Globalization & Climate Change
This term describes the increasing interconnectedness of people, places, and economies around the world.
Globalization
This mountain range runs the length of western South America.
Andes Mountains
This exchange of plants, animals, people, and diseases reshaped both hemispheres after 1492.
The Columbian Exchange
Fear of this ideology led the U.S. to intervene frequently in Latin America during the Cold War.
Communism
This “push factor” often drives people to leave rural areas for cities.
Economic opportunity (violence, poverty, environmental disaster)
These gases—like CO₂ and methane—trap heat in Earth’s atmosphere and contribute to global warming.
Greenhouse gases
This effect creates dry areas on one side of a mountain range because moist air drops its rain on the windward side.
The term used to describe the deadly event that wiped out up to 90% of Indigenous populations after European arrival.
Demographic collapse
This political swing describes how Latin American countries shifted between left-wing and right-wing governments.
Political pendulum
Money sent by migrants back home to support their families is known as this.
Remittances
This period marks when human activity became the dominant force shaping Earth’s systems.
Anthropocene
This river runs through Venezuela and Colombia.
Orinoco River
These companies—like the United Fruit Company—gained control over economies without directly ruling territories.
Economic imperialism / informal empire
This 1959 revolution brought a communist government to power only 90 miles from the U.S.
Cuban Revolution
This term describes a massive city of over 10 million people, such as Mexico City.
Megacity
This rapid post-1950 increase in population, production, and consumption dramatically accelerated human impact on the planet.
Great Acceleration
This phenomenon involves the large-scale removal of forests for farming, ranching, or logging.
Deforestation
This term describes the genetic and cultural mixing between Europeans and Indigenous peoples.
Mestizo
These elites—born in the Americas but of European ancestry—led many independence movements.
Creoles
People fleeing war or persecution across international borders fall into this category.
This measure compares countries’ achievements in health, education, and income to evaluate development levels.
Human Development Index (HDI)
Cities like Mexico City and São Paulo show this concept: when one huge urban area dominates a country’s economy and population.
Urban primacy
This 1494 agreement divided the Americas between Spain and Portugal.
Treaty of Tordesillas (1494)
A desire for land reform, better wages, and fairer economies explains why many Latin Americans were drawn to this political ideology in the mid-20th century.
Socialism (or Communism)
People forced to leave their homes but who remain within their country’s borders fall into this category.
Internally Displaced Person (IDP)