This is the code repository for SPAN 7559, Latin American Digital Humanities, a course taught at the University of Virginia in Spring 2017 by Allison Bigelow (Spanish) Rafael Alvarado (SHANTI, Media Studies). One goal of the course is to create a thematic research collection around a digital edition of the Popol Vuh, a colonial-period K'iche' Mayan text that many consider to be the "bible" of Maya culture. Although this designation is not uncontested, it indicates the importance of the text for both the Mayan people and students of Mayan culture.
The Popol Vuh has been translated, edited, paraphrased, and glossed in more than twenty five languages, and there are over 1,200 known editions of the work, published in verse, scholarly editions, and illustrated volumes. Our goal is to encode and represent the manuscript and its variant forms with a of suite tools to surface the narrative complexity and thematic depth of the text, allowing readers to engage deeply with questions of liguistic, historical, cultural, and spiritual translation. Such tools will include a set of TEI-encoded editions of the original manuscript and key translations, images from glyphs, vases, and codices that represent figures and events mentioned in the story, maps, and other media.
Our edition builds on existing digital resources, such as digital page facsimiles provided by the Ohio State University Library, and various transcriptions available on-line, such as Allen Christenson's transcriptions.