WHAT IS THE CAUSE OF DIVERSITY IN SOUTH AMERICA? - CULTURE VOCABULARY - 2024

The diversity in South America is due to the expansion processes generated by the political, economic and military models of the so-called imperialist or central countries. The idea of ​​giving quality of life to small nations or taking advantage of their resources resulted in an ethnic mix unique in its variety.

South America is made up of 13 countries: Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Chile, Guyana, Ecuador, Paraguay, Trinidad and Tobago, Peru, Uruguay, Suriname, French Guiana (French region) and Venezuela.

The root of diversity in South America is in the colonial era. Source: pixabay.com

Latin America is mestizo by definition; In their desire to conquer, the colonists fostered the emergence of new lines and races on American soil by mixing the different civilizations with each other.

The ethnic fusion between European whites, African blacks and American Indians gave rise -among many others- to social groups such as the Creoles, the mestizos, the mulattoes, the so-called “jump backwards”, and other variations.

These alliances between the different groups helped to form the castes, which classified individuals according to lineage, parents, and the social class to which they belonged.

Many scholars consider that, at bottom, it was nothing more than a method of economic and political domination that was later strengthened with evangelization.

The conquest

The empires of Spain and Portugal were the first to settle in America. Spain achieved a greater presence in these territories and established the viceroyalties of Peru, Nueva Ganada and Río de la Plata.

The history of South America is closely related to the history of the American continent, which is divided into Central America, North America, and South America.

South America has an extensive cultural and historical amalgam that closely links numerous civilizations. Formerly, the aboriginal populations developed alien to other existing societies in the other continents; one of the most prominent corresponds to the Incas.

Presence of African slaves

South America was a melting pot for the invasions of the European empires, especially Spain and Portugal after the discovery of Christopher Columbus and signing the Treaty of Tordesillas.

African slaves were taken to America; inevitably, this provoked a process of miscegenation and transculturation that changed the destiny of the new continent.

Numerous cities were founded that were organized into viceroyalties that depended directly on the Spanish Crown. Later, these viceroyalties were divided into smaller nuclei and became independent.

Fight against the Incas

Colombia gave way to the Spanish to confront the powerful Inca Empire, which ruled a territory that stretched from Ecuador to the northern part of Chile.

The Spanish conquerors capitalized on a power conflict during the Inca civil war, in which the warrior leader Atahualpa established ties with the conqueror Francisco Pizarro, who later betrayed and imprisoned him.

This made those peoples subjected by the Inca Atahualpa to sympathize with the invader. After the secession dispute, the Spanish could have access to the south.

The current territory of Chile was taken by Pedro de Valdivia in 1540. Michimalonco, one of the leaders of the Mapuche tribes, ended the city of Santiago founded by the Spanish. Despite resistance from the Mapuches (who murdered Valdivia), northern Chile succumbed to Spanish rule.

Creation of the colonies

Venezuela, Panama and Colombia - located on the Caribbean coast - make up the first administrative model established by Spain.

Carlos I of Spain created the viceroyalty of Peru, which encompassed the entire South American territory conquered by the Spanish and the great part of Central America. Then, in 1717, the viceroyalties of New Granada and Río de la Plata were separated.

In 1511 the captaincies of Brazil were created, after the concessions made by Portugal in 1503 to the Banca de Fugger for the exploitation of wood expired.

Portugal extended its dominions to the west, encompassing almost the entire current Brazilian border. When the French Emperor Napoleon banished the Portuguese royal family, they settled in Rio de Janeiro.

The problem of labor

Enslaving the natives did not give the expected results, since the diseases brought by the Europeans spread epidemics that caused the death of these natives.

The encomienda system was intended to improve the condition of these communities, but resulted in a significant number of African blacks arriving in the region as the new slave labor force.

In addition to the business of slaves as labor, another was developed in parallel: the pirate smuggling of which Spanish peasants were part. The result was the formation of a new social platform that replaced the indigenous labor force, which brutally disappeared.

All this political, economic and social movement was a breeding ground for the emergence of a new race characterized by its ethnic and cultural diversity, which is currently the most significant distinction of our civilization.

Mix of civilizations

In the American continent, plurality is appreciated in the diverse cultures and ethnic groups, in the different political, economic and social situations that imply multiplicity.

Obviously, there are clear differences that are determined by historical particularities, the scale of transculturation and miscegenation, and the characteristics of cultural products (folklore, crafts, gastronomy, artistic expressions, among others).

So, America is a diverse continent, multicultural in its idiosyncrasy, in its myths and in its creations. This can be seen in the artistic legacy of the American Baroque, which synthesized in its various manifestations -especially in architecture- the mixture of the indigenous with the European.

Determining phenomenon

Miscegenation has been considered one of the most relevant phenomena in the West. America was the recipient of a significant and unprecedented sociocultural movement.

The protagonists of this process were the aborigines of our region, the European settlers and the blacks brought from Africa under the figure of slaves.

Contact between these civilizations gave rise to the so-called New World, where links were created between different perspectives, ways of life and beliefs. The notion of otherness was inclusive and America, enriched, became a kind of unity in diversity.

Although it devastated indigenous cultural territories, this meeting of cultures also clashed with strongly rooted beliefs that prevailed and, after a dialectical antagonism, they managed to find coincidences and merge with the new elements, resolving the conflict and giving way to a reinterpretation of social thought..

References

1. “Mestizaje” in Wikipedia. Retrieved on May 11, 2019 from Wikipedia: wikipedia.org
2. Recondo, Gregorio “Diversity, cultural identity and integration in Latin America” in Group of Studies and Investigations on Globalizations. Retrieved on May 11, 2019 from the Study and Research Group on Globalizations: mondialisations.org
3. Stavenhagen, Rodolfo. "Cultural diversity in the development of the Americas" in Organization for American Studies. Retrieved on May 12, 2019 from the Organization of American States: oas.org
4. Sandoval, Pablo "Cultural diversity, development and social cohesion" at Academia. Retrieved on May 11, 2019 from Academia: academia.edu
5. Ríos, Patricia "Otherness as the principle of global citizenship" in ResearchGate. Retrieved on May 12, 2019 from ResearchGate: researchgate.net
6. Garcia, Nestor. "Hybrid Cultures" PDF in Monoskop. Retrieved on May 12, 2019 from Monoskop: monoskop.corg
7. "Creoles, mestizos, mulattos or backpacks: how the division of castes arose during the Spanish rule in America" ​​on the BBC. Retrieved on May 12, 2019 from BBC: bbc.com
8. Spanish colonization of America in Wikipedia. Retrieved on May 12, 2019 from Wikipedia: wikipedia.org