Let me first say this confusion exists also amongst some Latin Americans because there is a lack of Latin American history (as South American and Central American continents) taught in Latin America. Each country focuses largely on their own because each country has such a rich and diverse history.
But let's take your argument apart.
BROWN:
The whole subject of "brown" and their diverse shades has been discussed before and is currently joked about in Peruvian politics, where Alan García said he was more Peruvian because of his "copper" skin color. Naturally, this is ridiculed by most because it is a joke to talk about skin color since mestizos can be all shades of brown (indigenous blood notwithstanding). And then there is tanning (even mentioning this sounds ridiculous); as in, there are people with lighter skin who just happen to be tanned, because they live in an area where it is mostly sunny (sometimes all year round). You'll find a higher percentage of "white"-looking people in capital cities in Latin America. And many mestizos can pass off as Spanish (from Spain, just in case it isn't clear). And there are also indigenous peoples who are white (see indigenous groups that live closer to the Andean Cordillera or similar places of higher altitudes, such as Huaraz where there is a mix of all skin colors and valleys such as Pasco where there is an Austro-German community that immigrated there from the late 1800s. Uruguay probably has a larger "white" population than Argentina, and Paraguay has a very high one, too. You'll find lots of white people in Southern Brazil. One last thing about "brown", Latin Americans generally accept, rightfully so, that being "brown" has very little to do with Moorish or African ancestry, and if you have any noticeable Moorish or African features, you are mostly considered to have "black" attributes, since blacks do not originate from Latin America.
LANGUAGE:
No, most people do not speak French as their native language in Latin America and the Caribbeans. Haiti is the obvious one that has French and Creole as their official language, but only about 10% speak it fluently, and this is in a population of 9 million. French Guiana obviously has French as their official language, but they're a population of 217,000 with many people speaking other dialects and languages. Suriname has Dutch as their official language, with Guyana and Belize having English as theirs and a minority speak other Cariban languages, with tiny Belize having 40% Spanish speakers, I believe. These countries are minorities, though. That's about it for French. Portuguese is only spoken in Brazil, a country with a population of 203 million. All this out of a population of 580 million in Latin America. As for Guaraní, yes, it is an official language of Paraguay, with 4,650,000 speakers; a majority since the country's population is 6 million, but still a minority within the total Latin American population. If you want to count a language that is spoken by 200,000 people (Mapuzugun), go ahead, but then we start getting into the smaller languages and dialects, too, which are many, all throughout Latin America. Peru and Bolivia are interesting in that they sought to preserve indigenous culture. Peru's official languages are Spanish, Quechua and Aymara, in order of amount of speakers. Aymara is actually spoken by very few Peruvians, though, and Quechua by 13% of the population--another minority language. Quechua is spoken by 20% of Bolivia's population, and Aymara 14%, with Spanish being the majority.
I mention all of this so you can have a perspective for what I am about to say about language in Argentina. When colonizers arrived in modern day Argentina, there were about 35 languages spoken there. Now there are only 12. A variant of Quechua (called Quichua, most likely different from the "Incan" Quechua) is spoken in Santiago de Estero by 100,000 people, a city founded by Spanish settlers. Four Guaraní variants are spoken in Argentina: Chiriguano (known in Argentina as Ñandeva) spoken in Jujuy and Salta by about 15,000 people; the Guaraní Correntino is the official language of Corrientes; Mbyá is spoken by 3,000 people in Misiones; and lastly, the Paraguayan Guaraní spoken at various parts of the borders. Chaco has "co-official" languages: Qom, Moqoít, and Wichí (spoken by 45,000) from the Mataco language family. In Rosario, there are about 10,000 Wichi speakers/peoples. There are other dialects and subdialects such as Mivaclé, Chorote, and in Patagonia (Santa Cruz, specifically), Tehuelche (Aonikenk or Aonek'o 'ajen), with all these also being minority languages/dialects and the last spoken by just a few; there used to be more in the south, but the Conquest of the Desert nearly wiped them all out.
My point is there is a wealth of variety in each country, and many minority languages and minority peoples. Argentina is not an exception. All of them mixed with some type of European, whether it was a Western, Central or Eastern European.
And just to be clear, very few Catholics believe in Catholic saints that correspond to "American gods". And if by "American religions" you mean "indigenous religions", then, no. Most of Latin America is Roman Catholic, with an increasing number of Protestants, namely in Brazil.
Thank you for the interesting and informative reply.
The reason brown-skinned mestizos can pass as Spanish is because many Spanish people have a fair bit of Moorish blood, so they're brown-skinned themselves. "Moorish" can mean lots of different ethnic groups, some but not all of whom look "black".
I didn't know about these pink-skinned American indigenous people. Where can I learn more?
Uruguay definitely has a larger "white" population than Argentina.
It is certainly true that most people don't speak French as their native language in Latin America. But I didn't say they did. I said that most people in Latin America do speak one of French, Spanish, or Portuguese. I included French to avoid the debate about whether Haiti and French Guiana are part of Latin America. Adding more Romance languages to the list (Romansch! Ladino!) wouldn't make the statement less true. That's simple logic.
Suriname, Belize, and Guyana aren't part of Latin America, so they're irrelevant.
The numbers you quote for Bolivia are for primary language: 20% of Bolivians primarily speak Quechua. A much larger number speak primarily Spanish but also Quechua. I suspect the same thing is true of the other statistics you cite.
Your statistics for Argentina are a good demonstration of how Argentina is much less American (and more European) than the rest of the continent. In Peru, 20% of the people primarily speak Quechua; the Quechua-speaking community you mention in Santiago del Estero, by contrast, is 0.25% of the Argentine population, proportionally 80 times smaller.
There is indeed a wealth of variety in each country, even in Argentina, but Argentina's American heritage, in terms of language, genes, and religion, is extremely marginal here in the capital, and marginal even in the rest of the country.
> And just to be clear, very few Catholics believe in Catholic saints that correspond to "American gods". And if by "American religions" you mean "indigenous religions", then, no.
There are lots of examples of syncretic saint/American-god combinations. Here is one you might find interesting:
Of course the Catholic people who worship, excuse me, venerate these saints do not believe that they are worshipping Aztec or Maya or Mapuche gods or celebrating Aztec religious festivals; that would be heretical. Nevertheless, there are identifiable collections of attributes that have been transferred from pagan deities to Catholic saints, and from pagan festivals to Catholic holidays.
Not around here, though. We just have Gauchito Gil.
kragen, chromosomes passed on from Spanish people from their own ancestries are not something that people distinguish/highlight--at least not in South America. You are right, however, in stating that, colloquially/conversationally, "Moorish" can mean lots of different ethnic groups, but in my field of study, this interpretation is usually seen as pejorative. So, I was specifically talking about the immigrants in the Iberian Peninsula from the time of Al Andalus.
Regarding "pink-skinned" American indigenous peoples, the thing you have to understand is that there are many patches of Latin American territory that are not visited or studied (you can say they remain "undiscovered"), so there is no nomenclature or taxonomy for a specific tribe. So, there are dozens of indigenous tribes with no names and many that haven't been discovered yet. I mentioned the areas where they are from so you can get an idea and Google the places (Huaraz, Pozuzo, etc.), but, as you know, there was an incredible amount of mixing from Europeans (from all over Western and Central Europe) and the indigenous peoples, in this case from Peru.
The study of non-Spanish European immigrants in other South American countries that are not Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile, and I assume Southern Brazil, is still in its infancy, and, as an example (because I wrote on this and know more about it), German immigrants in many parts of the continent were never documented, and families of German descent (myself included) are only now formalizing everything and documenting where their ancestors came from and giving a rough estimate of a year of arrival based on memory and oral traditions. It's very difficult, though, because of the way Latin America functions, both politically, bureaucratically and socially. The take away point is that Latin America is a lot more diverse than books or numbers state, but the issue is that we can only guide ourselves by the numbers and facts (creating a dichotomy). This is why in Latin America we talk a lot about the "other history", the history that is not written or formalized, the history of oral tradition and information handed down through other means. Even in Argentina, there is a movie called "La historia oficial". It is one of Latin America's major themes in history.
Despite all this, here I go citing numbers again (because, unfortunately, that is what we have to work with): there are only 48 million indigenous peoples (discovered) in all of the Americas. Usually, only people who consider themselves "indigenous" (there is a social aspect to it, too, not just biological) speak an indigenous language. This means indigenous peoples are a minority and, in fact, are in danger of becoming extinct.
The reason why I brought up Peru and Bolivia is because they have the highest population of aborigines, and because they understand that they need to be protected. Peru and Cuba have a long history of sociopolitical discourse protecting minorities and different ethnicities.
Despite this "other history" and "undiscovered tribes", I do believe it is better to err on the side of caution. There is still much to be done and studied in Latin America. Because each group of people lives a different "reality" and each region is so isolated from one another, I'd rather think there is more to be found out and looked at, because not everything is as homogenized and connected as the United States (but even there, Americans aren't aware of customs and differences between other regions, and how many parts of the country look like a "developing nation").
Anyway, I need to cut this short, but on the subject of syncretism, the major indigenous gods were transferred over to Catholicism because Europeans needed a way to explain to indigenous peoples about Christianity, and as masters of proselytism, they understood that they had to get on their good side and gain their trust ("tame" them, in colonial speak) in order to facilitate a conquest. So, there is some overlap, but not much, because the God of Rain or God of Thunder had no real equivalent in Christianity, and Europeans taught indigenous peoples that these gods were inferior and these characteristics were held by an all-mightier god. So, most indigenous creation gods became the equivalent of the Christian God. As such Tonantzin, the female counter part of an All Mighty God, became Virgen de Guadalupe in Nueva España, just as the First Council of Constantinople made the Virgin Mary "official". Both of these female counterparts were created for similar reasons and both were derived from pagan gods/concepts.
Anyway, yes, of course, Suriname, Belize and Guyana aren't Latin American countries, but they are territorially in Latin America, and I mentioned them since you mentioned Haiti, which isn't really considered a Latin American country (there is a whole debate on what we should call "Latin America" or Spanish-speaking countries and what countries should be included, along with Brazil and Spain). So, I mentioned these other countries just in case.
Let me first say this confusion exists also amongst some Latin Americans because there is a lack of Latin American history (as South American and Central American continents) taught in Latin America. Each country focuses largely on their own because each country has such a rich and diverse history.
But let's take your argument apart.
BROWN:
The whole subject of "brown" and their diverse shades has been discussed before and is currently joked about in Peruvian politics, where Alan García said he was more Peruvian because of his "copper" skin color. Naturally, this is ridiculed by most because it is a joke to talk about skin color since mestizos can be all shades of brown (indigenous blood notwithstanding). And then there is tanning (even mentioning this sounds ridiculous); as in, there are people with lighter skin who just happen to be tanned, because they live in an area where it is mostly sunny (sometimes all year round). You'll find a higher percentage of "white"-looking people in capital cities in Latin America. And many mestizos can pass off as Spanish (from Spain, just in case it isn't clear). And there are also indigenous peoples who are white (see indigenous groups that live closer to the Andean Cordillera or similar places of higher altitudes, such as Huaraz where there is a mix of all skin colors and valleys such as Pasco where there is an Austro-German community that immigrated there from the late 1800s. Uruguay probably has a larger "white" population than Argentina, and Paraguay has a very high one, too. You'll find lots of white people in Southern Brazil. One last thing about "brown", Latin Americans generally accept, rightfully so, that being "brown" has very little to do with Moorish or African ancestry, and if you have any noticeable Moorish or African features, you are mostly considered to have "black" attributes, since blacks do not originate from Latin America.
LANGUAGE:
No, most people do not speak French as their native language in Latin America and the Caribbeans. Haiti is the obvious one that has French and Creole as their official language, but only about 10% speak it fluently, and this is in a population of 9 million. French Guiana obviously has French as their official language, but they're a population of 217,000 with many people speaking other dialects and languages. Suriname has Dutch as their official language, with Guyana and Belize having English as theirs and a minority speak other Cariban languages, with tiny Belize having 40% Spanish speakers, I believe. These countries are minorities, though. That's about it for French. Portuguese is only spoken in Brazil, a country with a population of 203 million. All this out of a population of 580 million in Latin America. As for Guaraní, yes, it is an official language of Paraguay, with 4,650,000 speakers; a majority since the country's population is 6 million, but still a minority within the total Latin American population. If you want to count a language that is spoken by 200,000 people (Mapuzugun), go ahead, but then we start getting into the smaller languages and dialects, too, which are many, all throughout Latin America. Peru and Bolivia are interesting in that they sought to preserve indigenous culture. Peru's official languages are Spanish, Quechua and Aymara, in order of amount of speakers. Aymara is actually spoken by very few Peruvians, though, and Quechua by 13% of the population--another minority language. Quechua is spoken by 20% of Bolivia's population, and Aymara 14%, with Spanish being the majority.
I mention all of this so you can have a perspective for what I am about to say about language in Argentina. When colonizers arrived in modern day Argentina, there were about 35 languages spoken there. Now there are only 12. A variant of Quechua (called Quichua, most likely different from the "Incan" Quechua) is spoken in Santiago de Estero by 100,000 people, a city founded by Spanish settlers. Four Guaraní variants are spoken in Argentina: Chiriguano (known in Argentina as Ñandeva) spoken in Jujuy and Salta by about 15,000 people; the Guaraní Correntino is the official language of Corrientes; Mbyá is spoken by 3,000 people in Misiones; and lastly, the Paraguayan Guaraní spoken at various parts of the borders. Chaco has "co-official" languages: Qom, Moqoít, and Wichí (spoken by 45,000) from the Mataco language family. In Rosario, there are about 10,000 Wichi speakers/peoples. There are other dialects and subdialects such as Mivaclé, Chorote, and in Patagonia (Santa Cruz, specifically), Tehuelche (Aonikenk or Aonek'o 'ajen), with all these also being minority languages/dialects and the last spoken by just a few; there used to be more in the south, but the Conquest of the Desert nearly wiped them all out.
My point is there is a wealth of variety in each country, and many minority languages and minority peoples. Argentina is not an exception. All of them mixed with some type of European, whether it was a Western, Central or Eastern European.
And just to be clear, very few Catholics believe in Catholic saints that correspond to "American gods". And if by "American religions" you mean "indigenous religions", then, no. Most of Latin America is Roman Catholic, with an increasing number of Protestants, namely in Brazil.