Portal:Latin America

Intro

Latin America (Spanish and Portuguese: América Latina; French: Amérique Latine) is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish and Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geography, and as such it includes countries in both North and South America. Most countries south of the United States tend to be included: Mexico and the countries of Central America, South America and the Caribbean. Commonly, it refers to Hispanic America plus Brazil. Related terms are the narrower Hispanic America, which exclusively refers to Spanish-speaking nations, and the broader Ibero-America, which includes all Iberic countries in the Americas and occasionally European countries like Spain, Portugal and Andorra. Despite being in the same geographical region, English- and Dutch-speaking countries and territories are excluded (Suriname, Guyana, the Falkland Islands, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Belize, etc.).

The term Latin America was first introduced in 1856 at a Paris conference titled, literally, Initiative of the Americas: Idea for a Federal Congress of the Republics (Iniciativa de la América. Idea de un Congreso Federal de las Repúblicas). Chilean politician Francisco Bilbao coined the term to unify countries with shared cultural and linguistic heritage. It gained further prominence during the 1860s under the rule of Napoleon III, whose government sought to justify France's intervention in the Second Mexican Empire. (Full article...)

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A bronze statue of Luis Aparicio, the namesake of the award

The Luis Aparicio Award is given annually to a Venezuelan player in Major League Baseball (MLB) who is judged to have recorded the best individual performance in that year. The winner of the award is determined by a vote conducted by Venezuelan sports journalists and Spanish-language media around the world. It is named after former MLB shortstop Luis Aparicio, who is the only player from Venezuela to be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. The award was first presented in 2004, and was created in order to honour Aparicio's major league career and to commemorate his father, who died thirteen years before his son was elected into the Hall of Fame.

Johan Santana, Jose Altuve, Miguel Cabrera, and Ronald Acuña Jr. are the only players to win the Luis Aparicio Award more than once, with Cabrera having won the award five times. Cabrera won the MLB Most Valuable Player (MVP) Award and Hank Aaron Award alongside the Luis Aparicio Award in 2012 and 2013, becoming the first Venezuelan to win the MLB MVP Award. Santana, the 2004 and 2006 recipient, also won the Cy Young Award in those two years, winning by a unanimous vote on each occasion. Altuve is the only player to win the Luis Aparicio Award, the MVP award, and become a World Series champion in the same season in 2017. He has also won a batting title in three of his four award seasons. Santana (2006) and Cabrera (2012) are the only award winners to also earn the pitching and batting Triple Crown respectively in the same season. In accomplishing the feat, Cabrera became the first player in 45 years to achieve a Triple Crown in batting since Carl Yastrzemski in 1967, while Santana became the first pitcher since Dwight Gooden in 1985 to secure a "Major League Triple Crown" by leading all of MLB in wins, earned run average and strikeouts. Francisco Rodríguez compiled a major league record of 62 saves in a single season in 2008 and went on to win the Rolaids Relief Man Award in the same year as the Luis Aparicio Award. Five winners, Cabrera, Altuve, Magglio Ordóñez, Carlos González, and Arráez, were batting champions in their respective leagues in the same year they won the award. (Full article...)

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Topics

More did you know -

... that Carmen Casco de Lara Castro, founder of one of the first human rights organizations in Latin America, was arrested, denied a passport, and monitored by the Stroessner regime?

WikiProjects

WikiProject South America
WikiProject Latin America (semi-active)

Selected article -

Skyline from El Ávila National Park

Caracas (/kəˈrækəs, -ˈrɑːk-/ kə-RA(H)K-əs, Spanish: [kaˈɾakas]), officially Santiago de León de Caracas (CCS), is the capital and largest city of Venezuela, and the center of the Metropolitan Region of Caracas (or Greater Caracas). Caracas is located along the Guaire River in the northern part of the country, within the Caracas Valley of the Venezuelan coastal mountain range (Cordillera de la Costa). The valley is close to the Caribbean Sea, separated from the coast by a steep 2,200-meter-high (7,200-foot) mountain range, Cerro El Ávila; to the south there are more hills and mountains. The Metropolitan Region of Caracas has an estimated population of almost 5 million inhabitants.

The historic center of the city is the Cathedral, located on Bolívar Square, though some consider the center to be Plaza Venezuela, located in the Los Caobos area. Businesses in the city include service companies, banks, and malls. Caracas has a largely service-based economy, apart from some industrial activity in its metropolitan area. The Caracas Stock Exchange and Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) are headquartered in Caracas. Empresas Polar is the largest private company in Venezuela. Caracas is also Venezuela's cultural capital, with many restaurants, theaters, museums, and shopping centers. Caracas has some of the tallest skyscrapers in Latin America, such as the Parque Central Towers. The Museum of Contemporary Art of Caracas is one of the most important in South America. (Full article...)

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Did you know (auto-generated)

... that Tural, the setting of the expansion pack Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail, is inspired by Latin America and Southeast Asia?
... that UK prime minister Rishi Sunak complained when a joint declaration was made at a summit between the EU and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States that used the term Islas Malvinas?
... that Diana Vicezar created recycled housing for street dogs, a recruitment platform for international students, and a podcast about Latin American students in Ireland?

General images

The following are images from various Latin America-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Agrarian reform poster, Guatemala 1952 (from History of Latin America)
Image 2Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (from History of Latin America)
Image 3A 17th-century map of the Americas (from History of Latin America)
Image 4The Basilica of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida is the second largest in the world, after only of the Basilica of Saint Peter in Vatican City. (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 5Fiambre, Guatemalan traditional dish, eaten on November 1, the Day of the Dead (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 6The Guadalajara International Film Festival is considered the most prestigious film festival in Latin America. (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 7Map of Countries in Latin America with Socialist regimes during the Cold War c. 1985 (from History of Latin America)
Image 8Roll-on/roll-offships, such as this one pictured here at Miraflores locks, are among the largest ships to pass through the Panama Canal. The canal cuts across the Isthmus of Panama and is a key conduit for international maritime trade. (from History of Latin America)
Image 9Calls for justice in the wake of the Guatemalan genocide (from History of Latin America)
Image 10Exhumation of corpses in the aftermath of the Guatemalan genocide (from History of Latin America)
Image 11Instituto Arnoldo Gabaldón, declared August 30, 1984, as a National Historic Landmark (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 12Plaquita, a Dominican street version of cricket. The Dominican Republic was first introduced to cricket through mid-18th century British contact, but switched to baseball after the 1916 American occupation. (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 13Left-leaning leaders of Bolivia, Brazil and Chile at the Union of South American Nations summit in 2008 (from History of Latin America)
Image 14Pope Paul VI and Salvadoran cleric Oscar Romero (now St Oscar Romero) (from History of Latin America)
Image 15Fidel Castro and his men in the Sierra Maestra, 2 December 1956 (from History of Latin America)
Image 16Monument to Cuauhtémoc, Mexico City (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 17Che Guevara Cuban revolutionary poster (from History of Latin America)
Image 18Comandanta Ramona of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, Mexico (from History of Latin America)
Image 191903 political cartoon: President Roosevelt intimidating Colombia to acquire the Panama Canal Zone. (from History of Latin America)
Image 20Villa de Leyva, a historical and cultural landmark of Colombia (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 21Mexican Stock Exchange (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 22In blue countries under right-wing governments and in red countries under left-wing and centre-left governments as of 2023 (from History of Latin America)
Image 23Countries in Latin America by date of independence (from History of Latin America)
Image 24Ethnic distribution by country. (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 25The joropo, as depicted in a 1912 drawing by Eloy Palacios (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 26Holy week, Ouro Preto-MG, 2010. Chrome. Photo: Guy Veloso. (from Culture of Latin America)
Image 27The name Augusto Sandino, Nicaraguan nationalist hero for his struggle against the United States, was taken by leftist guerrillas as the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). (from History of Latin America)
Image 28Intermediate level international-style Latin dancing at the 2006 MIT ballroom dance competition. A judge stands in the foreground. (from Culture of Latin America)

Selected panorama

The Juscelino Kubitschek bridge (Portuguese: Ponte Juscelino Kubitschek), also known as the President JK Bridge or just the JK Bridge, is a steel and concrete bridge that crosses Lake Paranoá in Brasília, capital of Brazil.

Selected picture

Mola (art form)

Credit: Markus Leupold-Löwenthal

The mola or molas, forms part of the traditional outfit of a Guna woman, two mola panels being incorporated as front and back panels in a blouse. The full costume traditionally includes a patterned wrapped skirt (saburet), a red and yellow headscarf (musue), arm and leg beads (wini), a gold nose ring (olasu) and earrings in addition to the mola blouse (dulemor). In Dulegaya, the Guna's native language, "mola" means "shirt" or "clothing". The mola originated with the tradition of Guna women painting their bodies with geometrical designs, using available natural colors; in later years these same designs were woven in cotton, and later still, sewn using cloth bought from the European settlers of Panama.