Ecuador

Resumen

Since pre-Columbian times the region that is now Ecuador has been an area of great cultural diversity. In part this diversity is due to the country's terrain. Over the last thousand years and before the demographic changes of the mid-twentieth century, most of the population inhabited the region where the Andes mountains reach their narrowest point. Here generous rainfall and volcanic soil ensure the narrow valleys' fertility. Elsewhere the landscape ranges from high-altitude moors (known as páramos) to the rainforests of the Amazon basin and the Pacific coastal plains. In this diverse geographical setting the indigenous peoples did not evolve into demographically large empires but lived in complex networks of smaller societies (Salomon, 1987).KeywordsIndigenous PeopleCapita ConsumptionChild LabourBilingual EducationIndigenous WomanThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.