This is hardly a problem unique to the Tarascans. Thankfully, I'm in my school's education library at the moment, so I ran upstairs to take inventory of a few textbooks. Looking at 2 World Geography textbooks and 4 World History ones (for upper Middle School - High School students) we see:

• Geography book with 1 paragraph on Maya culture (still very much alive), 1 paragraph on North American Indians, and references to the Inca, one of the peoples who had lived in Peru "for hundreds of years" (try 5 thousand years)

• Geography book with references to Maya, Aztec, and Inca culture, one paragraph on North Americans

• Two world history books with one lesson each (3-4 pages with pictures and insets, ~8 paragraphs total) on the Inca, Aztec, and North Americans, inset on the Maya and Olmec

• History book with a shared lesson on Aztec and Inca, one lesson on North Americans, and half a lesson in the "Other Later Empires" chapter of the "First Civilizations" unit dedicated to both Maya and Olmec

• Advanced AP/IB level history book with one whole chapter (!) dedicated to pre-Columbian America: 8 paragraphs on Maya, 12 on Aztec, 6 on Toltec (woah!), 2 on Olmec, 1 on Chavin (it's mostly vague and somewhat incorrect, but it's something), 10 on the Aztec, and 4 brief ones on North America (3-4 sentences each on Plains, Puebloans, Moundbuilders, and Northeasterners; Moctezuma II gets more time than them)

In case you couldn't tell, most of us archaeologists are a little miffed at the state of education on American cultures. If you're not the Aztec, Inca, or Maya, odds are you'll never be seen in a textbook. There's 4500 years of human history in South America that shows up in one vague, inaccurate paragraph. The best you can hope for if you're not one of the "big three" is a little inset a maybe a picture of a vessel on a timeline. There's all sorts of reasons for this: recency of research, the traditional "Western Civ" focus, and the self-perpetuation of unawareness (if you don't even know something exists, how can you vouch for its better representation in textbooks?). I might be a bit biased; it's obnoxious to deal with the monthly conversation of "You work in Peru? Isn't that like the Maya?....No? Well, close enough." However, I think it's justifiable to say that such a basic fact has its place in book that spends a full lesson on the Greco-Persian wars.

I think the answer is that 'western' culture is highly introspective and enormously (and subtly) influenced by hundreds of years of post-medieavel focus on Europe and its origins.

I'm only 50 but when I was taught history the 'Dark Ages' seemed like a worldwide 500 year cultural death of all that counts as civilised. Now that I'm more educated it seems a lot more like what it actually was, a dimming on the very western edge of one largish continent and largely invisible to the rest of the world.

The British and Europeans and also, post 1776, the Americans were enormously focused on classical history with the Greeks and the Romans being front and centre. Chuck in a bit of Egyptian and Middle-eastern (bible country) history and thats pretty much 90% of what counts.

To a large extent this is still true today, although the tide is changing, perhaps.

I think that there is also the additional element of a perceived culture. Most people in the anglophone west (and most of the rest of the world I guess) dont see themselves as being linked to these pre-European cultures. These peoples background is either European or some sort of American, a creature that sprung out of the earth 4-500 years ago. They just dont see the Tarascans as people they have any connection with. A modern american can look back in time and see perhaps a link to the Greeks, at least from a cultural perspective, for example we're still using their language in places. The Tarascans contributed so little to 'us' that its hard to feel a connection. (I know this is unfair, but I think its how its perceived).

Furthermore theres also the interest of the information involved. There is so much detail and so many stories to go with Greek/Roman/Egyptian/Norse/Germanic history. But many of the American ones lack that degree of detail. No real written records, and what we do know isnt couched in easily digestible chunks.

I think its regrettable but to most people many of the Pre-European American cultures are dead and have nothing of interest to offer. Ultimately many general interest books are focused on what people want to read and know, not what they should. And once you've told one or two European meets American culture stories then the rest seem like a bit of repetition.