Portal:Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The Indigenous peoples of the Americas Portal

Current distribution of Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the peoples who are native to the Americas or the Western Hemisphere. Their ancestors are among the pre-Columbian population of South or North America, including Central America and the Caribbean. Indigenous peoples live throughout the Americas. While often minorities in their countries, Indigenous peoples are the majority in Greenland and close to a majority in Bolivia and Guatemala.

There are at least 1,000 different Indigenous languages of the Americas still in use in the 21st century. Some languages, including Quechua, Arawak, Aymara, Guaraní, Nahuatl, and some Mayan languages, have millions of speakers and are recognized as official by governments in Bolivia, Peru, Paraguay, and Greenland. (Full article...)

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Chaco Culture National Historical Park is a United States National Historical Park hosting the densest and most exceptional concentration of pueblos in the American Southwest.The park is located in northwestern New Mexico, between Albuquerque and Farmington, in a remote canyon cut by the Chaco Wash. Containing the most sweeping collection of ancient ruins north of Mexico, the park preserves one of the most important pre-Columbian cultural and historical areas in the United States.

Between AD 900 and 1150, Chaco Canyon was a major center of culture for the Ancient Pueblo Peoples.Chacoans quarried sandstone blocks and hauled timber from great distances, assembling fifteen major complexes that remained the largest buildings in North America until the 19th century.Evidence of archaeoastronomy at Chaco has been proposed, with the "Sun Dagger" petroglyph at Fajada Butte a popular example. Many Chacoan buildings may have been aligned to capture the solar and lunar cycles,requiring generations of astronomical observations and centuries of skillfully coordinated construction Climate change is thought to have led to the emigration of Chacoans and the eventual abandonment of the canyon, beginning with a fifty-year drought commencing in 1130.

Comprising a UNESCO World Heritage Site located in the arid and sparsely populated Four Corners region, the Chacoan cultural sites are fragile – concerns of erosion caused by tourists have led to the closure of Fajada Butte to the public. The sites are considered sacred ancestral homelands by the Hopi and Pueblo people, who maintain oral accounts of their historical migration from Chaco and their spiritual relationship to the land. Though park preservation efforts can conflict with native religious beliefs, tribal representatives work closely with the National Park Service to share their knowledge and respect the heritage of the Chacoan culture.

The park is on the Trails of the Ancients Byway, one of the designated New Mexico Scenic Byways.

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Tom Torline (Diné), photographed at Carlisle Indian School, ca. 1882

image credit: public domain

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General images

The following are images from various Indigenous peoples of the Americas-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Tunumiit Inuit couple from Kulusuk, Greenland (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 2Pre-contact distribution of native American languages in the Southwest US, Mexico, and Central America (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 3Indigenous peoples textile art in 1995 by Julia Pingushat, including Inuk, Arviat, Nunavut, Canada, wool, and embroidery floss (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 4The tomato (jitomate, in central Mexico) was later cultivated by the pre-Hispanic civilizations of Mexico. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 5A Huichol woman from Zacatecas, Mexico (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 6A carnival with Tzeltal people in Tenejapa Municipality, Chiapas (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 7Owners of a roadside cafe near Cachi, Salta Province, Argentina (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 8Proportion of Native Brazilians in each department in 2022. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 9Ceramic portrait of a Maya noblewoman, Jaina Island, Mexico, 600–800 CE (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 10The West Indies (or Antilles) in relation to the continental Americas (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 11Proportion of Native Americans in each county in 2020. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 12A bison hunt depicted in a painting by George Catlin (1844) (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 13A Choctaw artist in present-day Oklahoma (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 14Areas of Indigenous peoples in the Americas at time of European colonization (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 15A map of Canada showing the percent of self-reported Indigenous identity (First Nations, Inuit, Métis) by census division, according to the 2021 Canadian census (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 16A map showing the origin of the first wave of humans into the Americas, including the Ancestral Northern Eurasian, which represent a distinct Paleolithic Siberian population, and the Northeast Asians, which are an East Asian-related group. The admixture happened somewhere in Northeast Siberia. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 17A Warao family traveling in their canoe in Venezuela (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 18Evo Morales, an Aymara member and former President of Bolivia (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 19Guambía people relaxing in Colombia (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 20Proportion of Native Mexicans in each municipalities in 2020. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 21An illustration in Florentine Codex, compiled between 1540 and 1585 CE, depicting the Nahua peoples suffering from smallpox during the conquest-era in central Mexico (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 22A representation of the domesticated plant species cultivated by Indigenous peoples have influenced the crops that were produced globally. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 23Wayuu women in the Guajira Peninsula, which encompasses parts of Colombia and Venezuela (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 24Quechua women in festive dress on Taquile Island on Lake Titicaca, west of Peru (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 25An Indigenous woman in traditional dress near Cochabamba, Bolivia (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 26Proportion of Native Argentines in each department in 2022. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 27An elderly Maya woman (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 28The major indigenous language families of South America, except Quechua, Aymara, and Mapuche (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 29A schematic illustration of maternal (mtDNA) gene-flow in and out of Beringia, from 25,000 years ago to present
Image 30Language families of Indigenous peoples in North America shown across present-day Canada, Greenland, the United States, and northern Mexico (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 31Members of an uncontacted tribe encountered in Acre in Brazil in 2009 (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 32Indigenous Pipil women dancing in the traditional Procession of Palms in Panchimalco, El Salvador (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 33Pre-contact distribution of North American language families (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 34Principal component analysis showing the Native American cluster in other Eurasian populations. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 35Chimu culture feather pectoral, feathers, reed, copper, silver, hide, cordage, c. 1350–1450 (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 36A Navajo boy in the desert in present-day Monument Valley in Arizona with the "Three Sisters" rock formation in the background in 2007 (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 37Modern Maya people in Sololá, Guatemala (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 38An Indigenous man playing a panpipe, antara, or siku (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 39Embera girl in the Darién Province, 2006. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 40A Mapuche man in present-day Chile (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 41Indigenous people at a farm plantation in Minas Gerais in present-day Brazil, c. 1824 (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 42A Navajo man on horseback in present-day Monument Valley in Arizona (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 43Maya glyphs in stucco now on display at Museo de sitio in Palenque, Mexico (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 44A Mapuche man and woman; the Mapuche make up about 85% of Indigenous population that live in Chile. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 45The common bean is native to Mexico and Central America and later began to be cultivated in South America. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 46The Rarámuri marathon in Urique (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 47Indigenous populations of the Americas in 2024 (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 48Moche portrait vessel from Peru, 100 BCE–500 CE (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 49An Indigenous Terena man from present-day Brazil (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 50The ancient Mesoamerican engraving of maize now on display at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 51Shaman of the Cofán people from the Amazonian forest in present-day Ecuador (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 52A Quechua woman and child in the Sacred Valley in Cuzco Region, Peru (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)
Image 53A qpGraph on the formation of Ancient Paleo-Siberians and Native American populations. (from Indigenous peoples of the Americas)

Selected biography

Morales during the Oruro carnival in February 2012

Juan Evo Morales Ayma, (born October 26, 1959), popularly known as Evo (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈeβo]), is a Bolivian politician, cocalero activist, and footballer, who has served as President of Bolivia since 2006. Widely regarded as the country's first democratically-elected president to come from the indigenous population, his administration has focused on the implementation of leftist policies, poverty reduction, and combating the influence of the United States and transnational corporations in Bolivia. A democratic socialist, he is the head of the Movement for Socialism (MAS) political party.

Born to an Aymara family of subsistence farmers in Isallawi, Orinoca Canton, Morales undertook a basic education before mandatory military service, in 1978 moving to Chapare Province. Growing coca and becoming a trade unionist, he rose to prominence in the campesino (rural laborers) union, campaigning against U.S. and Bolivian attempts to eradicate coca as a part of the War on Drugs, which he denounced as an imperialist violation of indigenous Andean culture. He repeatedly engaged in anti-government direct action protests, resuting in multiple arrests. Entering electoral politics in 1995, he became the leader of the MAS and was elected to Congress. His campaign focused on issues affecting indigenous and poor communities, advocating land reform and the redistribution of gas wealth. Gaining increasing visibility through the Cochabamba protests and gas conflict, in 2002 he was expelled from Congress, though came second in that year's presidential election.

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Did you know…

... that the Cascajal Block, a serpentinite slab from the Olmec civilization, was dated to the which early first millennium BCE and may represent the earliest writing system in the Americas?
... that Jim Thorpe (Sac and Fox) won the 1912 Olympic gold medals for the pentathlon and decathlon?
...that underwater panthers were creatures appearing in the mythology of a number of Native American traditions, which combined the features of mountain lions or lynx with those of snakes, and were believed to inhabit the deepest parts of lakes and rivers?

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