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Latin America consists of the countries of South America and North America (including Central America and the islands of the Caribbean) whose inhabitants mostly speak Romance languages, although Native American languages are also spoken there. Most frequently the term Latin America is restricted to countries whose inhabitants speak either Spanish or Portuguese, but the French-speaking areas of Haiti, French Guiana, and the French West Indies may also be included.Latin America is divided into 33 independent countries and 13 other political units. Brazil is by far the largest country in Latin America both in area and in population. It occupies more than 40 percent of the region's land area and has about a third of its people.
The United States, Anglophone Canada, BelizeBelize is a small nation in Central America, on the Caribbean Sea bordering Mexico to the northwest and Guatemala to the west and south. Honduras lies 75 km away at the two nations' closest point across the Gulf of Honduras to the east. In the Spanish lan, GuyanaThe Co-operative Republic of Guyana is a nation of northern South America. It constitutes the western part of the wider region of Guiana (an Amerindian word meaning Land of Many Waters , and is bordered to the east by Suriname, to the south by Brazil, to, and several islands in the Caribbean, who have as their main language EnglishThe English language is a West Germanic language, originating from England. It is the third most common "first" language (native speakers), with around 402 million people in 2002. English has lingua franca status in many parts of the world, due to the mil and therefore do not belong to Latin America, may be grouped under the term Anglo-AmericaThe term Anglo-America is used to describe those parts of North America in which English is the main language. It should be noted that this is not a widely used term. It is generally taken to include the United States of America and English Canada. In add. SurinameThe Republic of Suriname more commonly known as Suriname or Surinam (formerly known as Netherlands Guiana and Dutch Guiana is a country in northern South America, in between French Guiana to the east and Guyana to the west. The southern border is shared w and the Dutch West Indies, which speak DutchDutch is a West Germanic language spoken worldwide by around 21 million people. The variety of Dutch spoken in Belgium is also informally called Flemish . The Dutch name for the language is Nederlands or less formal Hollands and Dutch is sometimes called, also do not belong to Latin America.
There are many languages historically and currently spoken in Latin America: AymaraAymara is the language of the Aymara people of the Andes. It is one of only a handful of Native American languages with over a million speakers, and it is one of the official languages of Bolivia. Many linguists believe that it is related to its more wide, Creole/ Patois, Guarani, Tupi, Tupinamba , Mapudungun, Mayan, Nahuatl, Portuguese, Quechua, Spanish, Sranan , and many others. It should be noted that Latin is not spoken there, despite the joke, often taken to be fact, that US Vice President Dan Quayle believed it was.
Religion is highly diverse as well. The primary religion throughout Latin America is Roman Catholicism, however one might also be able to find Protestant, Pentecostal, Evangelical, Buddhist, Jewish, indigenous, and Candomblé (an Afro-Latin American religion) among the many.
The reason for these diversities is because a large percentage of the people in Latin America are of mixed blood, the result of racial intermingling among European settlers, African slaves, and American natives. This mixture of cultures and keeping of certain traditions and doing away with others has made Latin America the unique, yet very influenced culture that it has today. Culture mixes are not only about the languages and religions, but also about the dance and music of Latin America as well. A Latino is a person of Latin American heritage, or from a Latin American culture.
Etymological note: Treating the term literally, one might expect the term to apply to cultures and regions in the Americas deriving from cultures speaking Romance languages (those descended from Latin). However, French-speaking areas of the Americas, such as Quebec and Acadia in Canada, are not generally considered part of Latin America. Yet this was the original intention of the term. "Latin America" was first proposed during the French occupation of Mexico (1862-1867), when Napoleon III supported Archduke Maximilian's pretensions to be emperor of Mexico. The French hoped that an inclusive notion of "Latin" America would support their cause. Mexican citizens eventually expelled the French while retaining the term " Latino"; this is one of history's more charming ironies.
The alternative term Iberoamerica is sometimes used to refer to the nations that were formerly colonies of Spain and Portugal, as these two countries are located on the Iberian peninsula. The Organization of Ibero-American States (OEI) takes this defintion a step further, by including Spain and Portugal (often termed the Mother Countries of Latin America) among its member states, in addition to their Spanish and Portuguese speaking former colonies in America.
