ and ‘visitors’, while still only of moderate strength, both increased slightly (-0.244 and –0.199). The reason is indicated by the positive correlation of age for the scale score of ‘students’ (0.263). So while overall age is inversely correlated with the irrational spiritual association, ‘students’ demonstrate the opposite (positive) trend: the older the student the higher the score. This would seem to attenuate the causal conclusion regarding age and certainly contributes to the overall lower correlation with age. However, the mean age for ‘students’ is 19.53, with a narrow range of 18 to 25. This contrasts with an overall mean age of 31.84 for the sample, and a range of 18 to 99 (see Table 6.2). ‘Students’ between 20 and 25 years of age, who also tend to have more education (correlation of 0.241), more strongly associate Teotihuacan with an irrational or spiritual understanding. Whereas for the sample as a whole, those individuals younger than 32 can be said to generally hold a stronger association. An idiosyncratic result, the correlations for ‘students’, much like their role in the heritage association, actually allows a greater specification as to the underlying responsible factors. Tentatively, it allows me to say that the specific age group of 25-32 years olds hold the strongest irrational, spiritual association; and this in despite of (in the case of the overall sample) and, surprisingly, because of (in the case of ‘students’ with a positive correlation of 0.241) education.
In terms of the other groups correlations, ‘visitors’ held a host of relationships between their scale score and background, attitudinal and motivational elements. The majority of these factors underscore the overall causality sketch of Figure 7.62, or the counter influence that reading information signs, visiting the museums, their number of visits and so forth have upon a spiritual association. Subtracting the influence of the other groups accentuates the (negative) correlation with age, though it is less pronounced than with ‘workers’, indicating that younger visitors have higher scale scores. But previously unregistered correlations with income, occupation and gender allow for a greater specification of this profile for ‘visitors’. Performing partial correlations for the various combinations of age, income, gender and occupation indicate that age holds the strongest direct influence upon the scale score. Supporting the logical links between these variables (i.e., that neither income nor occupation affects age, but that age has influences income and occupation). So that, if we added these two ‘intervening causes’ to Figure 7.62, a younger age influences the type of occupation held and the level of income, which collectively predispose a higher association. Moreover, men (correlation of –0.189; gender is coded as ‘1’ for male, ‘2’ for female) have a slightly greater inclination towards the irrational, spiritual association, so that amongst ‘visitors’ gender likewise plays a determining role alongside age (much as it did for the archaeology association). The untoward positive correlation between income level and the spiritual association complicates this scenario somewhat. That is, ‘visitors’ with higher incomes tend to score higher on the scale. Akin to the negative or absent role of education, income (for ‘visitors’ only) plays a role not anticipated by other heritage studies. Together, these key components of a hypothetical ‘status’ of visitors to Teotihuacan sketch the opposite trend: individuals with higher ‘status’ are apt to develop a stronger irrational spiritual association. But put in the context of the primary agent (age) and the role of occupation and gender, the specific profile are younger men with higher income yet less professional occupations. This profile of ‘visitors’ tend not to involve themselves in activities which would expose them to rational information. And while unexpected, these results centered upon the influence of age serve as the foil to the opposite trends involving exposure that hold for the archaeology scale score. Indeed, a comparison of the various associations would not be most appropriate.
