National Museum of the American Indian
For this project, I decided to take a short trip to the National Museum of the American Indian, located in Washington D.C. There is another one in New York, New York.
Address
Fourth Street & Independence Ave., S.W. Washington DC 20560
Hours of Operation
10:00 AM to 5:30 PM
These are the hours for all Smithsonian museums unless stated otherwise.
Site Visit
The site visit started with grabbing a friend to tag along with me to the museum. We had both never been and thought it would be a fun experience.
Before we had gotten there, I had planned out my trip based on some information that the official website had given. There were articles about the Mayan Civilization, my original topic, but once we got there, we quickly found out that was not the case. (Maybe a quick trip to the actual exhibits tab might have been a bit helpful.) Either way, I was determined to make the most out of the gas, time, and stress to find a parking place to come home with something useful.
I approached the welcome desk asking if there were any other museums that had anything relating to the Mayan Civilization. They told me that there were very few to no full exhibits. The closest one was a 19-minute walk in the brisk winter cold. So, I improvised.
We walked to the Inca Road exhibit, but not before stopping in the interactive children's area to ride a skateboard and go into the tee-pee. I saw a few kids asking why the igloo was closed and the curator told them, "climate change". Once we had collected all of the stamps for the passport we headed out to the actual exhibit to complete the project.
The Inca Road Exhibit, formally titled "The Great Inca Road: Engineering An Empire", was a fairly sized exhibit. Though the main focus was the road itself and its purposes, there were other artifacts such as the gold headband and neck plate for the elite and plenty of interactive parts, such as a digital map for the empire, a small messenger game, and a touch screen that answered general questions about the Road.
The information on the food and crops were located towards the back of the exhibit. The most amazing part of the exhibit was a to-scale model of a section of the grass suspension bridge (found in the Agricultural Innovation section of the blog).
Overall, the site visit was very fun. After completing the original purpose, we explored other sections of the museum. It was really neat to see the cafe serving foods pertaining to the museum, such as the three sisters salad. I have always enjoyed museums, so this visit was no different.
I learned a lot about the Inca Empire and have overall just had the idea that everything really is connected solidified. It's one thing to just learn about it in class through a powerpoint or textbook, but it's another thing to go out and physically do the research yourself.
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| Image from Wikimedia Commons |
For this project, I decided to take a short trip to the National Museum of the American Indian, located in Washington D.C. There is another one in New York, New York.
Address
Fourth Street & Independence Ave., S.W. Washington DC 20560
Hours of Operation
10:00 AM to 5:30 PM
These are the hours for all Smithsonian museums unless stated otherwise.
Site Visit
The site visit started with grabbing a friend to tag along with me to the museum. We had both never been and thought it would be a fun experience.
Before we had gotten there, I had planned out my trip based on some information that the official website had given. There were articles about the Mayan Civilization, my original topic, but once we got there, we quickly found out that was not the case. (Maybe a quick trip to the actual exhibits tab might have been a bit helpful.) Either way, I was determined to make the most out of the gas, time, and stress to find a parking place to come home with something useful.
I approached the welcome desk asking if there were any other museums that had anything relating to the Mayan Civilization. They told me that there were very few to no full exhibits. The closest one was a 19-minute walk in the brisk winter cold. So, I improvised.
We walked to the Inca Road exhibit, but not before stopping in the interactive children's area to ride a skateboard and go into the tee-pee. I saw a few kids asking why the igloo was closed and the curator told them, "climate change". Once we had collected all of the stamps for the passport we headed out to the actual exhibit to complete the project.
The Inca Road Exhibit, formally titled "The Great Inca Road: Engineering An Empire", was a fairly sized exhibit. Though the main focus was the road itself and its purposes, there were other artifacts such as the gold headband and neck plate for the elite and plenty of interactive parts, such as a digital map for the empire, a small messenger game, and a touch screen that answered general questions about the Road.
The information on the food and crops were located towards the back of the exhibit. The most amazing part of the exhibit was a to-scale model of a section of the grass suspension bridge (found in the Agricultural Innovation section of the blog).
Overall, the site visit was very fun. After completing the original purpose, we explored other sections of the museum. It was really neat to see the cafe serving foods pertaining to the museum, such as the three sisters salad. I have always enjoyed museums, so this visit was no different.
I learned a lot about the Inca Empire and have overall just had the idea that everything really is connected solidified. It's one thing to just learn about it in class through a powerpoint or textbook, but it's another thing to go out and physically do the research yourself.
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