This chapter contains sections titled: The Question of Whether There Is a Latin American Philosophy Is There Philosophy in Latin America? References Further Reading.

This comprehensive collection of original essays written by aninternational group of scholars addresses the central themes inLatin American philosophy. Represents the most comprehensive survey of historical andcontemporary Latin American philosophy available today Comprises a specially commissioned collection of essays, manyof them written by Latin American authors Examines the history of Latin American philosophy and itscurrent issues, traces the development of the discipline, andoffers biographical sketches of key Latin American thinkers Showcases the (...) diversity of approaches, issues, and styles thatcharacterize the field. (shrink)

Critique of Latin American Reason is one of the most important philosophical texts to have come out of South America in recent decades. First published in 1996, it offers a sweeping critique of the foundational schools of thought in Latin American philosophy and critical theory. Santiago Castro-Gómez argues that “Latin America” is not so much a geographical entity, a culture, or a place, but rather an object of knowledge produced by a family of discourses in (...) the humanities that are inseparably linked to colonial power relationships. Using the archaeological and genealogical methods of Michel Foucault, he analyzes the political, literary, and philosophical discourses and modes of power that have contributed to the making of “Latin America.” Castro-Gómez examines the views of a wide range of Latin American thinkers on modernity, postmodernity, identity, colonial history, and literature, also considering how these questions have intersected with popular culture. His critique spans Central and South America, and it also implicates broader and protracted global processes. This book presents this groundbreaking work of contemporary critical theory in English translation for the first time. It features a foreword by Linda Martín Alcoff, a new preface by the author, and an introduction by Eduardo Mendieta situating Castro-Gómez’s thought in the context of critical theory in Latin America and the Global South. Two appendixes feature an interview with Castro-Gómez that sheds light on the book’s composition and short provocations responding to each chapter from a multidisciplinary forum of contemporary scholars who resituate the work within a range of perspectives including feminist, Francophone African, and decolonial Black political thought. (shrink)

While recognizing its origins and scope, Alejandro A. Vallega offers a new interpretation of Latin American philosophy by looking at its radical and transformative roots. Placing it in dialogue with Western philosophical traditions, Vallega examines developments in gender studies, race theory, postcolonial theory, and the legacy of cultural dependency in light of the Latin American experience. He explores Latin America’s engagement with contemporary problems in Western philosophy and describes the transformative impact of this encounter on (...) contemporary thought. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Identity Identity of Latin American Philosophy Four Approaches History of the Controversy Conclusion References Further Reading.

Many of the philosophical questions raised by Latin American thinkers are problems that have concerned philosophers at different times and in different places throughout the Western tradition. But in fact the issues are not altogether the same-- for they have been adapted to capture problems presented by new circumstances, and Latin Americans have sought resolutions in ways that are indeed novel. This book explains how well-established philosophical traditions gave rise in the "New World" to a distinctive manner (...) of thinking. There was no clean sweep of the past and an attempt to start over: rather, Latin American thinkers mostly welcomed European ideas at whatever pace such traditions happened to arrive. It is then no surprise that, for instance, Scholasticism became the accepted view under Spanish rule, and began to lose its grip only when the rulers did.But what does seem surprising is the radical way in which those traditions were transformed to account for problems that, though familiar, were now seen intake light of new circumstances. A distinctive Latin American way of thinking about such problems emerged from the project of "recycling" European philosophical traditions, some of which were already obsolete in Europe at the time their transplant took place. Thus theories commonly taken to be incompatible within Western traditions in philosophy were absorbed by Latin American thought-- and, in their newly acquired forms, such theories are even now at the basis of proposed solutions to many practical and philosophical problems.The book explores that recycling process. Above all, it aims to determine whether the various cultures that met in the "New World" could now be said to have come to share a common identity. This is in fact an issue which has preoccupied Latin Americans since at least the beginning of the 19th century, when their countries won their independence. But, in connection with this, it is also important to ask how Latin Americans have thought about the relationship between philosophy and rationality, and about other issues belonging to the major areas of philosophy such as epistemology, moral philosophy, and political philosophy, as well their application to vital social issues, including education and the emancipation of women. These are all taken up by the author, who pays special attention to questions of gender discrimination, justice, human rights, reparation for historically dispossessed peoples, and the role of education-- all matters of continuing concern in Latin American thought, from its earliest stirrings to the present day. (shrink)

The COVID‐ 19 pandemic is a critical test for the already overburdened and mostly underfunded public healthcare systems of Latin America. In a region that suffers from severe inequalities, public healthcare systems are the only source of medical care for a large sector of the population who work in the informal economy or are unemployed. State‐run hospitals and clinics are already overstressed by continuous demand for treatment of vector‐borne diseases and community‐acquired infections as well as high rates of non‐communicable (...) diseases. Ideological misconceptions and denial among Latin America’s political leaders prevented timely preparations for the pandemic and added to chronic governance problems. As ethical expertise in Latin America focuses on research ethics, few hospitals in the region have functioning clinical ethics committees or clinical ethics policy, forcing healthcare personnel to make excruciating treatment decisions in an environment dominated by material scarcity and public distrust. This essay examines the emergence of COVID‐19 in Latin America and the serious challenge that it poses for Latin America's public healthcare systems. (shrink)

"The essays in this book make it elegantly clear that there is a vigorous and rigorous Latin American philosophy... and that others dismiss it at their peril." —Mario Sáenz The ten essays in this lively anthology move beyond a purely historical consideration of Latin American philosophy to cover recent developments in political and social philosophy as well as innovations in the reception of key philosophical figures from the European Continental tradition. Topics such as indigenous philosophy, multiculturalism, (...) the philosophy of race, democracy, postmodernity, the role of women, and the position of Latin America and Latin Americans in a global age are explored by notable philosophers from the region. An introduction by Eduardo Mendieta examines recent trends and points to the social, political, economic, and cultural conditions that have inspired the discipline. Latin American Philosophy brings English-speaking readers up to date with recent scholarship and points to promising new directions. (shrink)

This encyclopedia article outlines the history of Latin American philosophy: the thinking of its indigenous peoples, the debates over conquest and colonization, the arguments for national independence in the eighteenth century, the challenges of nation-building and modernization in the nineteenth century, the concerns over various forms of development in the twentieth century, and the diverse interests in Latin American philosophy during the opening decades of the twenty-first century. Rather than attempt to provide an exhaustive and impossibly (...) long list of scholars’ names and dates, this article outlines the history of Latin American philosophy while trying to provide a meaningful sense of detail by focusing briefly on individual thinkers whose work points to broader philosophical trends that are inevitably more complex and diverse than any encyclopedic treatment can hope to capture. (shrink)

Twenty-two leading Latin American philosophers are featured in this complete anthology on the human condition, values, and the search for identity. Bibliography.

If we admit that Latin-American literature is a part of what is called Western culture, why, I ask myself, has it not been able to influence any of the great literatures of the West, outside of the Spanish? To be more precise, when I speak of influencing, I am not referring to the historico-cultural event that signifies Latin America, which has changed the West, but specifically to literature, that is, writing, the book, the language, the contents, the (...) creative structure and the symbols. From its origins until today, Latin-American literature, like Jugoslavian literature—in spite of the Nobel prize awarded to Ivo Andric—or Bulgarian or Icelandic, remains a marginal phenomenon. It is produced within a closed circuit, having no real resonance except in Spain. Furthermore, it struggles between two guilt feelings: one, that of being late with regard to renovating currents of fashions of the day and the other, that of not responding to its own reality. Because of those burdens of a guilty conscience, it often feigns innovation by following outside models or exalting a nationalist realism that has not produced the slightest new form but only a mediocre art of propaganda. It simulates and copies, or it lags behind. It either tries to be up to date or pretends to overcome this uneasiness by inventing an intransigent Americanism, behaving like a telluric barbarian or accepting traditional popular forms that may produce works such as Martin Fierro, whose value for the Latin-Americans cannot be denied but whose range is limited. (shrink)

The present book seeks to present a comprehensive picture of one on the most important stages in Hispanic-American thought, a stage during which there were ardent discussions of the problems presented by the incorporation of Hispanic America into the new social, political, and educational currents, once political independence had been won from Spain. This period was regarded as the incorporation of Hispanic America into civilization. There followed a discussion of the problems arising from the formation of a new order (...) that was to be a worthy substitute for the repudiated colonial order. (shrink)

Latin America - its people, its politics, its economy - has burst upon the world scene with powerful images that have captured the curiosity of many English-speaking North Americans. The strategic importance of this vast region to the stability of the Wes.

The Handbook of Latin American Environmental Aesthetics offers a comprehensive overview of Latin American aesthetic and conceptual production addressing the more-than-human environment at the intersection between art, activism, and critique. Fields include literature, performance, film, and other audiovisual media as well as their interactions with community activisms. Scholars who have helped establish environmental approaches in the field as well as emergent critical voices revisit key concepts such as ecocriticism, (post-)extractivism, and multinaturalism, while opening new avenues of (...) dialogue with areas including critical race theory and ethnicity, energy humanities, queer-*trans studies, and infrastructure studies, among others. This volume both traces these genealogies and maps out key positions in this increasingly central field of Latin Americanism, at the same time as they relate it to the environmental humanities at large. By showing how artistic and literary productions illuminate critical zones of environmental thought, articulating urgent social and material issues with cultural archives, historical approaches and conceptual interventions, this volume offers cutting-edge critical tools for approaching literature and the arts from new angles that call into question the nature/culture boundary. (shrink)

Studies the character and nature of Latin American thought, focusing on the evolution of political and social ideas.

Latin American Immigration Ethics advances philosophical conversations and debates about immigration by theorizing migration from the Latin American and Latinx context.

For Latin American philosophers, the quality of their own philosophy is a recurrent issue. Why hasn’t it produced any internationally recognized figure, tradition, or movement? Why is it mostly unknown inside and outside Latin America? Although skeptical answers to these questions are not new, they have recently shifted to some critical-thinking competences and dispositions deemed necessary for successful philosophical theorizing. Latin American philosophers are said to lack, for example, originality in problem-solving, problem-making, argumentation, and to (...) some extent, interpretation. Or does the problem arise from their vices of “arrogant reasoning?” On my view, all of these answers are incomplete, and some even self-defeating. Yet they cast some light on complex, critical-thinking virtues and vices that play a significant role in philosophical thinking. (shrink)

: "We are invisible": this melancholic assertion alludes to the "non-place" that we occupy as Latin American philosophers or, in general, as philosophers in the Spanish or Portuguese languages. We tend to survive as mere ghosts teaching courses and writing texts, perhaps some memorable ones, which, however, seldom spark anybody's interest, among other reasons, because almost no one takes the time to read them. In saying this, I do not mean to call upon a useless pathos, nor do (...) I mean to complain, or thrust forth a challenge. I am simply confirming a fact, and a widely acknowledged one at that. I wish to inquire a little into this invisibility. Later I will look into how the experience of our much acclaimed essay may help in fighting it. (shrink)

Studies the character and nature of Latin American thought, focusing on the evolution of political and social ideas.

This chapter contains sections titled: Philosophical and Scientific Approaches to Globalization in Latin America and Abroad The Philosophy of Liberation, Globalization, and Oppression The Philosophy of Liberation, Globalization, and Interculturalism Globalization, Philosophy, the Other Humanities, and the Sciences in Latin America A Working Characterization of Globalization Amazonian Development and Its Socio‐Ecological Consequences Dealing with Globalization Issues in Latin America Virtues and Limits of Legislation Beyond Tunnel‐Vision Approaches Civic Sector Partnerships References.

“Latin American Positivism: Theory and Practice” is unique in that the work examines this subject from a multi-disciplinary prospect. The philosophy contributors examine the doctrines of Latin American positivism as they evolved during the nineteenth century while the historians study the interplay between the philosophy and the larger society.

Latin American philosophy is best understood as a type of applied philosophy devoted to issues related to the culture and politics of Latin America. This introduction provides a comprehensive overview of its central topics. It explores not only the unique insights offered by Latin American thinkers into the traditional pre-established fields of Western philosophy, but also the many 'isms' developed as a direct result of Latin American thought. Many concern matters of practical ethics (...) and social and political philosophy, such as Lascasianism, Arielism, Bolívarism, modest and immodest feminisms, republicanism, positivism, Marxism, and liberationism. But there are also meta-philosophical 'isms' such as originalism and perspectivism. Together with clear and accessible discussions of the major issues and arguments, the book offers helpful summaries, suggestions for further reading, and a glossary of terms. It will be valuable for all readers wanting to explore the richness and diversity of Latin American philosophy. (shrink)

For undergraduate/graduate courses in Latin American Philosophy, Latin American Thought, Multicultural Philosophy, Latino Culture and Civilization, and Hispanic Culture and Civilization in the Departments of Philosophy, Latin American Studies, Political Science, Romance Languages, and Chicano Studies. The most comprehensive anthology in its field, 'Latin American philosophy' offers the reflections of Latin American thinkers on the nature of philosophy, justice, human rights, cultural identity, and other issues that have faced them from (...) the colonial period to the present day. Most of the essays are short and easy to read making them accessible to students with little or no philosophical background. (shrink)

A durable question in Latin American thought is whether it could amount to a characteristically Latin American philosophy. I argue that, if, as is now widely conceded, there is a role for philosophical analysis in thinking about problems that arise in applied subjects, such as bioethics, environmental ethics, and feminism, then why not also in Latin American thought? After all, the focus of Hispanic thinkers has often been upon the issues that arise in their (...) own experiences of the world, and they make up a diverse group of peoples related by very idiosyncratic ethnic and historical connections. I believe that, given some appropriate criteria, the existing corpus of works by Latin American thinkers constitutes a distinctive philosophy. (shrink)

From the most prominent thinkers in Latin American philosophy, literature, politics, and social science comes a challenge to conventional theories of globalization. The contributors to this volume imagine a discourse in which revolution requires no temporalized march of progress or takeovers of state power but instead aims at local control and the material conditions for human dignity.

Abstract:Latin American modernity/coloniality studies emerged in the early 1990s from a network of scholars focused on charting the nature and consequences of causal connections between the first appearances of modernity in Europe and Spanish and Portuguese colonialism in the Americas beginning in 1492. In this article, I address primarily epistemological and ontological issues raised by this literature for issues pertaining to the history and philosophy of science. The first section briefly summarizes the sixteenth century differences that were the (...) starting point of the modernity/coloniality analyses and points to just a few of the still-emerging feminist issues about this early era. The second section focuses on the distinctive epistemic and political stances that Latin American decolonial theorists use today to frame such analyses: they intend to do theory “otherwise.” This Latin American project has been conceptualized through Gloria Anzaldúa's influential “borderlands” thinking and aligns with the feminist standpoint methodology and other knowledge-from-below projects that have appeared in all of the social justice movements. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Metaphysics and Epistemology Ethics and Politics Aesthetic Worldviews References Further Reading.

A distinctive form of anticolonial analysis has been emerging from Latin America in recent decades. This decolonial theory argues that important new insights about modernity, its politics, and epistemology become visible if one starts off thinking about them from the experiences of those colonized by the Spanish and Portuguese in the Americas. For the decolonial theorists, European colonialism in the Americas, on the one hand, and modernity and capitalism in Europe, on the other hand, coproduced and coconstituted each other. (...) The effects of that history persist today. Starting thought from these LA histories and current realities enables envisioning new resources for social transformations. These decolonial insights seem to receive only a passing recognition in the Latin American social studies of science and technology projects that have begun cosponsoring events and publications with northern equivalents. My focus will be primarily on the decolonial theory and on just two of its themes. One is the critical resources it offers for creating more accurate and progressive northern philosophies and histories of science as well as social studies of science. The second is insights from Latin American feminists that carry different impacts in the context of the decolonial accounts. (shrink)

Through a close examination of philosopher Leopoldo Zea's historicist phenomenology, Mario Saenz offers fresh insights into the role of Mexican intellectuals in the creation of a Latin American "philosophy of liberation". While this philosophy of liberation has been widely recognized as the most intellectual political ideology to emerge from Latin America this century, few scholars have specifically explored the Mexican roots of this intellectual movement. Saenz redresses this imbalance by placing Zea and his contemporary intellectuals firmly within (...) the context of post-revolutionary Mexico, a political and social landscape that fostered criticisms of colonial and neo-colonial structures of dependence. Saenz demonstrates how Zea's philosophy was informed by a sense of Mexico's distinctive social and cultural identity. (shrink)

Throughout Latin America during the past 15 years, new democratic or postwar governments have faced demands for transitional justice following the end of authoritarian rule or the conclusion of internal armed conflicts.

Carnival was brought to the New World by Spanish and Portuguese colonizers, and it has been preserved there up to our day, although in the meantime it has almost disappeared from the countries where it originated. One asks oneself if Carnival has kept its original characteristics over the years, or if it instead has been transformed, and if so, how. The ethnological and cultural variety present in Latin America leads us to think that there must have been an evolution (...) over the years, and that Carnival should show some signs of acculturation. It is the examination of these two points that will be the subject of our study. (shrink)

Latin America plays an increasingly important role in the development of modern Christianity yet it has been underrepresented in current scholarship on religion and science. In this first edited volume on the subject, contributors explore the different ways that religion and science relate to each other, how developments in natural science shaped religious views from the pre-Hispanic period until the nineteenth century and the current debates over evolution and creationism. It will appeal to those researching theology, divinity, philosophy, history (...) of science and Latin American studies. (shrink)

This brief essay proposes to reflect on what could be Latin American bioethics, speculating about possible identity characteristics and operational limits of the idea of what constitutes Latin America, outlined conceptually by geographical, historical and cultural aspects. This attempt does not assume the task of defining exactly or definitively what Latin American bioethics is, but rather limits itself to the purpose of causing controversy in order to stimulate reflection on this topic to assess its usefulness.

This paper articulates a methodological strategy for creating a “conceptual home” whose aim is the enabling and promotion of Latin American feminist philosophy in the context of Latin American feminist theory's concern for the relationship between theory and practice. The author argues that philosophy as a discipline is still too compromised by masculine-dominant, Anglocentric, and Eurocentric ways of representing knowledge such that discursive and ideological impediments make it difficult to conceive and develop ways of feminist theorizing (...) that arise from an interpellation of the philosopher by the Latin American conditions affecting her social and cultural life. The author offers a fourfold approach to grounding knowledge, based on the principles of pursuing a critical approach to knowledge, a concern for the relationship of theory and practice, an orientation toward progressive political projects of freedom and liberation in the context of Latin American history and politics, and a transformative politics of culture. It is argued that through such specific methodological concerns, Latin American feminist philosophy can attain a distinct identity and stop depending for its articulation on paradigms of knowledge whose premises are not necessarily best attuned to understand the issues it must confront in its sociocultural practice. (shrink)

This article argues that a gender perspective enables us to better understand the emerging basis for collective organization in the world capitalist crisis. Since women and their children are most threatened by inroads on the subsistence economy, and since welfare provisions are the first budgetary cuts made by governments faced with increasing debt burdens, women are forced to engage in collective action to ensure survival. In Latin American countries, this new political arena is even more dynamic than the (...) workplace as a site for engaging in struggle. This situation contrasts with core industrial countries, where the encounter with bureaucratic agencies in redressing human welfare issues tends to fragment individual actions rather than weld together collective consciousness. (shrink)

Brief review about the Latin American Forum on the philosophy of education 2018.

Resumen El configuracionismo latinoamericano es la propuesta consumada en la obra tardía del sociólogo mexicano Enrique de la Garza Toledo. Este artículo propone una aproximación genealógica y arqueológica de esta perspectiva en tres campos convergentes. En primer lugar, como teoría social que propone la categoría de subjetividad como mediación entre estructura y acción. En segundo lugar, como una epistemología constructivista con implicancias metodológicas para la investigación social. Y, finalmente, como una corriente en el campo de la sociología del trabajo que (...) ha devenido en los nuevos estudios laborales latinoamericanos. El artículo propone, además, momentos de tensión y líneas de prospectiva a partir del desarrollo teórico, epistemológico, metodológico y de los estudios empíricos promovidos por De la Garza. Abstract Latin American configurationism is the proposal developed in the late work of Mexican sociologist Enrique de la Garza Toledo. This article proposes a genealogical and archaeological approach to this perspective in three convergent fields. First, as a social theory that proposes the category of subjectivity as a mediation between structure and action. Secondly, as a constructivist epistemology with methodological implications for social research. And finally, as a school in the field of the sociology of work that has resulted in the new Latin American labour studies. The article also proposes moments of tension and lines of prospective based on the theoretical, epistemological and methodological development and the empirical studies promoted by De la Garza. (shrink)

This chapter is devoted to the discussion of religious freedom and the anti-racist fight in the Black Diaspora in Latin America, considering the historical processes that involve such discussion, including legal apparatus such as Human Rights and local legislation. Therefore, as a starting point, we take the historical conditions of the emergence of Candomblé in Brazil, that are linked to the trafficking of enslaved African peoples and their resistance to keep alive in their memories, their religious beliefs and their (...) worldviews. Wherefore, it is a discussion in which religious freedom is not dissociated from the anti-racist struggle in the case of Brazil, where, in the 20th century, the myth of racial democracy is produced in the light of studies carried out by Gilberto Freyre in the midst of the 1922 post-week modernist movement. (shrink)

A distinctive focus of 19th- and 20th-century Latin American philosophy is the convergence of identity formation and political liberation in ethnically and racially diverse postcolonial contexts. From this perspective, Omar Rivera interprets how a "we" is articulated and deployed in central political texts of this robust philosophical tradition. In particular, by turning to the work of Peruvian political theorist José Carlos Mariátegui among others, Rivera critiques philosophies of liberation that are invested in the redemption of oppressed identities as (...) conditions for bringing about radical social and political change, foregrounding Latin America's complex histories and socialities to illustrate the power and shortcomings of these projects. Building on this critical approach, Rivera studies interrelated epistemological, transcultural, and aesthetic delimitations of Latin American philosophy in order to explore the possibility of social and political liberation "beyond redemption.". (shrink)

This review-essay offers an extended engagement with Fernando Ignacio Leiva’s Latin American Neostructuralism, one of the most important contributions to contemporary Latin-American political economy. It situates Leiva’s critique of neostructuralism against the wider backdrop of Latin America’s contradictory turn to the Left since the late 1990s, and compares the treatments of change in Latin-American capitalism over the course of the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries developed by the schools of classical structuralism, neostructuralism, and (...) neoliberalism. The essay finds that Leiva’s critique of neostructuralism and his explanation for its influence on large segments of the region’s Left is the best work on the topic currently available in English. Leiva systematically demolishes neostructuralism’s claim to be a progressive alternative to neoliberalism. At the same time, it is argued that Leiva’s theoretical framework is compromised by its uncritical adoption of categories from French regulation-theory, and its nostalgia for elements of classical structuralism and its associated development-model of import-substitution industrialisation. Further, it is found that Leiva’s implicit attachment to certain myths propagated by the Marxism of the Second and, especially, Third Internationals regarding the national bourgeoisie’s role in Third-World capitalist development leaves him unduly dogmatic about the necessity, and unduly optimistic about the possibility, of building a progressive stage of capitalism in Latin America today. The same mythologies prevent Leiva from drawing the appropriate conclusions as regards the urgent necessity of rebuilding the socialist project in Latin America and internationally. (shrink)

This publication refers to the proceedings of the Seventh Latin American on Mathematical Logic held in Campinas, SP, Brazil, from July 29 to August 2, 1985. The event, dedicated to the memory of Ayda I. Arruda, was sponsored as an official Meeting of the Association for Symbolic Logic. Walter Carnielli. -/- The Journal of Symbolic Logic Vol. 51, No. 4 (Dec., 1986), pp. 1093-1103.

This anthology offers the first serious, broad-ranging collection of English translations of significant Latin American contributions to social and political thought spanning the last forty years. Iván Márquez has judiciously selected narratives of resistance and liberation; ground-breaking texts in Latin American fields of inquiry such as liberation theology, philosophy, pedagogy, and dependency theory; and important readings in guerrilla revolution, socialist utopia, and post–Cold War thought, especially in the realms of democracy and civil society, alternatives to neoliberalism, (...) and nationalism in the context of globalization. Highlighting the vitality, diversity, and originality of Latin American thought, this anthology will be invaluable for students and scholars across the social sciences and humanities. (shrink)

Presents a unique view of the current state of development of bioethics in Latin America.

From the beginning of the environmental crisis, a constellation of ecosophies, theories, ideologies, discourses, and narratives have irrupted in the emergent complex ground of environmental philosophy and political ecology. In this non-unifyable field of forces, sociological analysis has been intended to sketch maps and derive typologies to order the different views and standpoints in science, ecological thinking, and environmental ethics so as to guide academic research or political action. From this will to set and settle differences in thought and strategy, (...) a diversity of environmentalisms has emerged; the lines are drawn from North to South, rich to poor, masculine to feminine, naturalism to culturalism. Environmentalisms differentiate their sources, attachments, and derivations from mother theories and their approaches from different disciplines. Thus, the prefix eco- or the adjective environmental are attached to traditional disciplines. Latin American environmental thinking draws its sources from critical philosophical thought; it differs from other systems of thought by a radical epistemological concept of environment; and it acquires its identity from the cultural heritage of its peoples and the ecological potentials of its territories. (shrink)