[2][5] At Yale, Taube studied under several notable Mayanist researchers, including Michael D. Coe, Floyd Lounsbury and the art historian Mary Miller.

[5] Field research undertaken during the course of his career include a number of assignments on archaeological, linguistic and ethnological projects conducted in the Chiapas highlands, Yucatán Peninsula, central Mexico, Honduras and most recently, Guatemala.

The two-part study of the San Bartolo murals (2005, 2010), although listing several authors, could be considered his third main publication, in asfar as it concerns the Late-Preclassic iconography of the maize god and the hero Hunahpu.

An example of the latter was already mentioned; to this could be added his influential 2004 article on the so-called "Flower Mountain", turning on concepts of life, beauty, and Paradise among the Classic Maya.

[10] Taube also researched the interactions between Teotihuacan, a dominant center in Mexico's plateau region during the Classic era of Mesoamerican chronology, and contemporary Maya polities.