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Survivor: Guatemala

season of television series

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 21, 2026
Entity authorityQ3234590
Source-derived summary

Survivor: Guatemala — The Maya Empire (commonly referred to as Survivor: Guatemala) is the eleventh season of the American CBS competitive reality television series Survivor. Filming took place from June 27, 2005, through August 4, 2005, and the season premiered on September 15, 2005. It was filmed in the Yaxhá-Nakúm-Naranjo National Park near the more popular Tikal National Park in northern Guatemala. Originally, the season was scheduled to be filmed in a location on the Indian Ocean, with scouting taking place in Madagascar, Southern India, and Sri Lanka. However, due to the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, the plans were scrapped.

Hosted by Jeff Probst, it consisted of the usual 39 days of gameplay with 18 competitors.

This season also featured the return of Survivor: Palau contestants Stephenie LaGrossa and Bobby Jon Drinkard, marking the first time new players competed against returnees. Perhaps most notably, Guatemala was the first season to introduce the hidden immunity idol, which subsequently became a permanent fixture of the show. The tribes merged with ten remaining players, naming their tribe Xhakúm. After the merge, they received news that an immunity idol was hidden somewhere at camp.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Survivor: Guatemala” as season of television series. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Survivor, Guatemala and season.

Editorial reviewBest approached as a cultural-object dossier: authorship and date matter, but circulation and reception often explain the wider significance. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2005, 2004—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Survivor, Guatemala and season providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Survivor: Guatemala”, the useful work is to connect “season of television series” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3234590. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2005 and 2004.

Critical limits

Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

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  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
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The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Survivor: Guatemala”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Survivor: Guatemala primary sources, Survivor: Guatemala archive and Survivor research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Survivor: Guatemala” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.