Peru's black community is struggling to keep its African heritage alive and maintain an identity unique from that of whites and Indians.
Black academics like sociologist Susana Matute believe it will take generations to teach Peruvian blacks to be proud of their African heritage."The hardest thing for us is to learn how to be blacks," Ms. Matute said.
Twice a year the dusty coastal town of El Carmen, 120 miles southeast of Lima, holds festivals that promote aspects of Peruvian black culture like cuisine, poetry, music and dance.
As soon as they can walk, boys here learn to play percussion instruments like the cajon, a wooden box with a sound hole, and the quijada, a donkey's jawbone with rattling teeth.
Girls dance the festejo, lando and zamacueca, complex, African-inspired rhythms that demand supple body movements.
Their infectiously joyful music is popular among other Peruvians. Blacks also have made their mark on Peru's cuisine and the arts. Restaurants abound in Lima featuring dishes of African origin such as anticuchos (skewered oxheart), cau cau (stewed tripes) and arroz zambito (rice pudding).
The first blacks were brought to Peru in 1532 by Spanish conqueror Francisco Pizarro, after he was authorized by the royal court to import 50 slaves to work plantations.
The number of descendants of the Yoruba, Mandinga, Congos and Propos tribes brought over as slaves reached a peak of 60,000 in the late 17th century.
The black population declined after the importation of slaves stopped in 1810. Slavery in Peru was abolished in 1854. Today, there are fewer than 30,000 blacks in Peru's population of 22 million.
Amador Ballumbrosio, Peru's greatest exponent of Afro-Peruvian music, plays a homemade violin in his ramshackle home in El Carmen, while his 8-year-old son Jesus performs the zapateo, an intricate dance similar to tap.
Ballumbrosio, 59, said Peruvians patronize black artists, but don't try to understand their culture.
"People organize homages to me, but they're really just taking advantage of a poor black man for their own ends," Ballumbrosio said, looking around at his bamboo roof and crumbling plaster walls. "They know nothing of the black man's sacrifice, his struggle."
Limited opportunities for non-menial jobs and higher education lead many blacks to feel they are largely excluded from Peruvian society.
"Peruvians want blacks to be amusing, to dance and generally act the clown, like the American black entertainer of the 1920s," said Rafael Santa Cruz, a musician who cultivates Afro-Peruvian traditions.
"But if blacks start to think, then they're subversive - people don't like it," he said.
In the capital, Lima, blacks mainly crowd into cramped housing in rundown and crime-infested neighborhoods. The few who escape poverty do so by excelling in music and sports like boxing, volleyball and soccer.