Neighborhood

Mott Haven

Bronx
In the Census-defined PUMA including Hunts Point, Longwood & Melrose, according to recent Census data, (in descending order) French, "Niger-Congo languages", and Mande are recorded as having over 1000 speakers. Varieties of English and Spanish are widely spoken.
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Languages with a significant site in this neighborhood, marked by a point on the map:

Arbëresh

Arbërisht
Arriving within the large Southern Italian immigrant wave beginning in the late 19th century, Arbëresh speakers (from places such as Vaccarizzo, San Cosmo Albanese, Frascineto, and Acquaformosa in Calabria and Greci in Campania) came to live within broader Italian neighborhoods, beginning in Little Italy and later in the Bronx, Staten Island, and likely elsewhere. According to community historians, the substantial community of the Inwood-Lawrence-Rockaway area on the South Shore of Long Island was largely from Cerzeto, San Martino di Finita, and surrounding Arbëresh villages. From 1904 to 1946, the Arbëresh priest Papas Ciro Pinnola created a parish within the Archdiocese of New York, unique in North America, dedicated to the distinctive (Greek-language) Byzantine Catholic rite of the Italo-Albanian Church. In recent years, the rite has been revived at Our Lady of Grace church on Staten Island.

Mam

Mam
Indigenous Maya Mam speakers from the Guatemalan departments of Huehuetenango and Quetzaltenango live across New York City and New Jersey in significant numbers, with a large, relatively new community from the town of Cabricán, for instance, that has members in East Harlem, the Bronx, Staten Island, and Queens. Many in Morristown, New Jersey are from Cajolá, with others reported to be from San Juan Ostuncalco — many different varieties of Mam, not always fully mutually intelligible, are spoken.

Mixtec

Tu'un Savi
Among the Mixtec speakers living in the Bronx are many isolated individuals and families from Guerrero, as well as those from San Miguel Ahuehuetitlán (Oaxaca) in the Bronx, such as the owners of the restaurant La Morada, a hub for both traditional Indigenous foodways and activism.

Nahuatl

Nahuatl
Based in the Bronx, the Red de Pueblos Transnacionales is a network of community groups formed by migrants from rural and Indigenous Mexican pueblos, including speakers of several varieties of Nahuatl. Several Bronx neighborhoods at least from the South Bronx up to Fordham Road are home to Nahuatl speakers.

Otomi

Hñähñu
Among Indigenous Otomi (Hñahñu) speakers in New York, there are many from the largely Hñahñu municipality of Texcatepec, in the Huasteca region of Veracruz. According to one estimate, of Texcatepec's 9,000 people, as many as 400 to 500 (mostly young men) were working in the New York City area, centered in the south Bronx.

Puerto Rican Spanish

Español Puertorriqueño
Puerto Ricans began moving to the mainland United States in significant numbers in the late 19th century, bringing with them their unique variety of Caribbean Spanish. The Great Migration following the Second World War brought tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans to the city each year, making Puerto Rican Spanish the dominant form of Spanish in New York for much of the 20th century in major barrios including East Harlem, the Lower East Side (sometimes called Loisaida), Williamsburg, Bushwick, and much of the Bronx. Proudly Nuyorican poets like Miguel Algarín and Tato Laviera, blending Puerto Rican and New York culture, forged a distinctive, poetic Spanglish. Today, Puerto Rican Spanish speakers live throughout the city, but an increasing number are moving to suburban areas of Westchester, New Jersey, and other states.

Q'anjob'al

Q'anjob'al
Along with other speakers of Indigenous Mayan languages of Guatemala, more and more Q'anjob'al speakers have been arriving in the United States, to the point there the language has become one of the most frequently encountered by Border Patrol at the U.S. southern border. While there are larger Q'anjob'al-speaking communities elsewhere in the country, there are also reports of individual speakers in the New York metro area.

Tlapanec

Me'phaa
Known to speakers themselves as Me'phaa, Tlapanec is an Indigenous Oto-Manguean language, with at least four distinct varieties, spoken in western central Mexico. The Malinaltepec variety spoken in the state of Guererro is estimated to have 37,500 speakers. Me'phaa activist and writer Zenaida Cantú is aware of at least 50 speakers of her language now living across New York, with some 30 or so from the municipio of Malinaltepec alone, some of whom have formed a band. There may be others who speak the very different (not always mutually intelligible) varieties from Acatepec and Tlacoapa. The largest concentrations of Me'phaa speakers live in upper Manhattan and the Bronx. Read more here.

Zapotec

Diidxazá
The Indigenous Zapotec community in and around Los Angeles is larger than the one in and around New York, but there are speakers of Zapotecan languages (a diverse group from Oaxaca in Mexico) living in and around Latino areas of New York and New Jersey. Important clusters include former residents of San Sebastián Teitipac now in the Bronx, who have been hoping to pass on their language with a dedicated school; a community in Corona, Queens from San Pablo Güilá, which has a distinctive variety of the language; a community from San Agustín Yatareni in Poughkeepsie; and farmworkers in and around Bridgeton in southern New Jersey.
Additional languages spoken in this neighborhood:
  • Central American Spanish
  • Mexican Spanish
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Mott Haven

Bronx

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AbakuáAbakuá

Caribbean

  • Cuba flag
    Cuba
Lower East Side

Smallest

Liturgical
AbazaАбаза

Western Asia

  • Turkey flag
    Turkey
  • Russia flag
    Russia
49,800
Abkhaz-Adyge
Wayne (NJ)

Smallest

Residential
Abruzzese (Orsognese)Abruzzésë

Southern Europe

  • Italy flag
    Italy
Indo-European
Astoria

Small

Residential
Abruzzese (Orsognese)Abruzzésë

Southern Europe

  • Italy flag
    Italy
Indo-European
Little Italy

Small

Historical
AcehneseBahsa Acèh

Southeastern Asia

  • Indonesia flag
    Indonesia
3,500,000
Austronesian
Astoria

Smallest

Community
AcehneseBahsa Acèh

Southeastern Asia

  • Indonesia flag
    Indonesia
3,500,000
Austronesian
Elmhurst

Smallest

Residential
AdjoukrouMɔjukru

Western Africa

  • Ivory Coast flag
    Ivory Coast
140,000
Atlantic-Congo
Concourse

Smallest

Residential
AdygheК|ахыбзэ

Western Asia

  • Turkey flag
    Turkey
  • Russia flag
    Russia
117,500
Abkhaz-Adyge
Wayne (NJ)

Small

Residential
AfenmaiAfenmai

Western Africa

  • Nigeria flag
    Nigeria
270,000
Atlantic-Congo
Castle Hill

Smallest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Bedford-Stuyvesant

Largest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Newark (NJ)

Largest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Clifton

Largest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Hollis

Largest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Edenwald

Largest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Central Harlem

Largest

Residential
African-American EnglishBlack English

Northern America

  • United States flag
    United States
45,109,521
Indo-European
Hempstead (NY)

Large

Residential
AfrikaansAfrikaans

Southern Africa

  • South Africa flag
    South Africa
  • Zimbabwe flag
    Zimbabwe
17,543,580
Indo-European
Murray Hill

Small

Community
AkanAkan

Western Africa

  • Ghana flag
    Ghana
9,231,300
Atlantic-Congo
Flatbush

Small

Residential
AkanAkan

Western Africa

  • Ghana flag
    Ghana
9,231,300
Atlantic-Congo
Shore Acres

Small

Residential
AkanAkan

Western Africa

  • Ghana flag
    Ghana
9,231,300
Atlantic-Congo
University Heights

Large

Residential

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