The WVU Humanities Center is pleased to celebrate the publication of Living between Worlds: Archaeology and History at the Southern Edge of the Maya Lowlands, edited by Megan E. Leight (Teaching Assistant Professor of Art History at WVU) and Brent K. S. Woodfill (Professor of Anthropology at Winthrop University).
This new volume, the result of more than 25 years of collaborative, multidisciplinary research, offers the first comprehensive study of Guatemala’s Northern Transversal Strip—a region long overlooked in Maya studies despite its vital importance to trade, cultural exchange, and political interaction.
Bringing together archaeologists, art historians, ethnohistorians, biologists, and paleoecologists, Living between Worlds reframes this so-called “peripheral” zone as a dynamic corridor that connected the Maya highlands and lowlands. Through analyses of ceramics, figurines, obsidian exchange, and settlement patterns, the volume illuminates how this region functioned as a vital hub within broader Maya networks, from the Classic period through the Spanish conquest and into the present.
Drawing on Leight’s research in the Maya region since 2011 and Woodfill’s presence in Central America since the late 1990s, this collaborative volume challenges long-standing assumptions about where cultural and political significance resides in the ancient world. The book highlights the importance of borderlands as spaces of interaction, negotiation, and innovation.
“Woodfill and Leight fill a void in our knowledge about the ancient Maya world and the interactions that occurred within an area between the Maya Highlands and the archaeologically well-worked Maya lowlands.” —Arlen Chase, co-editor, Ancient Mesoamerican Population History: Urbanism, Social Complexity, and Change
“Living between Worlds is an excellent contribution to Maya archaeology because it covers a region encompassing the interface between the Maya lowlands and highlands. It is a very cohesive and interesting volume.” —Joel Palka, author of Maya Pilgrimage to Ritual Landscapes: Insights from Archaeology, Ethnohistory, and Ethnography
By foregrounding a region that literally and conceptually bridges worlds, this publication makes a significant contribution to the fields of art history, archaeology, and interdisciplinary humanities research.
Learn more about the book here: https://www.uapress.ua.edu/9780817362386/living-between-worlds/. Use the promo code BAMA for a 30% discount on the text through August 1, 2026.