Term | Definition |
Conquistador | Name for the Spanish explorers who claimed land in the Americas for Spain |
Cultural convergence | The contact and interaction of one culture with another |
Caudillos | A Latin American military dictator |
Pampas | A grasslands region in Argentina and Uruguay |
Cay | A small, low island or coral reef |
Coral | The rocklike skeletons of tiny sea animals |
Tropical storm | A storm with winds of at least 39 miles (63 km) per hour |
Hurricane | A destructive tropical storm that forms over the Atlantic Ocean, usally in late summer and early fall, with winds of at least 74 miles (119 km) per hour |
El Nino | A warm ocean current off South Americas northwestern coast that influences global weather patterns |
Canopy | The uppermost layer of a forest where tree branches meet |
Mestizo | A person of mixed European and Native American heritage |
Mulatto | A person of mixed African and European ancestry |
Plateau | An area of high, flat land |
Peninsula | A strip of land that juts out into an acean |
Irragation | The watering of farmland with water drawn from reservoirs or rivers |
Sinkhole | A hole formed with limestone is dissolved, causing the land above to collapse |
Hacienda | A large Spanish-owned estate in the Americas, often run as a farm or a cattle ranch |
Land redistribution | A policy by which land is taken from those who one large amounts and redistributed to those who have little or none |
Ejido | Farmland owned collectively by members of a rural community |
Subsistence farming | Farming that provides only enough for the needs of a family or a village |
Latifundio | A large commercial farm owned by a private individual or a farming company |
Cash crop | A farm crop grown for sale and profit |
Migrant worker | A worker who travels from place to place, working where extra help is needed to cultivate or harvest crops |
NAFTA | Norht American Free Trade Agreement, which phased out trade barriers among the Unites States, Canada, and Mexico |
Maquiladora | A factory in Mexico, along the United States border, that assembles goods for export |
Market economy | An economic system in which decisions about production, price, and other economic factors are determined by the law of supply and demand |
GDP per capita | The total value of goods and services produced within a country in a year, divided by the country's total population |
Command economy | An economic system that is controlled by a single central government |
Traditional economy | An economic system in which families produce goods and services for their own use, with little surplus and exchange goods; also known as a subsistence economy |