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Vocab for L. America
Unit 3 Vocabulary- Chapters 9,10,11
Question | Answer |
---|---|
llanos | A large, grassy, treeless area in South America, used for grazing and farming |
cerrado | a savanna that has flat terrain and moderate rainfall, which make it suitable for farming |
pampas | a vast area of grassland and rich soil in south-central South America |
rain forest | a forest region located in the Tropical Zone with a heavy concentration of differentspecies of broadleaf trees |
slash-and-burn | a way of clearing fields for planting by cutting trees, brush, and grasses and burning them |
terraced farming | an ancient technique for growing crops on hillsides or mountain slopes, using step-like horizontal fields cut into the slopes |
push factors | a factor that causes people to leave their homelands and migrate to another region |
pull factors | a factor that draws or attracts people to another location |
infrastructure | the basic support systems needed to keep an economy going, including power, communications, transportation, water, sanitation, and education systems |
Spanish Conquest | the conquering of the Native Americans by the Spanish |
Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) | the political party introduced in 1929 in Mexico that helped to introduce democracy and maintain political stability for much of the 20th century |
mestizo | people of mixed Spanish and Native American heritage |
maquiladoras | a factory in Mexico that assembles imported materials into finished goods for export |
NAFTA | North American Free Trade Agreement, an important trade agreement creating a huge zone of cooperation on trade and economic issues in North America |
calypso | a style of music that began in Trinidad and combines musical elements from Africa, Spain, and the Caribbean |
reggae | a style of music that developed in Jamaica in the 1960s and is rooted in African, Caribbean, and American music, often dealing with social problems and religion |
Tenochtitlan | the ancient Aztec capital city which is the site of Mexico City today |
cultural hearth | a place from which important ideas spread |
Panama Canal | a ship canal that was built to connect the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean |
informal economy | jobs which take place outside official channels, without benefits or protections for workers such as street vending, shining shoes, and other small services |
Inca | people who built a civilization in the Andes Mountains in the 15th and 16th centuries |
Quechua | the language of the Inca Empire, now spoken in the Andes Highlands |
Mercosur | an economic common market that began operating in the southern cone of S. America in 1995 |
Treaty of Tordesillas | a treaty between Spain and Portugal in 1494 that gave Portugal control over the land that is present-day Brazil |
Carnival | the most colorful feast day in Brazil celebrated in the week before the beginning of Lent |
samba | A Brazilian dance with African influences |
capoeira | a martial art and dance that developed in Brazil from Angolans who were taken there by the Portuguese from Africa |
biodiversity | the variety of organisms within an ecosystem |
deforestation | the cutting down and clearing away of trees and forests |
global warming | the buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, preventing heat from escaping into space and causing rising temperatures and shifting weather patterns |
debt-for- nature swap | a debt-reducing deal wherein an organization agrees to pay off a certain amount of government debt in return for protection of a certain portion of rain forest |
oligarchy | government run by a few persons or small group |
junta | a government run by generals after a military takeover |
caudillo | a military dictator or political boss |
land reform | the process of breaking up large landholdings to attain a more balanced land distribution among farmers |
favelas | slums in Brazil |
North American Free Trade Agreement, an important trade agreement creating a huge zone of cooperation on trade and economic issues in North America |