Ethnic Groups In Honduras

This article is about the ethnic groups and population of Honduras.

Population size and structure

According to the total population was in , compared to 1,487,000 in 1950 (a fivefold increase in 60 years). The proportion of the population aged below 15 in 2010 was 36.8%, 58.9% were aged between 15 and 65 years of age, and 4.3% were aged 65 years or older.

As of 2014, 60% of Hondurans live below the poverty line. More than 30% of the population is divided between the lower middle and upper middle class, less than 10% are wealthy or belong to the higher social class (most live in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula).

Structure of the population

Vital statistics

UN estimates

Registration of vital events is in Honduras not complete. The Population Department of the United Nations prepared the following estimates.

Births and deaths

Demographic and Health Surveys

Total Fertility Rate (TFR) (Wanted Fertility Rate) and Crude Birth Rate (CBR):

Ethnic groups

Amerindian

The Amerindian population is the largest minority group in Honduras. The largest Amerindian group are the Lencan people. These people have been living in Honduran territory since before the colonization of the Americas, developing their own societies and civilizations. They still have many communities across the country. The indigenous population would begin to decline from the mid-16th century, mainly due to the various diseases brought by the Europeans in addition to the growing mestizo population after the founding of towns and cities. According to the 2001 census the Amerindian population in Honduras included 381,495 people (6.3% of the total population). With the exception of the Lenca and the Ch'orti' they still keep their language.

Six different Amerindian groups were counted at the 2001 census:
* the Lenca (279,507 in 2001;4.6% of the total population) living in the La Paz, Intibucá, and Lempira departments;
* the Miskito (51,607 in 2001; 0.8%) living on the northeast coast along the border with Nicaragua.
* the Ch'orti' (34,453 in 2001;0.6% of the total population), a Mayan group living in the northwest on the border with Guatemala;
* the Tolupan (also called Jicaque, "Xicaque", or Tol; 9,617 in 2001; 0.2% of the total population), living in the reserve of the Montaña de la Flor and parts of the department of Yoro;
* the Pech or Paya Indians (3,848 in 2001; 0.1% of the total population) living in a small area in the Olancho department;
* the Mayangna or Tawahka (2,463 in 2001; <0.1%)
Examples of Honduran natives are the many Mayan rules of Copan and other Mayan cities, native chiefs such as Lempira and Cicumba, and environmental and feminist activist Berta Cáceres.

Yax Kuk Mo.jpg, Copan founder, king Knich Yax Kuk Moo
Copán Stela N.jpg, Mayan ruler, Kʼakʼ Yipyaj Chan Kʼawiil
Lempira.jpg, Lencan ruler, Lempira
Berta Cáceres (cropped).jpg, Lencan environmental activist, Berta Cáceres

Mestizos

Mestizos (meaning mixed European and Amerindian) have been reported by the CIA World Factbook to be about 87% of the population of Honduras. As in other Latin American countries, the question of racial breakdown of a national population is contentious. Since the beginning of the 20th century at least, Honduras has publicly framed itself as a mestizo nation, along with other Latin American countries such as Guatemala or Mexico, ignoring and at times disparaging both the European component of the population and the surviving Amerindian population that was still regarded as "pure blooded". It's well known that many Hondurans of European or almost entirely Amerindian background consider themselves mestizo.Dario Euraque, "The Threat of Blackness to the Mestizo Nation: Race and Ethnicity in the Honduran Banana Economy, 1920s and 1930s," in Steve Striffler and Mark Moberg, eds. ''Banana Wars: Power, Production and History in the Americas'' (Duke University Press, 2003), pp. 229–49.

Because of social stigmas attached, many Honduran people denied having African ancestry, and after African descended Caribbean workers arrived in Honduras, an active campaign to denigrate all people of African descent, made persons of mixed race anxious to deny any African ancestry. Hence official statistics quite uniformly under-represent those people who have ancestry in favor of a "two race" solution.

A genetic admixture study focusing on kidney disease in Hispanic populations in the United States found an average genetic mix of 40% European, 39% Indigenous, and 21% African ancestry in the Honduran-American diaspora population, from a sample of 295 US residents who reported all four grandparents born in Honduras.

Examples of Honduran mestizos are, Poet Clementina Suarez, novelist and poet Roberto Sosa, footballer Noel Valladares and former president Manuel Zelaya.

File:José Trinidad Reyes2.PNG, Jose Trinidad Reyes, Founder of the National University
File:Rigobertoparedes.jpg, Writer and poet, Rigoberto Paredes.
File:Roberto Sosa.jpg, Novelist, Roberto Sosa
File:NoelValladares.jpg, Footballer, Noél Valladares

African

The Afro-Honduran population consist of people of African descent, Garifuna and Creoles. Most of them are descendants of African people brought by the Spanish and other European colonizers between the 16th and 18th centuries. Many of them came from the west African coast, from places like Angola or Senegambia, where European bought slaves for their colonies, while others came from the other colonies in the Caribbean.
* The Garifuna are descendants of Carib, Arawak, and West African people. This ethnic group has its origins in a group from St. Vincent islands in the Caribbean, who came in 1797. At the 2001 census 46,448 people were registered as Garifuna, 0.8% of the total population of Honduras. The Garifuna speak an Arawakan language. They live along the entire Caribbean coastline of Honduras, and in the Bay Islands.
* The number of Creoles was 12,370 (0.2%) in 2001.

Examples of well-known Afro-Hondurans are footballers David Suazo, Victor "Muma" Bernardez, Dr. Emet Cherefant, and Wilson Palacios.

David Suazo photo by Djuradj Vujcic.jpg, Footballer, David Suazo
Wilson Palacios Spurs 2009.jpg, Footballer, Wilson Palacios

European

Honduras of European descent or White Hondurans, along with Afro-descendants and Amerindians belong to the minorities of Honduras. Most of the white population are descendants of the Spanish settlers, who mainly came from southern Spain, and inhabit most of the western part of the country. Other populations include descendants of European immigrants who arrived at the beginning of the 20th century. In 2014, there were about 14,000 Hondurans of Italian descent, while there were around 400 Italian citizens. Percentages of whites varied between 2.1% and 7%, due to the fact that the majority of Hondurans identify themselves as mestizos, regardless of their ethnic and racial category. This makes it more difficult to study the number of people who fit into the white category in Honduras.

The census states that only 89,000 people in Honduras labeled themselves as white, which is equal to around 1% of the total population at the time. Another study has stated that around 210,000 people in Honduras fit this category, which would make the Honduran white population to be around 2.1%.

However, other studies report that the percentage could rise much more, reaching close to a half a million white people in Honduras, which according to official national sources would make a percentage of between 5% and 6.9% of whites in Hondurans. This is because the majority of whites in Honduras do not identify themselves as Euro-descendants as such, adopting and feeling more identified with the mestizo identity.

Examples of white Hondurans are ex-president Simon Azcona del Hoyo, pharmacologist Salvador Moncada, film director Juan Carlos Fanconi, politician Roberto Micheletti, General Florencio Xatruch and former president of the Central American federation Don Francisco Morazán Quezada.

Don Francisco Morazan Quezada.JPG, Central American president, General Francisco Morazán
Florencio Xatruch 1.jpg, General, Florencio Xatruch
Dr. Francisco Bertrand, Pres't Honduras LCCN2014693045.jpg, Ex-President, Francisco Bertrand
EWS23.20.jpg, Sir. Salvador Moncada, Honduran pharmacologist
Juan Carlos Fanconi.jpg, Juan Carlos Fanconi, film director
Jose Azcona 1987.jpg, Ex president, José Simón Azcona del Hoyo

East Asians

There is a small Chinese community in Honduras. A lawyer of the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Honduras (CODEH) stated that the Chinese community in Honduras is rather small. Many of the Chinese are immigrants who arrived from China after the revolution and their descendants.

Fotografia de Hajime Waki 2021.jpg, Hajime Waki, Honduran-Japanese singer.

Arabs

Honduras hosts a significant Palestinian community (the vast majority of whom are Christian Arabs). These Arab-Hondurans are sometimes called "Turcos", because they arrived in Honduras using Turkish travel documents, as their homeland was then under the control of the Ottoman Empire. The Palestinians arrived in the country in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, establishing themselves especially in the city of San Pedro Sula. As mentioned earlier, they are also considered whites in the country's censuses, in total the Arab-Hondurans make up 3% of the Honduran population.

File:Miguel Facusse.jpg, Businessman Miguel Facusse, son of immigrants from the Ottoman Empire
File:Salvador Nasralla in 2013 (cropped).jpg, TV host Salvador Nasralla, son of Palestinian immigrants
File:Kerim Gattas Asfura.jpg, Dr Kerim Gattas Asfura, of Arab descent
File:Carlos Flores Facusse.JPG, Carlos Flores Facussé, first Honduran president of Palestinian descent

Religion

See also

* Languages of Honduras
* Ethnic groups in Central America
* History of Honduras
*Hondurans
*

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Demographics Of Honduras


Society of Honduras