Languages of Costa Rica

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.

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.

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.

[4] An unknown language, known only as the lengua de Paro, was also spoken on the western coast of the Gulf of Nicoya.

[5] During the 9th century, speakers of the now-extinct Oto-Manguean language Chorotega controlled most of northeast Costa Rica.

According to the Education First international school, Costa Rica ranks highly in English-language proficiency in Central & South America.

[11] Also noteworthy is the great German migration that took place in Costa Rica during the 19th and 20th centuries, 22 inheriting the country a rich sociocultural and economic contribution.

[18] In addition, during the nineteenth century the largest migratory flow of French in Central America was registered, directed towards Costa Rica, which has contributed a large number of French-speaking descendants to the country and has produced the creation of many institutions and cultural alliances and even a school that carry out a great promotion and dissemination of French learning in the population.

[19] In the 19th century, important groups of Chinese emigrated to Costa Rica and settled mainly in the provinces of Limón, Puntarenas, and Guanacaste, preserving their language, Mandarin or Cantonese, depending on their origin.