New Mexico’s deep artistic traditions have long engaged with the multifaceted histories and cultures of the state. At Encounter Culture, we talk with artists, historians, scientists, museum curators, and writers who are all a part of New Mexico’s centuries’ old lineage of helping us understand the places and people who make the Land of Enchantment so unique.

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What Have the Trees Seen? New Mexico Folklore at Los Luceros Historic Site with Carly Stewart and Rebecca Ward

October may reign supreme as the spookiest season, but ghosts roam the picturesque grounds of Los Luceros all year round––or so say Carly Stewart, Site Manager, and Rebecca Ward, Instructional Coordinator, of the culturally significant…

Words on Walls with Dr. Maggie DePond, Exhibition Copy Editor for Santa Fe Museums and Historic Sites

Word nerds and punctuation perfectionists rejoice! Encounter Culture host Charlotte Jusinski ends the season in grand, grammatically correct fashion with Dr. Margaret DePond, exhibition copy editor for the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. Maggie…

All Roads Lead to Chocolate: Origins of Cacao in Chaco Canyon with Dr. Patricia Crown and Jay Shapiro

Is there a food more universally loved than chocolate? No other ingredient lends itself to savory, sweet, and even alcoholic applications, tempting folks in everything from molten cakes to moles to Martinis.  Chocolate—or, more specifically,…

#11: History For Folks Who Don’t Like History at the New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum with Heather Reed

As humans, we learn best when we don’t realize that learning is taking place. We’re naturally drawn to hands-on displays and curious about reenactments. We can recall tiny details from those experiences more enthusiastically than…

#10: Listen, and Speak the Truth: Collaborating Through Conversation on the Bosque Redondo Memorial with Manuelito Wheeler and Aaron Roth

Conversations worth having never come easy. Perhaps that’s why previous attempts to present a complete history of the Bosque Redondo Indian Reservation, an inhospitable million-acre concentration camp into which thousands of Navajo and Mescalero Apache…