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Huaso


A huaso is a Chilean countryman and skilled horseman, similar to the Argentinian, Rio Grande do Sul's or Uruguayangaucho, the American cowboy, and Mexican vaquero and charro. Huasos are found all over Central and Southern Chile while the Magellan Region sheep raisers are gauchos.

Huasos (plural) are generally found in Chile's central valley. They ride horses and typically wear a straw hat called a chupalla. They also wear a poncho called a manta or a chamanto over a short Andalusian waist jacket, as well as tooled leather legging over booties with raw hide leather spur holders that sustain a beautiful long shanked spur with 4" rowels, and many other typical garments.

Huasos are an important part of Chilean folkloric culture and are a vital part of parades, fiestas, and holidays. The dancing of the cueca in which the coy china is courted by the persistent huaso, both traditionally attired, is de rigueur on such occasions.

In Chile the term huaso or ahuasado (in a huaso way) is also used disparagingly to refer to people without manners or lacking the sophistication of an urbanite, akin to a redneck.

Etymology

Various theories are commonly advanced: from the Quechua huakcha (hispanicized as huacho) meaning orphan, not belonging to a community, hence free and homeless, an important aspect of the huaso/gaucho myth, or alternatively from the Quechua huasu, meaning either the back of an animal, or rough and rustic. Moreover the word guaso/a is used in Andalusian and American Spanish with the last sense. It appears that a form of folk etymology has operated to conflate the contrasting identities of the huaso, viewed as both a free horseman (implying some wealth and nobility) and an unsophisticated country bumpkin. Both senses can be observed in Chilean usage.

See also

Chilean rodeo

Chilean horse

Vaquero

Cowboy (U.S.A)

Gaucho

Charro

Guajiro (Cuba)

Llanero (Venezuela and Colombia)

[[:es:Chagra | Chagra]] (Ecuador)

External links

Huaso Postcards

Huaso photographs (text in Spanish)

http://www.huasochileno.cl/

http://www.pro-ohiggins.cl/libro/cuerpo/3_2_4.asp

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This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Huaso


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