There are those professors among the faculty at San Diego State whose influence students will remember for decades to come. These mentors educate by example, depicting unique routes to success and conveying lesser-known methods of wisdom through sagas that teach more than any curriculum could offer.
For more than 30 years, anthropology professors Joseph Ball and Jennifer Taschek have been faculty of such caliber. Hired by SDSU in 1975, the duo was recognized in 1992 and again in 2004 by the University Research Council for their exceptional and extraordinary contributions to the research field of anthropology. They are keystone members of the anthropology department’s teaching faculty, and are among a unique collection of teacher-scholars whom are trademark to SDSU.
Ball and Taschek practice a dynamic rare to the scholastic profession: They teach, travel, research and write in matrimony. Their marriage has worked to the advantage of their careers — as well as their students — by implementing the benefits of healthy and functional family collaboration into the occupational realm.
Ball and Taschek met as graduate students at The University of Wisconsin, Madison in the late 1960s, a time when student activism surrounding the Vietnam War had reached a violent plateau on campuses across the nation. Protests at Madison had become so fierce that professors encouraged their graduate students to remain off campus, and instead do research in the field.
“The building we were in was torn apart by smoke grenades and student rioters running through the halls with the National Guard chasing them, often with bayonets,” Taschek said.
“Classroom teaching had become nearly impossible so professors said ‘Go! Get out in the field and stay there.’”
The duo moved to Merida, Mexico where they earned their masters and doctorates together living on remote archaeological sites, researching and working on their dissertations for nearly five years. There, in the depths of the Yucatán, seeded a bond and a shared passion for the Mayan culture that became the inspiration for the remainder of their careers.
Ball and Taschek are now internationally recognized Mesoamerican authorities, dedicated to the excavation of refuse left behind by the Mayan culture between 700 and 800 A.D.
Through the span of their careers, the pair has worked on a variety of archaeological projects in the Yucatan Peninsula, combining their individual expertise to unearth vast amounts of information about the Mayan culture.
“We have specialized in excavating garbage,” Taschek said, tongue-in-cheek.
The garbage Taschek refers to includes the bounty of Mayan ceramic wares the professors are dedicated to cataloguing. Among the most famous of their discoveries is the “Jauncy
Vase,” a chocolate drinking vase that is now a designated National Treasure of Belize and on display in the foyer of the National Museum of Belize in Belize City.
Ball and Taschek perform field work in a manner made more efficient by the partnership they share.
“
When we’re in the field, we have a division of labor based on our preferences and our background training,” Ball said. “Jennifer is the field archaeologist and the restoration architect … my specializations are in laboratory work and specifically in ceramic and chipped stone analysis.”
The couple’s largest project, the SDSU Mopan-Macal Triangle Archaeological Project, was an ongoing excavation of sites in the upper Belize Valley that lasted nearly 20 years. Funded largely by the National Science Foundation, the Geographic Society and the United States Agency for International Development, the excavations have led to the discovery of burials and artifacts that reveal unprecedented knowledge about the daily life and customs of the region’s Mayan culture.
This project required a year-round presence in Belize, so for two decades the professors were commuting between San Diego and Belize to complete their research while simultaneously teaching courses at SDSU.
Now that the field research for the Belize Valley project is complete, the professors currently spend the majority of their time in San Diego compiling their data and teaching classes.
Since 2004, the duo has been team-teaching the Roots of Civilization course at SDSU, with one of them lecturing and the other providing anecdotal commentary, dialogue and analysis.
“Sharing our research with students is just as important to us as publishing our research,” Ball said. “What we’re doing is giving students some understanding of the cultures they are going to be dealing with or have dealt with for much of their lives. It helps to generate compassion between cultures.”
Successful in marriage, esteemed in scholastics and working toward a greater cause for humanity, Ball and Taschek are noble and inspirational examples for all students.
