Latin America
Latin America (Portuguese/Spanish: América Latina) is the region of the Americas where Romance languages — those derived from Latin — are officially or primarily spoken. Latin America is distinct from Anglo-America, a region of the Americas where English, a Germanic language, predominates.
There are several definitions of Latin America:
From a strict cultural and linguistic perspective, it would include all countries and territories where Romance languages — Spanish, Portuguese, French, and their creoles — are spoken.
The most common view is that Latin America includes territories in the Americas where Spanish or Portuguese prevail: Mexico and most of Central America, South America, and (per land area and population) the Caribbean. The acronym “LACRO” refers to this view. The English-speaking American countries are not considered to be part of Latin America. Territories where other Romance languages such as French (e.g., Quebec in Canada) or Kreyol (e.g. Haiti, Martinique and Guadeloupe) predominate are frequently not considered to be part of Latin America from this perspective, despite the French origins of the concept. The former Dutch colonies Suriname, Netherlands Antilles and Aruba are not considerend parts of Latin America, even though in the latter two, the predominantly Iberian-influenced language Papiamentu is more widely spoken than Dutch.
Sometimes, particularly in the United States, the term “Latin America” is used to refer to all of America south of the U.S., including countries such as Belize, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Jamaica, Barbados and Suriname where non-Romance languages prevail. Conversely, it is often used in Brazil to designate the Spanish-speaking countries within this area, which are often known as Hispanic America.
Geopolitically, Latin America is divided into 20 independent countries and several dependent territories. Spanish is predominant and an official language in most Latin American countries, with the exception of Brazil where Portuguese prevails.