Afro-Jamaicans

Afro-Jamaicans
Total population
76.3% of Jamaica[1]
Regions with significant populations
Throughout Jamaica
Languages
Jamaican Patois, Jamaican English
Religion
Mainly Christianity, with minorities of Irreligion, Rastafarism, Judaism
Afro-Jamaican religions
Rastafari, Convince, Jamaican Maroon religion, Kumina
Related ethnic groups
African Caribbean, British Jamaicans, Black Canadians, Jamaican Americans, Asante people

Afro-Jamaicans are Jamaicans of predominantly African descent. They represent the largest ethnic group in the country.[2]

The ethnogenesis of the Black Jamaican people stemmed from the Atlantic slave trade of the 16th century, when enslaved Africans were transported as slaves to Jamaica and other parts of the Americas.[3] During the period of British rule, slaves brought to Jamaica by European slave traders were primarily Akan, some of whom ran away and joined with Jamaican Maroons and even took over as leaders.[4]

  1. ^ "Jamaica | The University of the West Indies". www.uwi.edu.
  2. ^ "Jamaica Population 2021 (Demographics, Maps, Graphs)". World Population Review. Archived from the original on 22 December 2013. Retrieved 20 June 2021.
  3. ^ Castilla, Julian de (1924). "The English conquest of Jamaica". Camden. Third Series. 34: 32. doi:10.1017/S2042171000006932.
  4. ^ Gardner, William James (1909). History of Jamaica, From Its Discovery To The Year 1872. Appleton & Company. p. 184. ISBN 978-0415760997.