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With fastly increasing immigration from the Dominican Republic and Haiti, many of the immigrants being of black African descent.
As well as increased migration of Puerto Ricans moving from the island to the mainland, now mostly middle class Puerto Ricans, with far fewer lower class Puerto Ricans leaving, this would increase the share Black Puerto Ricans would make up of PR. (In PR, most middle class class folks are white/lighter skinned, while most lower class folks are black/darker skinned)
Also, as Puerto Rico increasingly becomes Americanized, it MAY start to follow the American version of the One-drop rule, PR currently follows the opposite of that rule. (Many multiracials may start to identify as black instead of white)
Increased connection and movement between Puerto Rico and the blacker neighboring US territory, the Virgin Islands.
Puerto Rico is now becoming a major destination for many in Latin America (the only place 'in the US' where Spanish is the main language), the Caribbean (the closest part of the US to many Caribbean islands, as well as the easiest to get to), and Africa (IDK why, but I read it on various sites that many Africans are starting to immigrate to PR, especially Nigerians, just look on census factfinder.com, thats one of the sites)
Anyway, I was in Puerto Rico no more than 2 weeks ago, and I must say it's beginning to look more and more like DR, very Mulatto-ish if u will. I remember when I first came to PR in 1991, PR was mainly whites and triracials, with some blacks and mulattos here and there, now it seems there's alot more Afro-descended people in PR.
Puerto Rico still overwhelmingly identifies as "White".
One interesting thing however is the growing number of Puerto Ricans identifying as "American Indian".
Which is more accurate, in my opinion. Anyone who has spent a significant amount of time in PR would know that most people have varying degrees of Taíno ancestry, though no one is more than 50% AFAIK. As for PR becoming blacker, I don't see why that would be an issue. If Boricuas don't want to marry a black person, then they are free not to
According to the Farmer's Almanac on Novemebr 3rd, 2013 there will be a partial solar eclipse visible along the east coast and down the Atlantic through the Caribbean. Best guess is Puerto Rico will be somewhat darker during the during this time.
There have been quite a few posts like this over the last few months, probably from the same person who continues to re-register and re-post under a new name. My impressions have been the posts are not so much about Puerto Rico but more about attempting to create inflammatory and controversial racial commentary.... that truthfully, doesn't apply to Puerto Rico. Maybe NYC, but not Puerto Rico.
If what you mean is a higher concentration of Afroantillean ancestry folks and their culture, which has always been part of the Puerto Rican heritage, that depends on what part of the island you find such immigrant concentrations from the DR, Haiti and the Lesser Islands. If what you mean is a U.S. African American influx and worldview on race then NO. That has never been as much part of Puerto Rican culture as it has always been in the 'states, nor the perpetrator-victim exclusionary mentality that prevails between whites and blacks in the U.S., nor do we want that kind of unnecessary cultural burden here.
The same question can be asked about the US. Is the US becoming browner or blacker? Is Europe becoming less white?
If the recent riots in Sweden and France show something is that people are uncomfortable with changing skin color.
The reason why Puerto Rico seemed whiter in the past is because Blacks NEVER were more than 12% of the population. In Cuba it was more than 50%, in the Domincan Republic about 70%.
Because Puerto Rico never was a full blown slave society like Cuba, blacks never overtook whites in numbers, thus our basically white look. Different from Puerto Rico, Cuba copied Jim Crow laws in order to keep the majority blacks under control. In the Dominican Republic Trujillo tried to bring in more whites to whiten the populaton. Even today Blacks don't consider themselves black but INDIO. Haitains are Blacks , not Dominicans. Example: Sammy Sosa's passport race says Indio not negro.
In Puerto Rico the Obesession with color is basically the preocupation of stateside Ricans , those that have been culturally colonized by American Afro-centric culture and want to impose their new found culture on island Puerto Ricans. We've had enough colonialism with white americans why do we have to accept it from Black americans too!
On average, Puerto Ricans tend to get 11.7% of the genes from their African ancestors. Only Dominicans tend to have a greater African contribution to their DNA (35.2%). The average Puerto Rican tends to get 12.3% of their DNA from the Tainos and 57.6% of their DNA from Europe. Basically, Puerto Rico is a country of mixed people with a very large percentage of their DNA originating in Europe.
With the arrivals of large numbers of Dominicans what will happen is a darkening of the population, but since Dominicans are overwhelmingly mixed themselves and they tend to have the same genetic components as PR (Europe, Taino, and African); in a way it will be more of the same.
At the same time, Puerto Rico is not receiving a large number of African Americans (on average they tend to be around 80% black), or black Caribbeans in general.
So Puerto Rico may be going through a darkening faze but I wouldn't call it blackening since most of the new arrivals are conspicuously mixed themselves, textbook mulattoes.
In the past Puerto Rico was a much more mulatto society that it is today, but thanks to the Spanish government incentivizing the migration of more Europeans at the end of the 1800s and the Puerto Rican government incentivizing the emigration of mostly blacks and mulattoes in the early to mid-20th century, the island whitened considerably as the 20th century progressed.
The increasing numbers of mulattoes in Puerto Rico will have the effect of making PR look more as it used to be before the massive numbers of whites migrated to the island and changed the character of the people.
PR is getting more DR so I would agree it is getting "darker" to some extent, but DR doesn't really identify as "black", but rather mixed, so it's complicated.
It's a big issue in DR too with the Haiti border. Yes, there is racism involved, but the identity is separate from the skin color. A dark-skinned PR or (especially) DR will not identify as African American if in the U.S., for example.
There is also a growing number of illegal immigrants from Haiti. They can't get to the mainland via Florida so now they will try via Puerto Rico.
So much for that new super-duper radar system installed by Homeland InSecurity
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