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Chapter 2 Vocab
key terms for middle america
Term | Definition |
---|---|
Primate city (and example) | A country's largest city--ranking atom its urban hierarchy--most expressive of the national culture and usually (but not in every case) the capital city as well (Ex: Tokyo) |
NAFTA | The free-trade launched in 1994 involving the United States, Canada, and Mexico. |
Maquiladoras | The term given to modern industrial plants in Mexico's US border zone. These foreign-owned factories assemble imported components and/or raw materials, and then export finished manufactures, mainly to the US. |
Land bridge | A narrow isthmian link between two large landmasses. |
Archipelago | A set of islands grouped closely together, usually elongated into a chain. |
Hurricane Alley | The most frequent pathway followed by tropical storms and hurricanes over the past 150 years in their generally westward movement across the Caribbean Basin. |
Altitudinal Zonation | Vertical regions defined by physical-environmental zones at various elevations, particularly in the highlands of South and Middle America. |
Tropical deforestation | The clearing and destruction of tropical rainforests in order to make way for expanding settlement frontiers and the exploitation of new economic opportunities. |
Culture hearth | Heartland, source area, or innovation center; place of origin of a major culture. |
Mestizo | Derived from the Latin word for mixed, refers to a person of mixed European (white) and Amerindian ancestry. |
Hacienda | Literally, a large estate in a Spanish-speaking country. |
Plantation | A large estate owned by an individual, family, or corporation and organized to produce a cash crop. |
Small-island developing economies | The additional disadvantages faced by lower-income island-states because of their often small territorial size and populations as well as overland inaccessibility. |
Acculturation | Cultural modification resulting from intercultural borrowing. |
Transculturation | Cultural borrowing and two-way exchanges that occur when different cultures of approximately equal complexity and technological level come into close contact. |
Ejidos | Mexican farmlands redistributed to peasant communities after the Revolution of 1910-1917. |
Remittances | Money earned by emigrants that is a set back to family and friends in their home country, mostly in cash; forms an important part of the economy in poorer countries. |
Offshore banking | Term referring to financial havens for foreign companies and individuals, who channel their earnings to accounts in such a country (usually an "offshore" island-state) to avoid paying taxes in their home countries. |
Social Stratification | In a layered or stratified society, the population is divided into a hierarchy of social classes. In an industrialized society, the working class is at the lower end; elites that possess capital and control the means of production are at the upper level. |
Mulatto | A person of mixed African (black) and European (white) ancestry. |