March 12, 2004

UCSB Researcher to Discuss Past, Present, Future of Maya Forest in Chancellor's Community Breakfast Presentation March 24

Bill Schlotter

For more than 1,700 years, the Maya center of El Pilar thrived beneath the lush canopy of the Maya forest along the border of Guatemala and Belize.

Today, however, the ancient city is an abandoned shambles.

And the great forest that sustained its people for so many centuries is at risk of being cut and cleared.

UC Santa Barbara research archeologist Anabel Ford will discuss "El Pilar and the Maya Forest: Out of the Past, In the Present, For the Future," at one of UCSB Chancellor Henry Yang's periodic Chancellor's Community Breakfasts, at 7:30 a.m. Wednesday, March 24. The breakfast will be held in the Cabrillo Pavilion Arts Center 1118 East Cabrillo Boulevard, Santa Barbara.

Tickets cost $10 per person.

Reservations can be made by contacting the UCSB Office of Community Relations (893-4388).

Payment, made out to the UCSB Affiliates, must be received by March 22.

Chancellor Yang and the UCSB Affiliates sponsor the event.

Ford, director of the UCSB-based MesoAmerican Research Center, has been working in the Maya forest area since 1972. In 1978, during a survey of the region, Ford came across the city site of El Pilar.

She has been at work at the site ever since, trying to make it a unique model of binational cooperation, community empowerment, and conservation and preservation awareness. She hopes her unique approach will preserve El Pilar's Maya monuments and the forest around them for the enjoyment of many generations to come.

About UC Santa Barbara

The University of California, Santa Barbara is a leading research institution that also provides a comprehensive liberal arts learning experience. Our academic community of faculty, students, and staff is characterized by a culture of interdisciplinary collaboration that is responsive to the needs of our multicultural and global society. All of this takes place within a living and learning environment like no other, as we draw inspiration from the beauty and resources of our extraordinary location at the edge of the Pacific Ocean.