Puerto Rico

D

Migration

In the late 1990s some 3.1 million Puerto Ricans lived on the U.S. mainland, the majority of them in the states of New York, New Jersey, and Florida. In general, Puerto Ricans went to the mainland in search of better economic opportunities.

Migration was particularly extensive during the first decades of industrialization, from the early 1940s through the 1960s. As people moved from rural to urban areas, the new manufacturing companies did not have enough jobs to offer. With no jobs in the cities, many Puerto Ricans left the island to go to the mainland to find employment. In fact, one of the reasons that Operation Bootstrap was successful was that hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans migrated to the mainland United States, easing economic pressure on the island.

Migration also increased in the early 1980s because of a serious economic recession on the island. As the economy recovered later in the decade, emigration declined. Migration helped to relieve competition for jobs in Puerto Rico and decreased the number of people the relatively impoverished island had to feed. It also provided a source of external income as emigrants on the mainland sent cash to relatives in Puerto Rico, thus somewhat aiding the island’s economy.

The migration of Puerto Ricans to the United States has created a Puerto Rican presence in the mainland nearly as large as the population of the island itself. By the late 1990s many Puerto Ricans were second- or third-generation residents of the mainland. Some traced their heritage back even further.

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V

Education and Cultural Institutions

Puerto Rico greatly improved its educational institutions throughout the 20th century. By 2005, 94.6 percent of the adult population was literate, compared with some 67 percent in 1940. The governor of Puerto Rico appoints the secretary of education, who heads the Department of Education. The department oversees the public education system. Most of the schools in Puerto Rico are public and are modeled on the public schools in the continental United States. About 20 percent of schoolchildren attend private schools. The Roman Catholic Church runs a number of the private schools. Children must attend school from age 6 to 16. Most attend for 12 years (six years of elementary school, three of junior high, and three of senior high school).

The government has gradually spent more money on public elementary and secondary schools, but in 1995–1996 Puerto Rico spent only $4,324 per pupil, compared to an average of $6,146 per pupil in the mainland United States. In the late 1990s the commonwealth’s public schools annually enrolled about 452,000 elementary pupils and about 162,000 secondary students.

In 1998-1999 the commonwealth had 51 private and 14 public institutions of higher education with a combined enrollment of 164,000 students. The University of Puerto Rico System was founded in 1903. It is the oldest institution of higher education in Puerto Rico, with a number of branches including those in Arecibo, Bayamón, Cayey, Humacao, Mayagüez, Ponce, and San Juan. Besides the University of Puerto Rico, other institutions of higher education include Bayamón Central University in Bayamón; Inter American University of Puerto Rico, with major campuses in Hato Rey and San Germán; Pontifical Catholic University of Puerto Rico in Ponce; and the University of the Sacred Heart in Santurce.

Language has been a central issue in Puerto Rican education and culture since 1898. Until 1930, U.S. authorities insisted upon making English the language of instruction in the schools. They wanted students to speak English in order to expose them to American culture. However, Puerto Ricans strongly resisted the effort to impose English as the primary language in schools. The policy was changed in 1948, when Spanish replaced English in the school system. English became a second language, although students were required to study English at every school level. In 1993 Puerto Rico declared both Spanish and English the island’s official languages.

Puerto Rico has many libraries, including the Carnegie Public Library, the library of the Ateneo Puertorriqueño (a privately run Puerto Rican cultural organization), and the Volunteer Library League, all in San Juan. Several of the other larger cities and towns also have municipal libraries. Many universities have libraries as well.

Many of Puerto Rico’s major cultural institutions are in San Juan. These include the Puerto Rico Museum of Art, housing works from pre-Columbian times to the present; the Children’s Museum in Old San Juan; and the Museum of the Indian, featuring exhibits about the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean region. Of note, too, is the Ponce Art Museum, which has exhibits of paintings by European and Puerto Rican artists. In addition, metropolitan San Juan is the home of the Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra, the Conservatory of Music of Puerto Rico, and ballet and dance companies. A popular cultural attraction is the Pablo Casals Museum in Old San Juan, which contains memorabilia from the life and career of renowned cellist Pablo Casals.

VI

Arts

Puerto Rico has enjoyed a long history of artistic expression. Many artists and writers have explored the island’s identity in their works. Music and dance also combine various elements of the island’s many cultures—indigenous, African, Spanish, and American. The Puerto Rican government has long supported arts and culture on the island and runs a number of artistic events.

A

Art and Literature

The most famous Puerto Rican painter of the 18th century was José Campeche. Francisco Oller was a painter of international renown. Oller traveled to Spain and France in the 1850s, where he was influenced by impressionist painting. In the 20th century, Ramón Frade became the island’s most famous impressionist painter. Contemporary sculptors such as Lindsay Daen, John Balossi, and Rafael Ferrer have contributed to Puerto Rico’s lively artistic life.

A persistent theme in much of the island’s literature is the quest for individual and national identity. Puerto Rican writers often focus on political and social topics. Prominent 19th-century writers include Salvador Brau and Eugenio María de Hostos. Alejandro Tapia y Rivera, who also wrote during the 19th century, is considered the father of Puerto Rican theater. One of the leading Puerto Rican playwrights is René Marqués, who achieved broad international recognition during the 1950s and 1960s.

Poetry has played an important role in Puerto Rico’s cultural and social history. In his poem El Puertorriqueño (1844), and his later book El Gíbaro (1849), Manuel A. Alonso helped define the Puerto Rican identity. José Gualberto Padilla, known as El Caribe, and Lola Rodríguez de Tío hold honored places in Puerto Rico’s pantheon of poets. The most famous Puerto Rican poet of the early 20th century is Luis Palés Matos, known for exploring the island’s African heritage.

Raised in a largely English-speaking environment, a number of Puerto Rican poets on the mainland write poetry in English but place Spanish words tellingly along the way to reveal their deep concerns about identity. Pedro Juan Pietri and Jesús “Papoleto” Meléndez exemplify this trend. An excellent example of this poetry is Pietri’s Puerto Rican Obituary (1974).

The island’s first novelist was Manuel Zeno Gandía, whose first novel was La Charca (1894). Puerto Rico’s best-known 20th-century novelist is Enrique Laguerre, who published La Llamarada (1935) and many other important works. Several Puerto Rican novelists who migrated to the mainland have achieved literary recognition. Among them are Pedro Juan Soto and Emilio Díaz Varcárcel. Soto lived in New York City and taught English. He is known especially for Spiks (1956), a collection of short stories, and the novel Usmail (1959). Another novelist who has gained a wide audience is Piri Thomas, who is famous for Down These Mean Streets (1967). Rosario Ferré has become an influential and widely acclaimed novelist both in Puerto Rico and the mainland United States. Her novels The House on the Lagoon (1995) and Eccentric Neighborhoods (1998) were written in English.

B

Music and Dance

In music, Puerto Rico has a long tradition of folk songs and romantic ballads based on African and Spanish rhythms such as décimas or coplas. Ballads are very popular in Puerto Rico, and the most famous composer of ballads was Rafael Hernández. His ballads, composed in the first part of the 20th century, continue to be widely sung in the United States and Latin America. Puerto Rican musicians on the island and on the mainland have contributed greatly to the creation of Latin jazz, and more recently to innovations in salsa, a genre of Latin music. Many Puerto Rican salsa musicians have experimented with a fusion of island rhythms and musical influences from the mainland, particularly from the New York City area. Among the most important of these musicians are Tito Puente and Willie Colón.

Puerto Rico also has had a rich tradition of classical music. Among the most important classical composers is Hector Campos Parsi. Classical musicians include pianists Elías López Sobá and Jesús María Sanroma. Two families in particular, the Figueroas and the Hutchinsons, have contributed several outstanding classical musicians. The most famous of all Puerto Rican classical musicians, however, is cellist Pablo Casals, who left his homeland in Spain and settled in Puerto Rico in the 1950s. Casals, whose mother was born in Puerto Rico, became the director of the Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra and the Conservatory of Music. The Casals Festival, an annual two-week concert series named for him, began in 1957. It attracts artists from around the world.

Opera, ballet, and popular concerts also take place throughout the year. The Fine Arts Center in San Juan is the island’s main artistic venue.

Puerto Ricans are also dedicated to dance. In the island’s interior, the seis is the representative dance of the jíbaros (peasant farmers). It is usually danced by six couples, to the accompaniment of a guitar. The bomba is the predominant dance among Afro-Puerto Ricans in coastal regions. By some accounts, it came to Puerto Rico with slaves from Africa. Bomba is played with two drums and maracas, accompanied by vocals. The refined danza is popular with Puerto Ricans of all walks of life.