Puerto Rican Spanish

Puerto Rican Spanish
Español puertorriqueño
Pronunciation[ehpaˈɲol pweltoχiˈkeɲo]
Native speakers
6 million (Puerto Rico & many stateside Puerto Ricans in U.S. mainland) (2011)[1]
Early forms
Latin (Spanish alphabet)
Official status
Official language in
 Puerto Rico
Regulated byAcademia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española
Language codes
ISO 639-3
Glottologpuer1238
IETFes-PR
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Puerto Rican Spanish is the variety of the Spanish language as characteristically spoken in Puerto Rico and by millions of people of Puerto Rican descent living in the United States and elsewhere.[2] It belongs to the group of Caribbean Spanish variants and, as such, is largely derived from Canarian Spanish and Andalusian Spanish. Outside of Puerto Rico, the Puerto Rican accent of Spanish is also commonly heard in the U.S. Virgin Islands and many U.S. mainland cities like Orlando, New York City, Philadelphia, Miami, Tampa, Boston, Cleveland, and Chicago, among others. However, not all stateside Puerto Ricans have knowledge of Spanish. Opposite to island-born Puerto Ricans who primarily speak Spanish, many stateside-born Puerto Ricans primarily speak English, although many stateside Puerto-Ricans are fluent in Spanish and English, and often alternate between the two languages.[3]

  1. ^ Spanish (Puerto Rico) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. ^ "U.S. Census, The Hispanic Population in the United States: 2004 Detailed Tables, Section I, Table 1.2". Archived from the original on 2018-07-18. Retrieved 2017-12-06.
  3. ^ Duany, Jorge (n.d.). The Puerto Rican Diaspora to the United States: A Postcolonial Migration? (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2020-10-16. Retrieved 2020-10-30 – via centropr.hunter.cuny.edu.