About The DR

Culture

A plethora of cultures have left their stamp on Dominican society. Traditional Taíno foods and medicines are familiar today, and Taíno words - like hammock and tobacco - still pepper the language. Spanish settlers gave the country their language and the Roman Catholic faith. Africans brought here as slaves brought their own faith as well as art and music. Even US troops left their mark - Dominicans love baseball. It is quite a mixture.

Music and dance is at the heart of Dominican culture. The most popular form is merengue, which will be blasted, full volume, almost anywhere you go in the country. A tad more pastoral is bachata, Dominican country music, with plenty of songs about heartbreak and loss. Bachata is the typical music in the region where we work. Salsa makes the third favorite musical type in the DR's holy trinity of music; although salsa is more the dance of the upper-class Dominicans..

While in the Dominican Republic, remember that politeness and a polished appearance will get you farther in just about any situation. Whining or complaining, on the other hand, will make you look foolish and do nothing to change your situation. Roll with the punches, relax and enjoy yourself; after all, how often do you get to visit and volunteer in a tropical paradise?

Architecture is another important part of Dominican culture, from the well-preserved colonial Spanish buildings of Santo Domingo, the Americas' first European city, to the brightly colored farmhouses of the countryside. Color and style are ignored by no one in the DR, which makes for some very interesting things to see.

While in the Dominican Republic, remember that politeness and a polished appearance will get you farther in just about any situation. Whining or complaining, on the other hand, will make you look foolish and do nothing to change your situation. Roll with the punches, relax and enjoy yourself; after all, how often do you get to visit and volunteer in a tropical paradise?

History and Politics

The earliest known inhabitants of the Dominican Republic reached the island around 2600 BC, using dugout canoes that allowed them to ride the current from South America throughout the Antilles. They were primarily nomadic hunter-gatherers who used stone tools and left little behind. A second group, often referred to as the Salanoids or ancient Arawaks, landed on Hispaniola around 250 BC. The group spread throughout the Caribbean. A third migration, from Venezuela, swept through the Antilles about 2000 years ago, and by 700AD occupied the Dominican Republic and most of the surrounding islands. This society's complex hierarchical structure allowed for specialization in fishing, worship, art and farming. They called themselves the Taíno (friendly people), and an estimated 400,000 of them lived on Hispanola when Christopher Columbus got off the ship to greet them. Folks on another island had told Columbus that there was gold to be found there, and the anxious Italian set off in the night to find it, accidentally dashing the Santa María offshore.

Columbus named the island Hispaniola ('Little Spain') and returned with a thousand colonists the following year. Naturally it was the Taíno who were set to work to build this vision, and within six years of Columbus' arrival they had been thoroughly decimated by cruel working conditions and European diseases. Though some independent communities survived in hard-to-reach areas of the island, much of the original culture was lost.

Toussaint L'Ouverture, a revolutionary leader, was eventually driven back to the formerly French territories, and Haiti declared independence in 1804. Then, they invaded the eastern half of the island again in 1821. This time they stayed for 23 years, looting the country, freeing the slaves and bringing economic activity to a standstill. A nascent Dominican nationalist movement formed during the occupation and beat the Haitians back to the eastern side of the island in 1844. The leader of this important revolution was Juan Pablo Duarte, now hailed as the father of the Dominican Republic.

The neighboring United States saw trouble in the Caribbean as opportunity for expansion, and in 1916, US troops moved in. Like the Spanish, who lost interest when the gold ran out, however, the USA became bored with the island when it became clear that the Germans probably weren't going to attack the Panama Canal after all, making the DR a bit less strategically important. In 1924, they stepped back, and President Horacio Vásquez stepped up. The new president built roads and schools, initiated irrigation programs and got the economy hopping. Just when things were going really well, army chief Rafael Leonidas Trujillo got jealous of all that power he didn't have. Although he had been siphoning money off the military budget for years, money was not enough for Trujillo and he forced Vásquez to resign. From 1930 to 1961, Trujillo dispensed with the formalities of democracy and got down to business. Repression, murder and torture went side by side with building, land reform and economic success during the Trujillo administration.

The resumption of free elections pitted the usual suspects against one another: reform-minded liberals, military men and wealthy families all fought for the brass ring. The Dominican Republic continued to diversify its economy, build schools and slowly move forward almost in spite of its leadership not to mention the increasingly regular rolling blackouts caused by increasingly run-down infrastructure and inadequate power plants.

The long rein of Joaquin Balaguer finally ended in 1996 in a cloud of corruption. Leonel Fernandez Reyna, of the leftist Dominican Liberation Party (PLD), won the subsequent election, but the PRD returned to power in 2000 with Hipolito Mejia at the helm. Civic life in recent years has been punctuated by the devastation wreaked by the hurricanes that pass across the island seasonally and by the death of Balaguer in 2002 at the age of 95. He'd dominated political life for a half-century. Civil unrest has become more common in recent years in response to the government's economic policies, particularly in regard to increasing prices and power cuts.

Santo Domingo

The ancient Caribbean seaport of Santo Domingo, founded in August 1496, was the first capital of the new territories discovered by Christopher Columbus. In recognition of the city's role in the Spanish colonization period, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) proclaimed Santo Domingo cultural heritage of the New World. Santo Domingo has numerous museums, restored historic sites and cobblestone streets. Its parks and plazas, ancient churches, main cathedral, coastal fortifications and reconstructed Spanish government buildings bring history to life. It is also a modern city with a population of 2 million, lively music, fine dining, casinos and five-star hotels dotting the landscape.

Spanish in the Dominican Republic

Spanish in the Dominican Republic is not like Spanish in other countries. Dominicanos greatly appreciate it if you speak Spanish with them. If you mangle the language, they are extremely patient. Dominicans speak very fast and are often times hard to understand. Keep trying- and have fun- get a good laugh out of trying to communicate in another language. For those trying to “get” Dominican Spanish; the number seis (six) will be pronounced se. Buenas noches or buenas tardes will be abbreviated to buena. Gracias likewise is gracia. Some beginners of Spanish find it different that the response to one saying gracia is most often the word siempre (always). It corresponds similarly to the "much obliged" in English. Best to listen with your heart and not just your ears – a good way to understand people in any language.

Suggested Reading

Revisit the days when the leaf ruled the island in Michiel Baud's Peasants and Tobacco in the Dominican Republic, 1870-1930.

World War II is the setting for Peter Furst's novel Don Quixote in Exile, where a Jewish refugee settles in the Dominican Republic.

Paul Austerlitz and Robert Farris Thompson dissect the phenomenon of Merengue: Dominican Music and Dominican Identity.

Sugarball: The American Game, the Dominican Dream by Alan Klein puts Slammin' Sammy Sosa in context.

Any book by award winning author Julia Alvarez will take you to the heart of Dominican culture and allow you to experience the love and compassion of these great people.