Total population | |
---|---|
Cubans: ~13.8 million (2024) Diaspora: ~3.8 million | |
Regions with significant populations | |
Cuba 10,055,968 (2023) [1] [2] [3] | |
United States | 2,568,036 (2023) [4] [5] |
Spain | 198,639 (2022) [6] |
Brazil | 50,355 (2024) [7] |
Mexico | 25,976 (2020) ** |
Uruguay | 24,485 (2020) [5] |
Italy | 23,531 (2023) ** |
Canada | 19,545 (2021) [8] [9] |
Chile | 19,068 (2022) |
Venezuela | 10,769 (2020) [10] |
Ecuador | 10,768 (2022) [11] [10] |
Germany | 9,185 (2022) [12] |
Puerto Rico | 8,891 (2023) [13] |
Costa Rica | 6,908 (2020) [10] |
France | 5,466 (2020) [10] |
Switzerland | 3,574 (2020) [10] |
Dominican Republic | 3,402 (2020) [10] |
Peru | 3,170 (2020) [10] |
Sweden | 2,992 (2020) [10] |
Colombia | 2,534 (2020) [10] |
Trinidad and Tobago | 2,412 (2020) [10] |
United Kingdom | 2,333 (2020) [10] [14] [15] [16] |
Russia | 2,224 (2020) [10] |
Panama | 2,194 (2020) [10] |
Australia | 1,021 (2023) [10] |
Bolivia | 1,971 (2020) [10] |
Belgium | 1,926 (2020) [10] |
Portugal | 1,858 (2020) [10] |
South Africa | 1,846 (2020) [10] |
Jamaica | 1,825 (2020) [10] |
Guinea | 1,714 (2020) [10] |
Netherlands | 1,501 (2020) [10] |
Haiti | 1,185 (2020) [10] |
Argentina | 1,116 (2020) [10] [17] [18] |
Languages | |
Cuban Spanish, Lucumí, English (Miami accent), Spanglish, Cubonics | |
Religion | |
Majority: Roman Catholicism [19] Minority: Irreligion, Protestantism, Santería, Ifá, Palo, Judaism, Islam [20] | |
Related ethnic groups | |
Criollos · Puerto Ricans · Floridanos · Taíno · Mulatto · Spaniards · Africans · Chinese people · Canarians · Catalans · Galicians · Andalusians · Portuguese people · French people · Jews · Arabs · Mestizo • Tahitians |
Cubans (Spanish : Cubanos) are the citizens and nationals of Cuba. The Cuban people have varied origins with the most spoken language being Spanish. The larger Cuban diaspora includes individuals that trace ancestry to Cuba and self-identify as Cuban but are not necessarily Cuban by citizenship. The United States has the largest Cuban population in the world after Cuba.
The modern nation of Cuba, located in the Caribbean, emerged as an independent country following the Spanish-American War of 1898, which led to the end of Spanish colonial rule. The subsequent period of American influence, culminating in the formal independence of Cuba in 1902, initiated a complex process of national identity formation. This identity is characterized by a blend of Indigenous Taíno, African, and Spanish cultural elements, reflecting a unique multicultural heritage. The Cuban Revolution of 1959, which brought Fidel Castro to power, marked a significant turning point as it transformed the political landscape, reinforced a sense of national identity centered around revolutionary and socialist ideals and led to the continuing Cuban Exodus, thus establishing the Cuban Diaspora.
The population of Cuba was 11,167,325 inhabitants in 2012. [21] The largest urban populations of Cubans in Cuba (2012) are to be found in Havana (2,106,146), Santiago de Cuba (506,037), Holguín (346,195), Camagüey (323,309), Santa Clara (240,543) and Guantánamo (228,436). [22] According to Cuba's Oficina Nacional de Estadisticas ONE 2012 Census, the population was 11,167,325 including: 5,570,825 men and 5,596,500 women.
Year | White / % | Mulatto/ Mestizo / % | Black / % | East Asian (Amarillo) / % | Total | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1774 | 96,440 | 56.2 | 75,180 / 43.8 | 171,620 | |||||
1861 | 793,484 | 56.8 | 603,046 / 43.2 | 1,396,530 | |||||
1899 | 1,052,397 | 67.9 | 270,805 | TBD | 234,738 | TBD | 14,857 | TBD | 1,572,797 |
1943 | 3,553,312 | 74.3 | 743,113 | 15.6 | 463,227 | 9.7 | 18,931 | 0.4 | 4,778,583 |
2002 | 7,271,926 | 65.0 | 2,658,675 | 24.86 | 1,126,894 | 10,08 | 112,268 | 1,02 | 11,177,743 |
2012 | 7,160,399 | 64.1 | 2,972,882 | 26.6 | 1,034,044 | 9.3 | - | - | 11,167,325 |
In the 2012 Census of Cuba, 64.1% of the inhabitants self-identified as white. Based on genetic testing (2014) in Cuba, the average percentages of European, African and Native American ancestry in those auto-reporting to be white were 86%, 6.7%, and 7.8%, respectively. [26] The majority of the European ancestry comes from Spain.
The Afro-Cuban population was 9.3% in the 2012 Census of Cuba. Just about 1.3 million Cubans described themselves as black. [21] Thus a significant proportion of those living on the island affirm some sub-Saharan African ancestry.
Based on genetic testing in 2014, the average African, European and Native American ancestry in those self-reporting to be "negro (Black)" was 65.5% "African", 29% "European" ancestry and 5.5% "Native American" or other ancestry. [26]
Although Afro-Cubans can be found throughout Cuba, Eastern Cuba has a higher concentration of Blacks than other parts of the island. Havana has the largest population of blacks of any city in Cuba. [27]
In the 2012 Census of Cuba, 26.6% (2.97 million) of the Cubans self-identified as mulatto or mestizo. [28]
Officially called amarilla (yellow in English) in the Cuban census, [29] Cubans of East Asian origins made up 1.02% of the population in the 2002 Census of Cuba. They are primarily made up of ethnic Chinese who are descendants of indentured laborers who came in the 19th century to build railroads and work in mines. Historically, Chinese descendants in Cuba were once classified as "white". [30]
The number of people identifying as Taíno has not been formally recorded. Most of them live on the eastern part of the island, notably in Granma, Guantánamo, and Las Tunas.
The intermixing between European settlers and the native Taíno was prevalent in the early colonial era. Their mixed-race descendants have been historically undercounted.
According to a 2018 genome-wide data study, the eastern region of the island had an average Native American ancestry contribution of 10%, as compared to an average of 5% in the rest of the island. [31]
Additionally, many North American Indians living in Spanish missions in Georgia and Florida were evacuated to Spanish Cuba along with the fleeing Spanish settlers following the loss of Spanish Florida. As a result, descendants of the Calusa, Tequesta, Timucua and other now-extinct indigenous peoples of Florida have been assimilated into the mainstream Cuban population. They comprise part of Cuba's Amerindian genetic makeup.
Intermarriage between diverse groups is so frequent as to be the rule. [32]
Cuba's birth rate (9.88 births per thousand population in 2006) [33] is one of the lowest in the Western Hemisphere. Its overall population increased from around 7 million in 1961 to 11 million today, but the rate of increase slowed over time and has recently turned to a decrease, with the Cuban government in 2006 reporting the first drop in the population since the Mariel boatlift. Immigration and emigration have had noticeable effects on the demographic profile of Cuba during the 20th century. Between 1900 and 1930, close to a million Spaniards migrated to the island.
Since 1959, over two million Cubans have left the island, primarily to Miami, Florida, where a vocal, well-educated and economically successful exile community exists. [34]
An autosomal study from 2014 found the genetic ancestry in Cuba to be 72% European, 20% African and 8% Amerindian. [26] Of note, there is high variability between regions within Cuba, with individuals from Western provinces having higher European ancestry on average, and those in the Eastern region having more African and Native American genetic contribution. [31] Cuban genealogy has become a rising interest for Cubans in the last 15 years. [35]
A 1995 study done on the population of Pinar del Río, found that 50% of the Mt-DNA lineages (female lineages) could be traced back to Europeans, 46% to Africans and 3% to Americans. This figure is consistent with both the historical background of the region, and the current demographics of it. According to another study in 2008, regarding the geographical origin attributed to each mtDNA haplogroup, 55% of the sequences found in Cubans are of West Eurasian origin (namely, Europe and the Middle East) and 45% of African origin [36] Regarding Y-chromosome haplogroups (male lineages), 78.8% of the sequences found in Cubans are of West Eurasian origin, 19.7% of African origin and 1.5% of East Asian origin. Among the West Eurasian fraction, the vast majority of individuals belong to West European haplogroup R1b. The African lineages found in Cubans have a Western (haplogroups E1, E2, E1b1a ) and Northern (E1b1b-M81 ) African origin. The North African haplogroup E1b1b1b (E-M81), is found at a frequency of 6.1%. [36]
According to Fregel et al. (2009), the fact that autochthonous male E-M81 and female U6 lineages from the Canaries have been detected in Cuba and Iberoamerica, demonstrates that Canary Islanders with indigenous Guanche ancestors actively participated in the American colonization. [37]
The United States has the largest number of Cubans outside Cuba. As of 2023, the United States Census Bureau's American Community Survey showed a total population of 1,450,808 Cuban immigrants. [38] As of 2015, 68% of Cuban-born residents of the United States have naturalized [39] automatically losing their Cuban citizenship. [40] Significant populations of Cubans exist in the cities of Hialeah and Miami in Florida (995,439 Cubans in this state in 2017) and in Texas (60,381), New Jersey (44,974), California (35,364), New York (26,875), and Illinois (22,541) [41]
The second largest Cuban diaspora is in Spain. As of 2019, there were 151,423 Cubans in Spain. [6] Smaller numbers of Cubans live in Brazil, Uruguay, [42] Italy *, Mexico *, and Canada. [43]
After the founding of the republic in 1902, a considerable migration (over 1 million) arrived from the Iberian peninsula to the island, between them were more than a few former Spanish soldiers who participated in the wars, and yet it never created an obstacle for the respect and affection of Cubans, who have always been proud of their origins. [44] In December 2008, Spain began accepting citizenship applications from the descendants of people who went into exile after its brutal 1936-39 Civil War, part of a 2007 law meant to address the painful legacy of the conflict. This new Historical Memory Law has granted to more than 140,000 Cubans of Spanish ancestry the Spanish citizenship, and there were 143,048 Cubans with Spanish citizenship in Cuba and 93,004 in Spain on January 1, 2019. [6] Under the law, the descendants had until December 2011 to present themselves at the Spanish embassy in their home country and turn in documentation that proves their parents or grandparents fled Spain between 1936 and 1955. They did not need to relinquish their current citizenship. [45] [46]
The first people known to have inhabited Cuba was the Siboney, an Amerindian people. They were followed by another Amerindian people, the Taíno who were the main population both of Cuba and other islands in The Antilles when Christopher Columbus first sighted the island in 1492. He claimed the islands for Spain and Cuba became a Spanish colony. It was to remain so until 1902 apart from a brief occupation by Britain in 1762, before being returned in exchange for Florida.
Towards the end of the 19th century, Spain had lost most of its American possessions and a series of rebellions had shaken Cuba. This, combined with calls for annexation of Cuba in the United States, led to the Spanish–American War, and in 1902 Cuba gained formal independence. [47]
During the first decades of the 20th century, USA interests were dominant and in Cuba, leading to large influence over the island. This ended in 1959 when de facto leader Fulgencio Batista was ousted by revolutionaries led by Fidel Castro. Quickly deteriorating relations with the US led to Cuba's alliance with the Soviet Union and Castro's transformation of Cuba into a declared socialist republic. Cuban soldiers were sent overseas to fight in the Angolan Civil War and Ogaden War in the 1970s-1980s. Castro remained in power until 2008, first as Prime Minister then from 1976 as President of Cuba. Fidel was succeeded by his brother Raúl Castro.[ citation needed ]Miguel Díaz-Canel succeeds the brothers Fidel and Raúl Castro, making him the first non-Castro leader of Cuba since the revolution in 2018.Miguel Mario Díaz-Canel y Bermúdez (Spanish: [mi.ˈɣel ˈdi.as kaˈnel]; born 20 April 1960) is a politician and engineer who is the third first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba.
This section possibly contains original research .(October 2016) |
The culture of Cuba reflects the island's influences from various cultures, primarily European (Spanish),Taino and African.
One of the most distinctive parts of Cuban culture is Cuban music and dancing, being well-known far outside the country. Well known Hispanic music styles such as mambo, salsa, rumba, cha-cha-chá, bolero, and son originated in Cuba. The origins of much of Cuban music can be found in the mix of Spanish and West African music, while American musical elements such as trombones and big band were also significant elements in the formation of Cuban music. Cuban literature includes some of the most well-known names of the islands, such as writer and independence hero José Martí in the late 19th century. More contemporary Cuban authors include Daína Chaviano, Pedro Juan Gutiérrez, Antonio Orlando Rodríguez, Zoé Valdés and Leonardo Padura Fuentes. [48]
The Spanish language is spoken by virtually all Cubans on the island itself. Cuban Spanish is characterized by the reduction of several consonants, a feature that it shares with other dialects of Caribbean Spanish as well as the Canary Islands. Many Cuban-Americans, while remaining fluent in Spanish, use American English as one of their daily languages. [49]
Cuba's prevailing religion is Roman Catholicism, although in some instances it is profoundly modified and influenced through syncretism. A common syncretic religion is Santería, which combined the Yoruba religion of the African slaves with some Catholicism; it shows similarities to Brazilian Umbanda and has been receiving a degree of official support. [50]
The Roman Catholic Church estimates that 60 percent of the population is Catholic, [51] with 10 percent attending mass regularly, [52] while independent sources estimate that as few 1.5 percent of Catholics do so. [53]
Membership in Protestant churches is estimated to be 5 percent and includes Baptists, Pentecostals, Seventh-day Adventists, Presbyterians, Episcopal Church of Cuba|Episcopalians, Methodists, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and Lutherans. Other groups include the Greek Orthodox Church, the Russian Orthodox Church, Jehovah's Witnesses, Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, Baháʼís, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Cuba is home to a variety of syncretic religions of largely African cultural origin. According to a US State Department report, [51] some sources estimate that as much as 80 percent of the population consults with practitioners of religions with West African roots, such as Santeria or Yoruba. Santería developed out of the traditions of the Yoruba, one of the African peoples who were imported to Cuba during the 16th through 19th centuries to work on the sugar plantations. Santería blends elements of Christianity and West African beliefs and as such made it possible for the slaves to retain their traditional beliefs while appearing to practice Catholicism. La Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre (Our Lady Of Charity) is the Catholic patroness of Cuba, and is greatly revered by the Cuban people and seen as a symbol of Cuba. In Santería, she has been syncretized with the goddess Ochún. The important religious festival "La Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre" is celebrated by Cubans annually on 8 September. Other religions practised are Palo Monte, and Abakuá, which have large parts of their liturgy in African languages.
The flag of Cuba is red, white, and blue; and was first adopted by Narciso López on a suggestion by the poet Miguel Teurbe Tolón. The design incorporates three blue stripes, representing the three provinces of the time (Oriente, Centro, and Occidente), and two white stripes symbolizing the purity of the patriotic cause. The red triangle stands for the blood shed to free the nation. The white star in the triangle stands for independence. [54]
The population of Puerto Rico has been shaped by native American settlement, European colonization especially under the Spanish Empire, slavery and economic migration. Demographic features of the population of Puerto Rico include population density, ethnicity, education of the populace, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.
The demographic characteristics of Cuba are known through census which have been conducted and analyzed by different bureaus since 1774. The National Office of Statistics of and Information of Cuba (ONEI) is doing it since 1953. The most recent census was conducted in September 2012. The population of Cuba at the 2012 census was nearly 11.2 million.
Puerto Ricans, most commonly known as Boricuas, but also occasionally referred to as Borinqueños, Borincanos, or Puertorros, are an ethnic group native to the Caribbean archipelago and island of Puerto Rico, and a nation identified with the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico through ancestry, culture, or history. Puerto Ricans are predominately a tri-racial, Spanish-speaking, Christian society, descending in varying degrees from Indigenous Taíno natives, Southwestern European colonists, and West and Central African slaves, freedmen, and free Blacks. As citizens of a U.S. territory, Puerto Ricans have automatic birthright American citizenship, and are considerably influenced by American culture. The population of Puerto Ricans is between 9 and 10 million worldwide, with the overwhelming majority residing in Puerto Rico and mainland United States.
The Guanche were the indigenous inhabitants of the Spanish Canary Islands, located in the Atlantic Ocean some 100 kilometres (60 mi) to the west of modern Morocco and the North African coast. The islanders spoke the Guanche language, which is believed to have been related to the Berber languages of mainland North Africa; the language became extinct in the 17th century, soon after the islands were colonized.
Mulatto is a racial classification that refers to people of mixed African and European ancestry only. When speaking or writing about a singular woman in English, the word is mulatta. The use of this term began in the United States of America shortly after the Atlantic Slave Trade began and its use was widespread, derogatory and disrespectful. After the post Civil Rights Era, the term is now considered to be both outdated and offensive in America. In other Anglophone countries such as the British Isles, the Caribbean, and English and Dutch-speaking West Indian countries, the word mulatto is still used. The use of this word does not have the same negative associations found among English speakers. Among Latinos in both the US and Latin America, the word is used in every day speech and its meaning is a source of racial and ethnic pride. In four of the Latin-based languages, the default, masculine word ends with the letter "o" and is written as follows: Spanish and Portuguese – mulato; Italian – mulatto. The French equivalent is mulâtre. In English, the masculine plural is written as mulattoes while in Spanish and Portuguese it is mulatos. The masculine plural in Italian is mulatti and in French it is mulâtres. The feminine plurals are: English – mulattas; Spanish and Portuguese – mulatas; Italian – mulatte; French – mulâtresses.
Dominicans are an ethno-national people, a people of shared ancestry and culture, who have ancestral roots in the Dominican Republic.
Afro–Latin Americans or Black Latin Americans are Latin Americans of sub-Saharan African heritage. African heritage is common throughout Latin America.
Chinese Cubans are Cubans of full or mixed Chinese ancestry who were born in or have immigrated to Cuba. They are part of the ethnic Chinese diaspora.
Afro–Puerto Ricans, most commonly known as Afroboricuas, but also occasionally referred to as Afroborinqueños,Afroborincanos, or Afropuertorros, are Puerto Ricans of full or partial sub-Saharan African origin, who are predominately the descendants of slaves, freedmen, and free Blacks original to West and Central Africa. The term Afro-Puerto Rican is also used to refer to historical or cultural elements in Puerto Rican society associated with this community, including music, language, cuisine, art, and religion.
Christianity is the most widely professed religion in Cuba, with Catholicism being its largest denomination. A significant share of the Cuban population is either non-religious or practices folk religions.
The Spanish West Indies, Spanish Caribbean or the Spanish Antilles were Spanish territories in the Caribbean. In terms of governance of the Spanish Empire, The Indies was the designation for all its overseas territories and was overseen by the Council of the Indies, founded in 1524 and based in Spain. When the Crown established the Viceroyalty of New Spain in 1535, the islands of the Caribbean came under its jurisdiction.
Canary Islanders, or Canarians, are the people of the Canary Islands, an autonomous community of Spain near the coast of Northwest Africa. The distinctive variety of the Spanish language spoken in the region is known as habla canaria or the (dialecto) canario. The Canarians, and their descendants, played a major role during the conquest, colonization, and eventual independence movements of various countries in Latin America. Their ethnic and cultural presence is most palpable in the countries of Uruguay, Venezuela, Cuba and the Dominican Republic as well as the US territory of Puerto Rico.
Brazilians are the citizens of Brazil. A Brazilian can also be a person born abroad to a Brazilian parent or legal guardian as well as a person who acquired Brazilian citizenship. Brazil is a multiethnic society, which means that it is home to people of many ethnic origins, and there is no correlation between one's stock and their Brazilian identity.
African admixture in Europe refers to the presence of human genotypes attributable to periods of human population dispersals out of Africa in the genetic history of Europe.
Genetic studies of Jews are part of the population genetics discipline and are used to analyze the ancestry of Jewish populations, complementing research in other fields such as history, linguistics, archaeology, and paleontology. These studies investigate the origins of various Jewish ethnic divisions. In particular, they examine whether there is a common genetic heritage among them. The medical genetics of Jews are studied for population-specific diseases.
The genetic history of North Africa encompasses the genetic history of the people of North Africa. The most important source of gene flow to North Africa from the Neolithic Era onwards was from Western Asia, while the Sahara desert to the south and the Mediterranean Sea to the north were also important barriers to gene flow from sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Europe in prehistory. However, North Africa is connected to Western Asia via the Isthmus of Suez and the Sinai peninsula, while at the Straits of Gibraltar, North Africa and Europe are separated by only 15 km (9 mi), similarly Malta, Sicily, Canary Islands, Lampedusa and Crete are close to the coasts of North Africa, with the indigenous Guanche people of the Canary Islands being Berber.
Taíno is a term referring to a historic Indigenous people of the Caribbean, whose culture has been continued today by their descendants and Taíno revivalist communities. Indigenous people in the Greater Antilles did not refer to themselves as Taínos, as the term was coined by the anthropologist Constantine Samuel Rafinesque in 1836. The Indigenous peoples of the Greater Antilles are sometimes referred to as Island Arawaks. At the time of European contact in the late 15th century, they were the principal inhabitants of most of what is now Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Haiti, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, and the northern Lesser Antilles. The Lucayan branch of the Taíno were the first New World peoples encountered by Christopher Columbus, in the Bahama Archipelago on October 12, 1492. The Taíno historically spoke a dialect of the Arawakan language group. They lived in agricultural societies ruled by caciques with fixed settlements and a matrilineal system of kinship and inheritance. Taíno religion centered on the worship of zemis.
Afro-Haitians or Black Haitians are Haitians who trace their full or partial ancestry to Sub-Saharan Africa. They form the largest racial group in Haiti and together with other Afro-Caribbean groups, the largest racial group in the region.
In the 2020 United States census, the number of people who identified as "European alone" was 536,044 or 16.5%, with an additional non-Hispanic 24,548, for a total population of 560,592.
Mixed Dominicans, also referred to as mulatto, mestizo or historically quadroon or castizo, are Dominicans who are of mixed ancestry, these stand out for having brown skin. Representing 71.72% of the Dominican Republic's population, they are by far the single largest racial grouping of the country.
Artículo 32.- Los cubanos no podrán ser privados de su ciudadanía, salvo por causas legalmente establecidas. Tampoco podrán ser privados del derecho a cambiar de esta. No se admitirá la doble ciudadanía. En consecuencia, cuando se adquiera una ciudadanía extranjera, se perderá la cubana. La ley establece el procedimiento a seguir para la formalización de la perdida de la ciudadanía y las autoridades facultadas para idirlo. / (English translation) Dual citizenship will not be admitted. Consequently, when foreign citizenship is acquired, Cuban citizenship will be lost.
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