| Languages of Costa Rica | |
|---|---|
| Official | Spanish |
| Indigenous | Maléku, Cabécar, Bribri, Guaymí, Buglere |
| Foreign | American English, Italian, Haitian Creole, French, Tagalog |
Costa Rica's official and predominant language is Spanish. The variety spoken there, Costa Rican Spanish, is a form of Central American Spanish.
Costa Rica is a linguistically diverse country and home to at least five living local indigenous languages spoken by the descendants of pre-Columbian peoples: Maléku, Cabécar, Bribri, Guaymí, and Buglere.
Immigration has also brought people and languages from various countries around the world. Along the Atlantic Ocean in Limón Province, inhabited primarily by Afro-Caribs, an English-based creole language called Mekatelyu or Patua is spoken to varying degrees, as is English; many older Limonenses speak English as their native language. The Quakers community, who settled in Monteverde in the early 1950s, speaks an older dialect of English, using thou instead of you.[1][2] Costa Rican Sign Language is also spoken by the deaf community, and Costa Rican Spanish slang is known as "pachuco".
Since 2015 Costa Rica is officially known as a multi-ethnic and pluralistic republic. The greatest advance in this respect came with the amendment of Article 76 of the Constitution of Costa Rica, which now states: "Spanish is the official language of the Nation. However, the State will oversee the maintenance and cultivation of indigenous national languages."[3]