Garifuna

The Garifuna people ( GAR-ee-FOO-nə or Spanish pronunciation: [ɡa'ɾifuna]; pl. Garínagu in Garifuna) are an Afro-Indigenous people of mixed free African and Amerindian ancestry who originated in the Caribbean island of Saint Vincent and traditionally speak Garifuna, an Arawakan language. The Garifuna are the descendants of Indigenous Arawak and Kalinago (Island Carib) people, and Afro-Caribbean people. The founding population of the Central American diaspora, estimated at 2,500 to 5,000 persons, were transplanted to Roatán from Saint Vincent, which was known to the Garinagu as Yurumein, in the Windward Islands of the Lesser Antilles. Small Garifuna communities still live in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. The Garifuna diaspora abroad includes communities in Honduras, the United States, and Belize.