Population
According to thesciencetutor, Argentina was one of the first countries in South America to suffer a decline in birth and death rates, and today there is a relatively low population increase. The population density is an average of 16 residents per km2, but the population is fairly unevenly distributed over the country; 3/4 live on the cultivable part of Pampas, which represents 20 percent of the country’s area, while large parts of Patagonia, Gran Chaco and the areas along the border with Chile are almost uninhabited.
The urbanization rate has been high in recent decades, and the urban population is 92 percent. More than 1/3 of Argentines currently live in or around the capital Buenos Aires (13.1 million residents, 2010, in the metropolitan area 14.6 million). Other million cities are Córdoba (1.5 million) and Rosario (1.2 million).
The population of Argentina is more than 95 percent Europeans, thereby differentiating it from other Latin American states (except Uruguay). In the West, there is a greater proportion of mastics, and together with the remnants of the Native American population they make up about 3 percent of the total population. Immigration has been significant since the mid-19th century; From 1857 to 1939, net immigration from Europe was 5.5 million. Since the 1950s, immigration flows have come mainly from neighboring countries. Immigrants during the decades around the turn of the century were often 70 to 80 percent Spaniards and Italians, while French, British and Germans contributed to the cosmopolitan atmosphere. The influence of English culture is most evident in schools and clubs belonging to the country’s higher society; otherwise, the heritage of the Mediterranean countries dominates. There are still groups that speak Basque, Sicilian, Ukrainian, Welsh and Swedish (in, among others, Oberá and Misiones in northeastern Argentina). The masculine aggressive machismoid ideal is prominent in urban environments. The pasture operation at Pampas has created gauchon, the famous cattle driver. The Gauchoid ideal has strong elements of individualism and the desire for freedom.
Some of Gran Chaco’s indigenous people, e.g. the guaicurú-speaking abipón and mocoví, were able to master large parts of the Argentine plains in the 18th and 19th centuries. Further south, hunter and gatherer people lived, such as puelche at Pampas and tea huelche in Patagonia. The ona and yahgan peoples of the wildland were eradicated by epidemics of introduced diseases, against which the indigenous people lacked immunity, and by ruthless Indian hunters. Nowadays, Argentina’s indigenous people are no longer threatened by physical extinction but by assimilation (acculturation). However, through new Indian laws in several provinces, their situation has changed. In the Northwest, Northeast and West the Native American population is increasing, and the total number of Native Americans is probably significantly higher than previously assumed. In the highland region, quechua and mapuche are large populations, and in the dry Gran Chaco, some of South America’s largest lowland people live: tobacco, mataco and ava. Faced with the threat of integration, these various peoples are linked together in the emerging Native American movement.
Language
In addition to Spanish, which is an official language and is spoken by practically the entire population, there are still some 20 native languages. Of these, different quechua languages, spoken by just over 2% of the population, dominate, while mapudungun (mapuche), wichí, aymara, toba and the tupí-guaraní language chiriguano and related languages together account for about 0.5%.
Religion
After 1539, the Spanish Catholic Colonial Church was responsible for the extinction of the Native American religion. In response to this, Jesuits developed Native American cooperatives, so-called reduccciones. After independence in 1816, the first Anglican Foreign Assembly was opened in Buenos Aires in 1829. In 1836, Methodists and Presbyterians came to Argentina. The majority of the population, 91.6%, are Catholics, belonging to 50 dioceses. In the 1960s, a Catholic renewal began. The hierarchy was divided during the military dictatorship 1976–83, when the opposition bishop Angelelli was killed in 1976. In Argentina there are also Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodists and Pentecostals, 140,000 Orthodox and 330,000 Jews. Ecumenical cooperation is concentrated on social issues, reduction of the debt burden and defense of human rights.
