Chiquitano

Chiquitano
Drawing of typical Chiquitano dress,
by Alcide d'Orbigny, 1831
Total population
88,358 (2012)[1]
Regions with significant populations
 Bolivia ( Santa Cruz Department  Beni) 87,885 (2012)[1]
 Brazil ( Mato Grosso) 473 (2012)[1]
Languages
Chiquitano, Spanish, Portuguese[2]
Religion
Traditional tribal religion, Christianity[2]

The Chiquitano or Chiquitos are an indigenous people of Bolivia, with a small number also living in Brazil. The Chiquitano primarily live in the Chiquitania tropical savanna of Santa Cruz Department, Bolivia, with a small number also living in Beni Department and in Mato Grosso, Brazil. In the 2012 census, self-identified Chiquitanos made up 1.45% of the total Bolivian population or 145,653 people, the largest number of any lowland ethnic group.[3] A relatively small proportion of Bolivian Chiquitanos speak the Chiquitano language. Many reported to the census that they neither speak the language nor learned it as children.[4] The Chiquitano ethnicity emerged among socially and linguistically diverse populations required to speak a common language by the Jesuit Missions of Chiquitos.[5]

  1. ^ a b c "Chiquitano: Introduction." Instituto Socioambiental: Povos Indígenas no Brasil. Retrieved 31 March 2012
  2. ^ a b "Chiquitano." Ethnologue. Retrieved 31 March 2012.
  3. ^ "Censo de Población y Vivienda 2012 Bolivia Características de la Población". Instituto Nacional de Estadística, República de Bolivia. p. 29. Archived from the original on 2021-08-01. Retrieved 2020-03-27.
  4. ^ Albó, Xavier; Carlos Romero (2009). Autonomías Indígenas en la realidad boliviana y su nueva Constitución (PDF). La Paz: Vicepresidencia del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia. p. 19.
  5. ^ Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL) (2005). Los pueblos indígenas de Bolivia: diagnóstico sociodemográfico a partir del censo del 2001. Santiago, Chile: United Nations. p. 39.