Transcript Scenes of Developing Countries

A View of Developing Countries
Meaning of Third World
• Practical definition – poor developing
countries
• Has lost some meaning
– 1st World – Rich, non-communist market
economies
– 2nd World – Communist countries (they have
practically disappeared)
– 3rd World – non-communist poor countries
with “immature” economies
A More Realistic Approach
• Developed Countries (formerly 1st World)
• Developing Countries (all the other
countries)
• What about the former 2nd World?
– They are divided between the two groups –
i.e. the Czech Rep. is in the developed group,
whereas Vietnam is in the developing group.
Latin America
Land of the Maya
300-900 AD
The Roman Empire was already declining.
Mezoamerican Art
Housing much like that of
the Pre-Colombian Maya
1st step in milpa agriculture - clearing
2nd step -- burning
Ashes serve as fertilizer
Will produce a
decent harvest for
several years only.
Typical rural
town or village
market.
Some are descended from
the Maya
About 50 percent of Guatemala's 11 million people are
Indians, who speak 24 indigenous languages.
1% of the population owns 80% of
the land. 20% of “white” men own
cars; only 5% of Indian men do.
99 percent of the
population owns 20 percent
of the land.
Copal, resin collected
from pine trees in the
surrounding
mountains, is burned
in the Roman
Catholic church.
Belize
Spanish cultural influence architecture
Comparative Values
1 Pepsi = 1 peso OR 1 peso = 20 kg. of corn for a family for
a week.
The Cathedral in Mexico City is the largest in Latin
America. It took 300 years to build. The Zocalo (plaza) in
front of it is the largest in the world.
lDeforestation results from high
prices paid for tropical hardwoods.
Lumberjacks
averaged $10-15
per week;
food for a family
of six cost $6.
In the 19th century the Yucatan was an informal
colony of Chicago’s International Harvester, which
turned the sisal into bailer twine for Midwestern
farmers. The planters built wedding-cake mansions
in Merida and sent their children to schools in New
Orleans and Havana.
Sisal Plants
Sisal cut & bundled for
shipping
Sisal fibers drying
Loading primary products for export
Rainfall
variations in
Central
America
Checking coffee beans
Fields of cash crops for export
Raw latex?
Exposing poor, red lateritic soil
Tourism does little for the poor.
West Africa
350 years of slave trade here -- 9.5 million slaves
Dutch Fort 1637
Portuguese Fort 1482
South Asia
Galle, Sri Lanka
Portuguese 1580-1640
Dutch 1640-1796
British 1796-1948
Independence 1948
Tea is grown in the Hill Country, above 1,220 meters.
British colonials brought the Tamil Hindu (from India) minority to pick tea.
The British established coffee (until 1870s), and later, tea plantations; in
1948 the socialist government nationalized most of these private estates.
3 billion people in the world depend on rice for their food!
Sinhalese Buddhist are the majority in Sri Lanka.
What food is being sold at this roadside shop?
The bounty of the tropics. Why would people being hungry?
Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka's first capital in the 4th century BC.
A Buddhist statute
The rock fortress of Sigiriya, the
Lion Rock was built by King
Kashyapa, in the last quarter of the
5th Century to fend off the
persistent South Indian invaders.
People climb up
the 200-meter
precarious metal
steps to see the
temple dancers
painted in the
caves 1,500 years
ago.
And you think studying is hard work?