Hamilton, NY — Gary Urton, professor of anthropology at Colgate University, is one of 25 individuals selected to be a MacArthur Fellow by The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation in Chicago. Along with the recognition that accompanies this remarkable honor, all MacArthur fellows will receive a ‘no-strings-attached’ grant of $500,000 over five years.
‘MacArthur Fellows are chosen for their exceptional creativity, record of significant accomplishment, and potential for still greater achievement,’ said Daniel J. Socolow, director of the Fellows Program. It is impossible to apply for the MacArthur Fellowships. The first word of the award comes in the form of a phone call from the foundation. ‘It is the first and only call we make to them, and it can be life-changing,’ says Socolow.
Urton’s call came while he was mowing the lawn at his home in Earlville, New York. His son actually answered the phone, and Urton asked him to take a message. His son came back outside and said, ‘The man on the telephone said this is one call you’re going to be glad you answered.”
For the past 30 years, Urton has studied and written about the language, astronomy and systems of numbers associated with the prehistoric culture of the Incas. According to the MacArthur Foundation, ‘{Urton’s} inquiries always concern non-Western knowledge and the beauty and complexity of its organization as manifested through visual form. As such, his work provides new perspectives on human intelligence and illuminates different ways of thinking about and organizing the world’He has consistently made connections that others have been unable to see, and through imaginative and groundbreaking work has made a succession of new discoveries.”
The flexibility and freedom the $500,000 stipend provides has the potential of bringing Urton closer to making his most significant scholarly discovery to date. Urton has been working to ‘crack the code’ of the quipu [‘kee-p