Language and Identity: Limonese Creole and the Black Minority of Costa Rica

Abstract

G iven the general connection between the development of national ism and l ingu istic u n iformity, the existence of mult i­ l i ngua l ism and eth n ic d ivers ity i n a cou ntry is a complex p roblem. limonese C reole is the language spoken by a Black m inority of approximately 30,000 people who have l ived i n predominantly white and Spanish-speaking Costa R ica for over 400 years. The l imon P rovince , where th is group res ides, is markedly d istinguishable from the rest in terms of its geogra­ phy, history, population, economy, language, and culture. This paper seeks to present the development of ethnic re lat ions and language in that area. H isto ry shows that e ither harmonious bi l ingualism or fiercely suppressing colonial ism usually prevails in a " Ianguagesin-contact s i tuat io n . " In th is c ase study, the h istor ical re l at ionship between eth n ic ity and language accounts for differences between societies, with such divergent consequences of contact as racial nationalism, cultural assimi­ lation and fusion, and possibly even language extinction.