We Were Taught to Plant Corn Not to Kill: Secrets Behind the Silence of the Mayan People

My name is Tax'a Leon and this book is about my family and my people, the K'iche' Maya. My father was murdered three years ago. I still have my mother and 12 brothers and sisters. Nothing was done to solve the murder of my father or the people that turn up every day in the cornfields machetied to death. After all the things that have happened to our family there are times when I feel fear and sadness and despair in humanity. I wrote this book to tell people about the armed conflict that is still taking place in my country, Guatemala. The interviews were conducted in my native language K'iche'. People have trusted me and told me their stories. They told me with fear and anxiety in their eyes. Painting was also a way they could express how they feel without having to come up with words that consciously commit them to forming an opinion. The violence continues because no one wants to remember the past and our lips are sealed. We are afraid.. Not long ago, 200,000 people were murdered only 750 miles from Miami. There are people today in our governments who may not want you know about the worst violence that the Americas have seen in this century. This is a portrait of the Mayan people, written by a young Maya K'iche' artist, Tax'a, and her American husband Harvard Medical School researcher Douglas London. Eighty-one paintings by Mayan artists, including K'iche' children's art and photos, accompany graphic testimonies by Maya witnesses. "We Were Taught to Plant Corn not to Kill" is a stunning art book, an uncovering of the secrets behind the silence of the Mayan people and a look at the daily life and culture of the K'iche'. The Maya need your help because history is still happening to them.

Tax'a Leon is a Maya human rights worker, artist and law student. She grew up with 12 brothers and sisters in a small K'iche' Maya village in the department of Quiche, Guatemala. She is a native K'iche' speaker and learned Spanish when she was fourteen years old. She recently immigrated to the United States and lives with her husband Douglas.

Douglas London has worked nine years in Guatemala where he founded and directed a mental health clinic to develop culturally appropriate mental health treatments for developing nations. He has worked in developing nations around the world. He has a degree in public health from Johns Hopkins University and a degree in International Education from Columbia University. He is a researcher at McLean Hospital and on the Faculty of Medicine at Harvard University. London is an expert in international mental health.