Latin America

Latin America (Spanish: América Latina or Latinoamérica; Portuguese: América Latina; French: Amérique latine) is the region of the Americas where Romance languages (i.e., those derived from Latin), particularly Spanish, Portuguese and French, are primarily spoken.

Definition

• In most common contemporary usage, Latin America refers only to those territories in the Americas where the Spanish or Portuguese languages prevail: Mexico, most of Central and South America, plus Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico in the Caribbean, as well as the smaller numbers of French and Papiamentu speakers that reside in the region
• Strictly speaking, Latin America can designate all of those countries and territories in the Americas where a Romance language (i.e. languages derived from Latin, and hence the name of the region) is spoken: Spanish, Portuguese, and French, and creole languages based upon these. Indeed, this was the original intent when the term was popularized by Napoleon III as part of his campaign to install Maximilian as emperor of Mexico.Fact: date=December 2007 Using this definition, Latin America includes not only all Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries, but also the current and former French territories in the hemisphere, including Quebec in Canada; Louisiana in the United States; Haiti, Martinique and Guadeloupe in the Caribbean; French Guiana in South America; and St. Pierre and Miquelon near Newfoundland.
• Often, particularly in the United States, the term may be used to refer to all of the Americas south of the U.S., including such countries as Belize, Jamaica, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Antigua and Barbuda, and the Bahamas where English prevails.
• The former Dutch colony Suriname, the Netherlands Antilles, and Aruba are not usually considered part of Latin America, although in the latter two, a predominantly Iberian-derived creole language, Papiamento, is spoken by the majority of the population.
• In historical terms, Latin America could be defined as all those parts of the Americas that were once part of the Spanish, Portuguese, and French Empires, and that speak languages stemming from Latin. Under this definition, much of the U.S. Southwest, Florida, and French Louisiana would be also included in the region.

The distinction between Latin America and Anglo-America, and more generally the stress on European heritage (or Eurocentrism), is simply a convention by which Romance-language and English-speaking cultures are distinguished, currently being the predominant languages in the Americas. There are, of course, many places in the Americas (e.g. highland Ecuador, Bolivia, Guatemala, and Paraguay) where American Indian cultures and languages are important, as well as areas in which the influence of African cultures is strong (e.g. the Caribbean, including parts of Colombia and Venezuela, coastal Ecuador, coastal Peru, and coastal Brazil).