The biologist and geographer Johannes F. Brakel recounts encounters and experiences in America. He describes the inhabitants' dependence on nature—from the Amazon rainforest to the cold tundra of Canada—and reports on foreign influences, oil sand extraction, banana plantations, and illegal logging, as well as the hopes and new ideas of the people and their possibilities for freedom. How do people live in America? For instance, the Dene in northwest Canada in their desperate struggle against oil sand extraction? Or the Haida on the west coast of British Columbia? What is life like for immigrants in the bustling city of Vancouver, and what is it like for the residents of the capital, Lima? What is the daily life of the Bribri in the rainforests of Costa Rica and the workers on the adjacent massive banana plantations? What are the Shipibo doing in the Amazon region? All of this and much more is described by Johannes F. Brakel.