Indigenous peoples of Panama in the context of "Comarca Emberá-Wounaan"

Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country located at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the south. Its capital and largest city is Panama City, whose metropolitan area is home to nearly half of the country's over 4 million inhabitants.

Before the arrival of Spanish colonists in the 16th century, Panama was inhabited by a number of different indigenous tribes. It broke away from Spain in 1821 and joined the Republic of Gran Colombia, a union of Nueva Granada, Ecuador, and Venezuela. After Gran Colombia dissolved in 1831, Panama and Nueva Granada eventually became the Republic of Colombia. With the backing of the United States, Panama seceded from Colombia in 1903, allowing the construction of the Panama Canal to be completed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers between 1904 and 1914. The 1977 Torrijos–Carter Treaties agreed to transfer the canal from the United States to Panama on December 31, 1999. The surrounding territory was returned first, in 1979.

Panamanians (Spanish: panameños; feminine panameñas) are people identified with Panama, a country in Central America (which is the central section of the American continent), and with residential, legal, historical, or cultural connections with North America. For most Panamanians, several or all of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their Panamanian identity. Panama is a multilingual and multicultural society, home to people of many different ethnicities and religions. Therefore, many Panamanians do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship and allegiance to Panama. The overwhelming majority of Panamanians are the product of varying degrees of admixture between European ethnic groups (predominantly Spaniards) with native Amerindians (who are indigenous to Panama's modern territory) and Black Africans.

The culture held in common by most Panamanians is referred to as mainstream Panamanian culture, a culture largely derived from the traditions of the Indigenous people and the early Spanish settlers, along with other Europeans arriving later such as Italians, with west African culture as another important component.