Why We Need to Stop Treating Modern Cuban Spanish Like It's "Broken"

Every now and then, I come across comments that say things like:

"Cubans should speak proper Spanish."

Or...

"Cuban Spanish is becoming too vulgar."

Sometimes it's:

"That's not how educated Cubans speak."

Or even:

"Cubans used to speak better Spanish."

And every time I read comments like these, I find myself wondering...

Are we actually talking about language?

Or are we talking about something much deeper?

Because language is never just language.

It's history.

It's migration.

It's power.

It's identity.

It's class.

It's race.

And if we ignore those things, we'll never really understand why Cuban Spanish sounds the way it does today.

Let's start with Jamaica.

Jamaica was colonised by Britain.

Enslaved Africans were forcibly brought to the island, each with their own languages and cultures.

Later came indentured labourers from India and China.

Over generations, communities mixed, cultures blended and new ways of speaking emerged.

One of those was Jamaican Patois.

Today, Jamaica's national motto is:

"Out of Many, One People."

Black Jamaicans.

Chinese Jamaicans.

Indian Jamaicans.

White Jamaicans.

Mixed Jamaicans.

Different histories.

One nation.

And if you spend time in Jamaica, you'll hear Jamaican Patois everywhere.

In homes.

On the street.

In music.

In comedy.

On social media.

It's part of everyday life.

That doesn't mean there aren't still debates about language. There are.

In fact, Jamaica is currently having national conversations about the role of Jamaican Patois alongside English in formal settings such as Parliament.

But that's an important distinction.

The language people use in Parliament isn't always the language they use around the dinner table.

Or with friends.

Or in the taxi.

Or at the market.

Every society has different registers.

Most of us don't speak to our boss the same way we speak to our siblings.

Language changes depending on where we are, who we're with and what we're trying to achieve.

The same is true in Jamaica.

No one expects Jamaicans to sound like nineteenth-century Britain when they're chatting with their neighbours.

The language has evolved alongside Jamaican history, Jamaican identity and Jamaican culture.

It's Jamaican.

England tells a similar story.

Think about the way Queen Elizabeth II spoke.

Received Pronunciation.

Carefully articulated.

Associated with prestige, education and authority.

Now spend an afternoon walking around London.

You'll hear something very different.

Multicultural London English, often shortened to MLE, has emerged through decades of migration and cultural mixing.

It's been shaped by influences from across the world, including Caribbean varieties of English such as Jamaican Patois.

What's interesting is that many of the people who speak MLE every day are also highly educated professionals.

They're teachers.

Lawyers.

Doctors.

Engineers.

Business owners.

People with university degrees, master's degrees and positions of leadership.

In other words, they also carry prestige, education and authority.

The difference is that language changes depending on the context.

The way someone speaks with friends isn't necessarily the way they speak in a job interview.

The way they speak at a family barbecue isn't necessarily the way they speak in a courtroom.

Most people naturally shift between different ways of speaking depending on where they are, who they're with and what they're trying to achieve.

That's not a sign of poor language skills.

It's a sign of linguistic competence.

The language spoken on London's streets today isn't the same English many people would expect to hear in Parliament or a courtroom.

And that's perfectly normal.

Language isn't static.

It reflects the people who speak it.

And that's what I find so interesting.

In both Jamaica and England, people generally accept that everyday speech evolves over time.

They recognise that there's a difference between the language used in formal institutions and the language people actually use in daily life.

Yet when the conversation turns to Cuba, that same grace isn't always extended.

So why do we expect Cuba to be different?

Cuba has its own history of colonisation, slavery and migration.

Spain colonised the island.

Enslaved Africans were brought there.

Chinese labourers later arrived.

People from different regions, cultures and backgrounds built the Cuba we know today.

Just like Jamaicans don't all speak the same way...

Cubans don't either.

Some people speak very close to what learners would recognise as standard Spanish.

Others use regional vocabulary.

Some pronounce every consonant clearly.

Others reduce sounds so much that learners genuinely struggle to understand them.

And yes...

If you've only ever studied textbook Spanish, some varieties of Cuban Spanish can feel overwhelming at first.

But here's the question I keep coming back to.

Does difficulty automatically make something incorrect?

Or does it simply make it unfamiliar?

This is where I think we sometimes get it wrong.

I still hear people say that Cubans should speak "proper Spanish."

What they usually mean is that Cubans should sound closer to the prestige varieties historically associated with Spain.

But Cuba hasn't been a Spanish colony for more than a century.

Like every other Spanish-speaking nation, Cuba has continued to develop its own linguistic identity.

Its language has been shaped by Caribbean geography, African influences, migration, music, politics, social change and generations of Cubans speaking to one another.

So when someone says,

"Cubans should speak like they do in Spain,"

I can't help but wonder...

Why?

Why should the benchmark for "good Spanish" always be the speech of the former colonial power?

Why is the language spoken by millions of Cubans today treated as though it's somehow less authentic than the variety spoken thousands of miles away?

That doesn't mean Standard Spanish isn't valuable.

Of course it is.

It gives us a shared written standard across the Spanish-speaking world.

But Standard Spanish and Cuban Spanish are not competing ideas.

One is a standardised variety used across education, publishing and formal communication.

The other is the living, evolving language spoken by Cuban people.

Both deserve to be understood.

This matters if you're learning Cuban Spanish.

One of the questions I get asked is:

"Why do you learn/share/teach Cuban Spanish like this?"

The answer is simple.

Because I'm teaching the language people actually speak.

Not because every Cuban speaks the same way.

They don't.

Not because standard Spanish isn't important.

It absolutely is.

Grammar matters.

Reading matters.

Writing matters.

Formal Spanish has its place.

But if your dream is to visit Havana...

If your partner is Cuban...

If your suegra is Cuban...

If you want to understand Cuban music...

Watch Cuban films...

Laugh at Cuban memes...

Or simply have real conversations with Cuban people...

Then you also need to understand the Spanish you'll actually hear.

Not just the Spanish that's easiest to put in a textbook.

Language isn't deteriorating.

It's adapting.

Every generation says the next generation is ruining the language.

People said it about English.

They said it about French.

They said it about Jamaican Patois.

And today, people say it about Cuban Spanish.

But history suggests something different.

Languages don't stand still because societies don't stand still.

People migrate.

Communities mix.

Technology changes how we communicate.

Music influences vocabulary.

Social media accelerates trends.

Each generation leaves its fingerprints on the language it inherits.

Cuban Spanish isn't frozen in time.

But some mindsets are.

My final thought.

You don't have to like every variety of Cuban Spanish.

You don't have to speak every variety either.

Even Cubans don't.

But I do think we need to stop treating language variation as though it's evidence that something has gone wrong.

Because when we dismiss the way people speak, we're often dismissing the people themselves.

And if our goal is to understand Cuba...

Really understand it...

Then we have to be willing to listen to Cuba as it exists today.

Not as it existed when colonised.

Not as it existed when fifty years ago.

Not as we'd prefer it to be.

But as it is.