Reiner Tom Zuidema (May 24, 1927 – March 2, 2016) was professor of

Anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, society, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...

and Latin American and Caribbean Studies at

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC, U of I, Illinois, or University of Illinois) is a public land-grant research university in the Champaign–Urbana metropolitan area, Illinois, United States. Established in 1867, it is the f ...

. He is well known for his seminal contributions on

Inca The Inca Empire, officially known as the Realm of the Four Parts (, ), was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America. The administrative, political, and military center of the empire was in the city of Cusco. The History of the Incas, Inca ...

social and political organization. His early work consisted of a structural analysis of the ceque system. He later extended this approach, based on French and Dutch

structuralism Structuralism is an intellectual current and methodological approach, primarily in the social sciences, that interprets elements of human culture by way of their relationship to a broader system. It works to uncover the structural patterns t ...

, to other aspects of Andean civilization, notably

kinship In anthropology, kinship is the web of social relationships that form an important part of the lives of all humans in all societies, although its exact meanings even within this discipline are often debated. Anthropologist Robin Fox says that ...

, the Inca calendar and Incaic understanding of

astronomy Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest includ ...

Biography

Zuidema was born in

Haarlem Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English language, English) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the Provinces of the Nether ...

, the Netherlands. He obtained a PhD in his home country and later moved to the United States. He had started studying Indonesian social sciences but later switched to anthropology of South America. The main reason for this was that Indonesia became independent of the Netherlands, and he could not work in the country anymore. Zuidema studied Spanish in

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

and moved to Peru in 1957. He published a study on the (lines) of

Cusco Cusco or Cuzco (; or , ) is a city in southeastern Peru, near the Sacred Valley of the Andes mountain range and the Huatanay river. It is the capital of the eponymous Cusco Province, province and Cusco Region, department. The city was the cap ...

in 1962. In 1964 Zuidema moved his family to Peru and started teaching at

San Cristóbal of Huamanga University The National University of San Cristóbal de Huamanga () is a public university located in the city of Ayacucho (formerly known as Huamanga) in southern Peru. History The university was established in 1677 by Cristóbal de Castilla y Zamora, the ...

. After three years he returned to the United States and started working at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In 1993 he retired. In 1977 Zuidema became a correspondent of the

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (, KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed in the Trippenhuis in Amsterdam. In addition to various advisory a ...

. He was awarded an honorary doctorate by the

Pontifical Catholic University of Peru Pontifical Catholic University of Peru (, PUCP) is a private university in Lima, Peru. It was founded in 1917 with the support and approval of the Catholic church, being the oldest private institution of higher learning in the country. The Peru ...

in 1993.

Publications (selection)

*1964. ''The ceque system of Cuzco: the social organization of the capital of the Inca''. Trans. Eva M. Hooykaas. Archives Internationales d’Ethnographie 50. Leiden: Brill. *1977. The Inca Calendar. In ''Native American Astronomy'', 1:221-259. Austin: University of Texas Press. *1981. Inca Observations of the Solar and Lunar Passages Through Zenith and Anti- Zenith at Cuzco. In ''Archaeoastronomy in the Americas'', ed. Ray A. Williamson, 319–342. Los Altos: Ballena Press. *1983. “Hierarchy and Space in Incaic Social Organization.” ''Ethnohistory'' 30 (2): 49–75. *1990. ''Inca Civilization in Cuzco''. Trans. Jean-Jacques Decoster. Austin: University of Texas Press. *2011a. El Calendario Inca. Tiempo y Espacio en la Organizacion Ritual del Cuzco. La idea del pasado. Lima: Fondo Editorial del Congreso del Peru. pp. 906 *2011b. "Chuquibamba Textiles and their Interacting Systems of Notation. In: Their Way of Writing. Scripts, Signs, and Pictographs in Pre-Columbian America. E. Boone and G. Urton, eds. Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, pp. 251-275. *2014a "Hacer calendarios" en Quipus y Tejidos. Los Numeros y su Rol en el Registro Simultaneo del Orden Sociopolitico y Calendarico Andino en El Cuzco, Chuquibamba y Collaguas. In: Sistemas de notacion Inca: Quipu y Tocapu. Actas del Simposio Internacional, Lima 15-17 de Enero de 2009. Carmen Arellano Hoffman, Editora. Peru, Ministerio de Cultura, Museo Nacional de Arqueologia, Antropologia e Historia del Peru. Proyecto QhapagNan, pp. 397–444

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Zuidema, R. Tom 1927 births 2016 deaths American anthropologists Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Scientists from Haarlem University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign faculty