✊🏾🇨🇷 Afro-Costarricense History Lesson

“Cuando miro mi rostro en el espejo,
Con mi boca
Rotundamente grande,
Y mi nariz Rotundamente hermosa,
Y mis dientes,
Rotundamente blancos,
Y mi piel valientemente negra.
Y me niego categóricamente
A dejar de hablar
Mi lengua, mi acento y mi historia.”
𝑹𝒐𝒕𝒖𝒏𝒅𝒂𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒆 𝑵𝒆𝒈𝒓𝒂 ✍🏾by Shirley Campbell.
Slavery in 🇨🇷 spans across the 1500s thru the 1800s. African migration stems from 3 main demands: 1) The Colonization Period 2) Construction of Puerto Limón 3) Building of the Railroad & the rise of Banana Plantations.
The first Africans in 🇨🇷 are believed to come from specific regions in Africa Equatorial & the West, based on the belief that they were stronger, amiable, & more hard-working than other regions. Most brought in from the port city of Portobelo in Panama and who later intermixed with the mestizo population. The last group came from the Caribean, mainly Jamaica.

Key📝Notes:

𝟏𝟖𝟐𝟒, 🇨🇷 𝐚𝐛𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝 slavery.
1910, the Banana industry boomed on the backs of African labor. The United Fruit Company, now Dole, controlled land, banana plantations & export.
Marcus Garvey, a key figure/activist of African rights and in Limon introduced “Garveyism” and the idea of the Black Star Line, a ship that promised Africans the dream of returning to Africa.

By the 1980s, 🇨🇷 declared August 31 as el Día del Negro, which was later expanded to el 𝐃𝐢𝐚 𝐝𝐞𝐥 𝐍𝐞𝐠𝐫𝐨 𝐲 𝐥𝐚 𝐂𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐚 𝐀𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞. In 2018, the month of August was declared the History of African-Descended Peoples.

To this day 🇨🇷 maintains a strong Afro Caribbean culture, communities of Caribbean descent are prevalent in Puerto Limón & most speak Spanish, English, and Caribbean Patois.