Nova is a famous series on PBS that covers a wide range of topics from archaeology to mathematics. I've been watching episodes on Amazon that are made within the last decade, but suddenly I found one from the 1970s about the Maya. To be honest I found it more fascinating to see how they portrayed the information than the information itself. For example, if they're interviewing an archeologist today, he would say the earliest Mayan settlements are from 80 B.C. or even C.E. However the archeologists here consistently said the phrase "Before Christ," which most today would shy away from due to cultural insensitivity.

They also constantly compared the Maya to the Roman Empire. Nowadays you'd hear, "It seems the height of this city was in the early 300s," but the dude here said, "The height was around the time that Constantine founded Constantinople," as if he expected his entire audience to know that off the top of their heads. Or, "We think this settlement began right when the Social Wars were happening in Italy." I definitely know most people nowadays would go, "What the fuck is a Social War? Is that Facebook versus MySpace?"

In a way I think it reflects our current education system. I don't know the curriculum for about fifty, sixty years ago, but I'm going to assume it's more Euro-centric. Is it that our knowledge of history has declined because not only are we aware of Europe and America, but now we have to learn about everywhere else on the globe? We're given the same total amount of time to study, so consequently we just acquire a little knowledge about everything instead of one thing intensely. I'm actually not really certain whether this is better or worse. I've heard people decry how the American school system has gone down the drain, but I've talk with old people all the time and I can assure you their education doesn't impress me either. Still, I think it'd be cool to make an offhand comment about how this is similar to Scipio Africanus at Carthage and have people know what the fuck I'm talking about.