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South American Culture
The culture of South America draws on diverse cultural traditions. These include the native cultures of the peoples that inhabited the continents prior to the arrival of the Europeans; European cultures, brought mainly by the Spanish, the Portuguese and the French; African cultures, whose presence derives from a long history of New World slavery; and the United States, particularly via mass culture such as cinema and TV. Religions Roman Catholicism is the dominant religion (over 80%-70% in Hispanic countries, some 65% in Brazil). French Guiana also has a large number of Protestants. Guyana and Suriname are exceptions, with three major religions: Christianity in general, Hinduism, and Islam. In lowland South America, as well as the Andes, animism and shamanism are common, as noted among the Urarina of Peruvian Amazonia. Languages Portuguese and Spanish are the primary languages of the continent. The majority of South Americans (more than 50%) speak Portuguese. However, most Sou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Argentinian Gauchos
Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''Argentine''. Argentina is a multiethnic and multilingual society, home to people of various ethnic, religious, and national origins, with the majority of the population made up of Old World immigrants and their descendants. As a result, Argentines do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship and allegiance to Argentina. Aside from the indigenous population, nearly all Argentines or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries. Among countries in the world that have received the most immigrants in modern history, Argentina, with 6.6 million, ranks second to the United States (27 million), and ahead of other immigr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Animism
Animism (from Latin: ' meaning 'breath, Soul, spirit, life') is the belief that objects, places, and creatures all possess a distinct Spirituality, spiritual essence. Potentially, animism perceives all things—Animal, animals, Plant, plants, Rock (geology), rocks, River, rivers, Weather, weather systems, human handiwork, and perhaps even Word, words—as animated and alive. Animism is used in the anthropology of religion, as a term for the Belief, belief system of many Indigenous peoples, especially in contrast to the relatively more recent development of organized religions. Animism focuses on the Metaphysics, metaphysical universe, with a specific focus on the concept of the immaterial soul. Although each culture has its own mythologies and rituals, animism is said to describe the most common, foundational thread of indigenous peoples' "spiritual" or "supernatural" perspectives. The animistic perspective is so widely held and inherent to most indigenous peoples, that they ofte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
English Language
English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the island of Great Britain. Existing on a dialect continuum with Scots, and then closest related to the Low Saxon and Frisian languages, English is genealogically West Germanic. However, its vocabulary is also distinctively influenced by dialects of France (about 29% of Modern English words) and Latin (also about 29%), plus some grammar and a small amount of core vocabulary influenced by Old Norse (a North Germanic language). Speakers of English are called Anglophones. The earliest forms of English, collectively known as Old English, evolved from a group of West Germanic (Ingvaeonic) dialects brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the 5th century and further mutated by Norse-speaking Viking settlers starting in the 8th and 9th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guarani Language
Guaraní (), specifically the primary variety known as Paraguayan Guarani ( "the people's language"), is a South American language that belongs to the Tupi–Guarani family of the Tupian languages. It is one of the official languages of Paraguay (along with Spanish), where it is spoken by the majority of the population, and where half of the rural population are monolingual speakers of the language. It is spoken by communities in neighboring countries, including parts of northeastern Argentina, southeastern Bolivia and southwestern Brazil, and is a second official language of the Argentine province of Corrientes since 2004; it is also an official language of Mercosur. Guaraní is one of the most widely spoken American languages, and remains commonly used among the Paraguayan people and neighboring communities. This is unique among American languages; language shift towards European colonial languages (in this case, the other official language of Spanish) has otherwise be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wayuu Language
Wayuu ( guc, Wayuunaiki ), or Guajiro, is a major Arawakan language spoken by 305,000 indigenous Wayuu people in northwestern Venezuela and northeastern Colombia on the Guajira Peninsula. There are 200,000 speakers of Wayuu in Venezuela and 120,000 in Colombia. Smith (1995) reports that a mixed Guajiro–Spanish language is replacing Wayuu in both countries. However, Campbell (1997) could find no information on this. Recent developments To promote bilingual education among Wayuu and other Colombians, the Kamusuchiwo’u Ethno-educative Center () came up with the initiative of creating the first illustrated Wayuunaiki–Spanish, Spanish–Wayuunaiki dictionary. In December 2011, the Wayuu Tayá Foundation and Microsoft presented the first ever dictionary of technology terms in the Wayuu language, after having developed it for three years with a team of technology professionals and linguists. Dialects The two main dialects are Wüinpümüin and Wopumüin, spoken in the northeast ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quechua Languages
Quechua (, ; ), usually called ("people's language") in Quechuan languages, is an indigenous language family spoken by the Quechua peoples, primarily living in the Peruvian Andes. Derived from a common ancestral language, it is the most widely spoken pre-Columbian language family of the Americas, with an estimated 8–10 million speakers as of 2004.Adelaar 2004, pp. 167–168, 255. Approximately 25% (7.7 million) of Peruvians speak a Quechuan language. It is perhaps most widely known for being the main language family of the Inca Empire. The Spanish encouraged its use until the Peruvian struggle for independence of the 1780s. As a result, Quechua variants are still widely spoken today, being the co-official language of many regions and the second most spoken language family in Peru. History Quechua had already expanded across wide ranges of the central Andes long before the expansion of the Inca Empire. The Inca were one among many peoples in present-day Peru who already spok ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aymara Language
Aymara (; also ) is an Aymaran language spoken by the Aymara people of the Bolivian Andes. It is one of only a handful of Native American languages with over one million speakers.The other native American languages with more than one million speakers are Nahuatl, Quechua languages, and Guaraní. Aymara, along with Spanish and Quechua, is an official language in Bolivia and Peru. It is also spoken, to a much lesser extent, by some communities in northern Chile, where it is a recognized minority language. Some linguists have claimed that Aymara is related to its more widely spoken neighbor, Quechua. That claim, however, is disputed. Although there are indeed similarities, like the nearly identical phonologies, the majority position among linguists today is that the similarities are better explained as areal features rising from prolonged cohabitation, rather than natural genealogical changes that would stem from a common protolanguage. Aymara is an agglutinating and, to a cert ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area and the seventh most populous. Its capital is Brasília, and its most populous city is São Paulo. The federation is composed of the union of the 26 States of Brazil, states and the Federal District (Brazil), Federal District. It is the largest country to have Portuguese language, Portuguese as an List of territorial entities where Portuguese is an official language, official language and the only one in the Americas; one of the most Multiculturalism, multicultural and ethnically diverse nations, due to over a century of mass Immigration to Brazil, immigration from around the world; and the most populous Catholic Church by country, Roman Catholic-majority country. Bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the east, Brazil has a Coastline of Brazi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lusophone
Lusophones ( pt, Lusófonos) are ethnic group, peoples that speak Portuguese language, Portuguese as a native language, native or as common second language and nations where Portuguese features prominently in society. Comprising an estimated 270 million people spread across 10 sovereign countries and territories, thus called ''Lusofonia'' or the Lusophone world ( pt, Mundo Lusófono), is the community of Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) world; these include Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Galicia (Spain), Galicia, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Macau, Mozambique, Portugal, São Tomé and Príncipe, East Timor, Uruguay, Kochi, Cochin, Azores, Madeira, Goa, Daman and Diu, Singapore and Malacca to various degrees. The history of the Lusophone world is intrinsically linked with the history of the Portuguese Empire, although the Portuguese diaspora, the Brazilian diaspora and the Cape Verdean diaspora communities have also played a role in spreading the Portuguese language and Lusophone c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spanish Language
Spanish ( or , Castilian) is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from colloquial Latin spoken on the Iberian peninsula. Today, it is a world language, global language with more than 500 million native speakers, mainly in the Americas and Spain. Spanish is the official language of List of countries where Spanish is an official language, 20 countries. It is the world's list of languages by number of native speakers, second-most spoken native language after Mandarin Chinese; the world's list of languages by total number of speakers, fourth-most spoken language overall after English language, English, Mandarin Chinese, and Hindustani language, Hindustani (Hindi-Urdu); and the world's most widely spoken Romance languages, Romance language. The largest population of native speakers is in Mexico. Spanish is part of the Iberian Romance languages, Ibero-Romance group of languages, which evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Portuguese Language
Portuguese ( or, in full, ) is a western Romance language of the Indo-European language family, originating in the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It is an official language of Portugal, Brazil, Cape Verde, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau and São Tomé and Príncipe, while having co-official language status in East Timor, Equatorial Guinea, and Macau. A Portuguese-speaking person or nation is referred to as " Lusophone" (). As the result of expansion during colonial times, a cultural presence of Portuguese speakers is also found around the world. Portuguese is part of the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia and the County of Portugal, and has kept some Celtic phonology in its lexicon. With approximately 250 million native speakers and 24 million L2 (second language) speakers, Portuguese has approximately 274 million total speakers. It is usually listed as the sixth-most spoken language, the third-most sp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Urarina Shaman B Dean
The Urarina are an indigenous people of the Peruvian Amazon Basin (Loreto (Department of Peru), Loreto) who inhabit the valleys of the Chambira, Urituyacu, and Corrientes Rivers. According to both archaeological and historical sources, they have resided in the Chambira Basin of contemporary northeastern Peru for centuries. The Urarina refer to themselves as ''Kachá'' (lit. "person"), while ethnologists know them by the ethnonym Urarina. The local vernacular term for the Urarina is ''Shimaku'', which is considered by the Urarina to be pejorative, as it is a Quechua term meaning "unreliable". The ethnonym "Urarina" may be from Quechua languages, Quechua--''uray'' meaning below, and ''rina'' referring to ''runa'', or ''people''. Urarina is rendered in Quechua as ''uray-runa'' or ''people from below'' or ''down stream people''. Society and culture Urarina society and culture have been given little attention in the burgeoning ethnographic literature of the region, and only sporadic r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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