Surinamese people

Surinamese people are people identified with the country of Suriname. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Surinamese, several (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being Surinamese.

Surinamese people

Flag of Suriname
Total population
c. 1,000,000
Regions with significant populations
Suriname	575,990[1][2]
Netherlands	349,978[3][4]
French Guiana	32,412[5]
Belgium	20,000[6]
United States	14,555[5]
Guyana	4,662[7]
Aruba	3,000[8]
Canada	1,005[5]
Languages
Primarily Dutch and Sranan Tongo (lingua francas)[lower-alpha 1] numerous minority languages
Religion
Christianity (Protestant and Roman Catholic), Hinduism, Islam, Winti, Irreligious

Suriname is a multiethnic and multilingual society, home to people of various ethnic, racial, religious, and national origins, with the majority of the population made up of Old World immigrants and their descendants. As a result, the Surinamese do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship and allegiance to Suriname. Aside from the indigenous population, nearly all Surinamese or their ancestors arrived since the Age of Discovery and establishment of the colony of Surinam, primarily from Africa, Europe and Asia.

Ethnic groups

The population of Suriname is made up of various distinguishable ethnic groups:

• Indians form 27% of the population. They are descendants of 19th-century contract workers from British India, who came to work on the sugar estates of Surinam. They are mostly from the present-day Indian states of Bihar, Jharkhand, and Uttar Pradesh, in Northern India.
• Afro-Surinamese form about 37% of the population, and are usually divided into two groups: the Creoles (15.7%), mixed descendants of enslaved Africans and European colonists (mostly Dutch), and Maroons (21.7%), descendants of enslaved Africans who managed to escape and set up a living in the bush. The two main Maroon subgroups are the Ndyuka and Saramaccans.
• Javanese (descendants of contract workers from the Dutch East Indies on the island of Java),[9] form 14% of the population.
• Amerindians, the original inhabitants of Suriname, form 3.7% of the population. The main groups are the Akurio, Arawak, Kalina (Caribs), Tiriyó and Wayana.
• Chinese, mainly descendants of the earliest 19th-century contract workers. The 1990s and early 21st century saw renewed immigration on a large scale. In the year 2011 there were over 40,000 Chinese in Suriname.[10]
• Europeans, descendants of Dutch 19th-century immigrant farmers, known as "Boeroes" (derived from boer, the Dutch word for "farmer"), Portuguese from Madeira and other European groups.
• Levantines, primarily Maronites from Lebanon, and Jews of Sephardic and Ashkenazi origin. In their history, Jodensavanne plays a major role. Many Jews are mixed with other populations.
• Multiracial people form 13.4% of the population.[11]

Population

Most of the inhabitants live in the north of the country, in the districts of Paramaribo, Wanica and Nickerie. The least populated county is Sipaliwini, which covers most of the nation's interior and is sparsely inhabited. More than half of the population lives in and around the capital.

Emigration

Migration to the Netherlands began during the colonial era. Initially this was mainly the colonial elite but expanded during the 1920s and 1930s to the less fortunate inhabitants looking for better education, employment, or other opportunities.[12]

Approximately 350,000 individuals of Surinamese descent now live in the Netherlands, with mass migration beginning in the years leading up to Suriname's independence in 1975, and continuing in the period immediately after independence and during military rule in the 1980s. Surinamese continued to migrate to the Netherlands throughout the 1990s because of the then tough economic situation in Suriname. Other emigration destinations include French Guiana and the United States.

Languages

In Suriname, there are no fewer than twenty languages spoken. Most Surinamese are multilingual. In terms of numbers of speakers are the main languages in Suriname, successively the Dutch language, Sranan Tongo (Surinamese Creole), English, Sarnami (Surinamese Hindustani), Javanese, and different Maroon languages (especially Saramaccan and Ndyuka). Since most Surinamese people are multilingual (for instance Dutch and Sranan Tongo), the society functions as a diglossia, where Dutch is the standardized and formal prestige register and Sranan Tongo generally the informal street vernacular.[13] Dutch serves as the language of law, government, business, media and education.[14]

According to the results of the seventh general population and housing census, which was held in 2004, Dutch is the most spoken home language in the country, at around 60% of the population speaking it at home.[15] A further 24% of the population speaks Dutch as a second language.[16][15] Sranan Tongo, which literally means "Surinamese language", is spoken primarily as a second language in 46% of households, along with 22% Sarnami Hindustani and 11% Javanese.

Religion

The following religious statistics have been reported as of 2012:[17]

• 48.4% Christianity (26.8% Protestant and 21.6% Roman Catholic)
• 22.3% Hinduism (Sanatani and Arya Samaj)
• 13.9% Islam (Sunnism, Sufism, and Ahmadiyya)
• 4.7% Other
• 10.7% None

References

1. As Surinamese is primarily a national identity made up of various ethnic and religious groups, a large number of mutually unintelligible languages are spoken in the country and by the Surinamese diaspora. Other than Dutch and Sranan Tongo, these are not spoken by the majority but rather only within the racial or ethnic minority group. Dutch, as the language of law, education, media and business, and Sranan Tongo, as the most widely spoken vernacular, are the only two languages spoken fluently by the majority of the Surinamese.

1. ""World Population prospects – Population division"". population.un.org. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. Retrieved November 9, 2019.
2. ""Overall total population" – World Population Prospects: The 2019 Revision" (xslx). population.un.org (custom data acquired via website). United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. Retrieved November 9, 2019.
3. "CBS StatLine - Bevolking; generatie, geslacht, leeftijd en herkomstgroepering, 1 januari". Statline.cbs.nl. Retrieved 5 October 2017.
4. "The Netherlands and Suriname are closely linked". Government.nl. Retrieved 18 November 2011.
5. International Organization for Migration
6. Radio 10. "Precieze cijfers illegale Surinamers in België nu in kaart gebracht"
7. "Guyana Migration Profiles" (PDF).
8. "Surinamers op Aruba". Parbode. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
9. (in Indonesian)Orang Jawa di Suriname (Javanese in Suriname) Archived 2011-03-16 at the Wayback Machine, kompasiana. Access date:26 March 2011
10. Romero, Simon. "With Aid and Migrants, China Expands Its Presence in a South American Nation", The New York Times, 10 April 2011.
11. "Census statistieken 2012". Statistics-suriname.org. Retrieved 13 July 2014.
12. Gert Oostindie en Emy Maduro, In het land van de overheerser - II - Antillianen en Surinamers in Nederland 1634/1667-1954 (KITLV; Leiden 1986)
13. Romero, Simon (23 March 2008). "In Babel of Tongues, Suriname Seeks Itself". The New York Times.
14. "Suriname". The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. 2013. Retrieved 4 August 2013.
15. "Het Nederlandse taalgebied" (in Dutch). Nederlandse Taalunie. 2005. Retrieved 4 November 2008.
16. Source: Zevende algemene volks- en woningtelling 2004, Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek
17. 2012 Suriname Census Definitive Results. Algemeen Bureau voor de Statistiek – Suriname.