Arab Mexicans
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| (1,100,000 1% of Mexico's population) |
|
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Chiapas, Baja California, Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Sinaloa, Mexico City, Veracruz, Guanajuato, Chihuahua, Durango, Nayarit, Jalisco | |
| Languages | |
| Mexican Spanish, Mexican Arabic, Arabic | |
| Religion | |
| Majority Christianity, Minority Other religions | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Arabs, Jews, Spanish Mexicans |
Arab Mexicans are Mexican citizens of Arab ethnic, cultural and linguistic heritage or identity, who identify themselves as Arab. The vast majority of Mexico's 1,100,000 Arabs are from either Lebanese, Saudi Arabian, Syrian, Iraqi, Moroccan, Yemeni or Palestinian background.
The inter-ethnic marriage in the Arab community, regardless of religious affiliation, is very high; most community members have only one parent who has Arab ethnicity. As a result of this, the Arab community in Mexico shows marked language shift away from only Arabic. Only a few speak any mainly Arabic, and such knowledge is often limited to a few basic words. Instead the majority, especially those of younger generations, speak Spanish as a first language. Throughout the Arab slave trade Arabic and Spanish have collided in Mexico as a mixture of languages and put into one which is spoken more than the original Arabic. Today, the most common Arabic surnames in Mexico include Slim (Salim), Bichir (Bashir), Hayek, Medina, Ayoub, Nader, Ali, Sabah, Mier, Haddad, Nasser, Mohamed, Jamal, Malik, Machi, Abed, Mansoor, Magana, Esper, Harb, Califa, Elias etc.
Arab immigration to Mexico started in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Roughly 100,000 Arabic-speakers settled in Mexico during this time period. They came mostly from Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, and Iraq and settled in significant numbers in Nayarit, Guanajuato, Puebla, Mexico City and the Northern part of the country (mainly in the states of Baja California, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, Sonora, Sinaloa, Chihuahua, Zacatecas, Coahuila, and Durango), as well as the cities of Tampico and Guadalajara . They also came for slave trade in the 18th century. The term "Arab Mexican" may include ethnic groups that do not in fact identify as Arab.
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Wikipedia