Mexico is located in North America, bordering the United States to the north. It has a long coastline facing the Pacific Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. Mexico has a long history of indigenous civilizations like the Aztecs and Maya. Today, Mexico has a population of over 120 million people and a diverse culture influenced by both indigenous and Spanish traditions. Mexican culture is expressed through art, music, cinema and cuisine. Mexico gained independence from Spain in 1821 after a prolonged independence war.

1. MexicoBy: Sandra Flores

2. GeographyMexico is in the region known as Middle America.Mexico is bounded to the north with a 5,000 kilometer border by the United States (specifically, from west to east, by California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas), to the west and south by the Pacific Ocean, to the east by the Gulf of Mexico, and to the southeast by Belize (251-kilometer border), Guatemala (871 kilometer border), and the Caribbean Sea.Geopolitically, Mexico is generally not considered part of Central America.As well as numerous neighboring islands, Mexican territory includes the more remote Isla Guadalupe and the Islas Revillagigedo in the Pacific Ocean.Mexico's total area covers 1,972,550 square kilometers, including approximately 6,000 square kilometers of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea, and Gulf of California Mexico has a 9,330 kilometer coastline, of which 7,338 kilometers face the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California, and the remaining 2,805 kilometers front the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Mexico's exclusive economic zone (EEZ), which extends 200 nautical miles (370 km) off each coast, covers approximately 2.7 million square kilometers.

3. GeographyBeginning approximately 50 kilometers from the United States border, the Sierra Madre Occidental extends 5000 kilometers south to the Río Santiago, where it merges with the Cordillera Neovolcánica range that runs east-west across central Mexico. The Sierra Madre Occidental averages 2,250 meters in elevation, with peaks reaching 3,000 meters.The Sierra Madre Oriental starts at the Big Bend region of the border with the U.S. state of Texas and continues 1,350 kilometers until reaching Cofre de Perote, one of the major peaks of the Cordillera Neovolcánica. The median elevation of the Sierra Madre Oriental is 2,200 meters, with some peaks at 3,000 meters.One other significant mountain range, the Peninsular Ranges, cuts across the landscape of the northern half of Mexico. A southern extension of the California coastal ranges that parallel California's coast, the Mexican portion of the Peninsular Ranges extends from the United States border to the southern tip of the Baja California Peninsula, a distance of 1,430 kilometers. Peaks in the California system range in altitude from 2,200 meters in the north to only 250 meters near La Paz in the south.

4. PeopleIn Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica many cultures matured into advanced civilizations such as the Olmec, the Toltec, the Teotihuacan, the Maya and the Aztec before the first contact with Europeans.Aztec is a term used to refer to certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language. From the 12th century Valley of Mexico was the core of Aztec civilization: here the capital of the Aztec Triple Alliance, the city of Tenochtitlan, was built upon raised islets in Lake Texcoco. In 1521, Hernán Cortés, along with a large number of Nahuatl speaking indigenous allies, conquered Tenochtitlan and defeated the Aztec Triple Alliance under the leadership of HueyiTlatoaniMoctezuma II. Subsequently the Spanish founded the new settlement of Mexico City on the site of the ruined Aztec capital.The Maya is noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as its art, architecture, and mathematical and astronomical systems. The Maya peoples never disappeared. Today, the Maya and their descendants form sizable populations throughout the Maya area and maintain a distinctive set of traditions and beliefs that are the result of the merger of pre-Columbian and post-Conquest ideologies (and structured by the almost total adoption of Roman Catholicism).

5. PeopleThe Maya peoples constitute a diverse range of the Native American people of southern Mexico and northern Central America. The overarching term "Maya" is a convenient collective designation to include the peoples of the region who share some degree of cultural and linguistic heritage; however, the term embraces many distinct populations, societies, and ethnic groups, who each have their own particular traditions, cultures, and historical identity.There are an estimated 7 million Maya living in this area at the start of the 21st century. Ethnic Maya of southern Mexico and the Yucatan Peninsula, Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador, and western Honduras have managed to maintain substantial remnants of their ancient cultural heritage. Some are quite integrated into the modern cultures of the nations in which they reside, while others continue a more traditional culturally distinct life, often speaking one of the Mayan languages as a primary language.The largest populations of contemporary Maya inhabit the Mexican states of Yucatán, Campeche, Quintana Roo, Tabasco, and Chiapas, and in the Central American countries of Belize, Guatemala, and the western portions of Honduras and El Salvador.

6. CultureMexican culture reflects the complexity of the country's history through the blending of pre-Hispanic civilizations and the culture of Spain, imparted during Spain's 300-year colonization of Mexico. Exogenous cultural elements mainly from the United States have been incorporated into Mexican culture. As was the case in most Latin American countries, when Mexico became an independent nation, it had to slowly create a national identity, being an ethnically diverse country in which, for the most part, the only connecting element amongst the newly independent inhabitants was Catholicism.Mexican films from the Golden Age in the1940s and 1950s are the greatest examples of Latin American cinema, with a huge industry comparable to the Hollywood of those years. Mexican films were exported and exhibited in all of Latin America and Europe.Mexican society enjoys a vast array of music genres, showing the diversity of Mexican culture. Traditional music includes Mariachi, Banda, Norteño, Ranchera and Corridos; on an every-day basis most Mexicans listen to contemporary music such as pop, rock, etc. in both English and Spanish. Mexico has the largest media industry in Latin America, producing Mexican artists who are famous in Central and South America and parts of Europe, especially Spain.Two of the major television networks based in Mexico are Televisa and TV Azteca. Televisa is also the largest producer of Spanish-language content in the world and also the world's largest Spanish-language media network.

7. CulturePost-revolutionary art in Mexico had its expression in the works of renowned artists such as Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, Rufino Tamayo, Federico Cantú Garza, David Alfaro Siqueiros and Juan O'Gorman. Academic music composers of Mexico include Manuel María Ponce, José Pablo Moncayo, Julián Carrillo, Mario Lavista, Carlos Chávez, Silvestre Revueltas, Arturo Márquez, and Juventino Rosas, many of whom incorporated traditional elements into their music. Nobel Prize winner Octavio Paz, Carlos Fuentes, Juan Rulfo, Elena Poniatowska, and José Emilio Pacheco, are some of the most recognized authors of Mexican literature.Mexican cuisine is known for its intense and varied flavors, colorful decoration, and variety of spices. Most of today's Mexican food is based on pre-Columbian traditions, including the Aztecs and Maya, combined with culinary trends introduced by Spanish colonists. The conquistadores eventually combined their imported diet of rice, beef, pork, chicken, wine, garlic and onions with the native pre-Columbian food, including maize, tomato, vanilla, avocado, papaya, pineapple, chili pepper, beans, squash, limes, sweet potato, peanut and turkey. The most internationally recognized dishes include chocolate, tacos, quesadillas, enchiladas, burritos, tamales and mole among others. Regional dishes include mole poblano, chiles en nogada and chalupasfrom Puebla; cabrito and machaca from Monterrey, cochinitapibil from Yucatán, Tlayudas from Oaxaca, as well as barbacoa, chilaquiles, milanesas, and many others.

8. HistoryCampfire remains in the Valley of Mexico have been radiocarbon-dated to 21,000 BCE, and a few chips of stone tools have been found near the hearths, indicating the presence of humans at that time. Around 9,000 years ago, ancient indigenous peoples domesticated corn and initiated an agricultural revolution, leading to the formation of many complex civilizations. Between 1,800 and 300 BCE, many matured into advanced pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilizations such as: the Olmec, the Teotihuacan, the Maya, the Zapotec, the Mixtec, the Toltec and the Aztec, which flourished for nearly 4,000 years before the first contact with Europeans. These civilizations are credited with many inventions and advancements including pyramid-temples, mathematics, astronomy, medicine and theology.On September 16, 1810, independence from Spain was declared by priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, in the small town of Dolores, Guanajuato. Following his death, the leadership was assumed by priest José María Morelos. In 1813, the Congress of Chilpancingo was convened and on November 6, signed the "Solemn Act of the Declaration of Independence of Northern America". In subsequent years, the insurgency was near collapse, but in 1820 Viceroy Juan Ruiz de Apodaca sent an army under the criollo general Agustín de Iturbide against the troops of Vicente Guerrero. Instead, Iturbide approached Guerrero to join forces, and in 1821 representatives of the Spanish Crown and Iturbide signed the "Treaty of Córdoba", which recognized the independence of Mexico under the terms of the "Plan of Iguala".Agustin de Iturbide immediately proclaimed himself emperor of the First Mexican Empire. A revolt against him in 1823 established the United Mexican States. In 1824, a Republican Constitution was drafted and Guadalupe Victoria became the first president of the newly born country. The first decades of the post-independence period were marked by economic instability, which led to the Pastry War in 1836, and a constant strife between liberales, supporters of a federal form of government, and conservadores, proposals of a hierarchical form of government.

9. HistorySuspended the 1824 Constitution, civil war spread across the country, and three new governments declared independence: the Republic of Texas, the Republic of the Rio Grande and the Republic of Yucatán. Texas successfully achieved independence and was annexed by the United States, a border dispute led to the Mexican–American War, which began in 1846 and lasted for two years, settled via the "Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo" forcing Mexico to give up nearly half of its land to the U.S., including California and New Mexico. Further transferred some of its territories, southern Arizona and New Mexico, via the Gadsden Purchase in 1854. The Caste War of Yucatán, the Mayan uprising that began in 1847,was one of the most successful modern Native American revolts.Maya rebels, or Cruzob, maintained the Maya free state until the 1930s.Dissatisfaction with Santa Anna's return to power led to the liberal "Plan of Ayutla", initiating an era known as La Reforma, after which a new Constitution was drafted in 1857 that established a secular state, federalism as the form of government and several freedoms. As the conservadores refused to recognized, the War of Reform began in 1858, both groups had their own governments, but ended in 1861 with the liberal victory led by Amerindian President Benito Juárez. In the 1860s underwent a military occupation by France, which established the Second Mexican Empire under the rule of Habsburg Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian of Austria with support from the Roman Catholic clergy and the conservadores, who later switched sides and joined the liberales. Maximilian surrendered, was tried on June 14 and was executed on June 19, 1867.

10. SourcesGeography:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_mexicoPeople: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexicohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_civilizationhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztechttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayan_peopleCulture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico#CultureHistory:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico#History