Jíbaro is a term from the Taíno

Taíno language

Taíno, an Arawakan language, was the principal language of the Caribbean islands at the time of the Spanish Conquest, including the Bahamas, Cuba, Hispaniola, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, the Florida Keys, and the Lesser Antilles...

 words "jiba" ("forest") and "ro"(man), that means forest people, commonly used in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

 to refer to mountain-dwelling peasants, but in modern times it has gained a broader cultural meaning.

History

In Puerto Rico, some elements of the jibaro culture are still visible today. For example, when Luis Muñoz Marín

Luis Muñoz Marín

Don José Luis Alberto Muñoz Marín was a Puerto Rican poet, journalist, and politician. Regarded as the "father of modern Puerto Rico," he was the first democratically elected Governor of Puerto Rico. Muñoz Marín was the son of Luis Muñoz Rivera, a renowned autonomist leader...

 founded the Popular Democratic Party

Popular Democratic Party of Puerto Rico

The Popular Democratic Party of Puerto Rico is a political party that supports Puerto Rico's right to self-determination and sovereignty, through the enhancement of Puerto Rico's current status as a commonwealth....

 (PDP) in 1938, the party adopted the jíbaro hat, the pava, as its symbol. The PDP seal shows the pava with the words "Pan, Tierra, y Libertad", which translates to "Bread, Land, and Freedom" in English. Also, every Christmas, Puerto Ricans use the Jíbaros instruments, music, and cuisine to celebrate these festivities.

Modern usage of the word

Jibaros in modern Puerto Rican culture have a more positive connotation, proudly associated with a cultural ideology as pioneers of Puerto Rico. The term also has a negative connotation; a jibaro can mean someone who is considered ignorant or impressionable due to a lack of formal education.

Despite this negative connotation, the image of the jíbaro represents an ideology of a traditional Puerto Rican: hard-working, simple, independent, and prudently wise. Colloquially, the jíbaro imagery serves as a representation of the roots of modern Puerto Rican people, and symbolizes the strength of traditional values of living simply and properly caring for homeland and family.

Uses of the word in other countries

• In Cuba
  Cuba
  The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
  
   there exists a word similar to jíbaro, Guajiro.
• Xivaro, or Gibaro, which is pronounced similarly to jibaro, was a name given to the natives of Colombia, Brazil and Venezuela by the Spaniards and Portuguese.
• The Shuar
  Shuar
  The Shuar people are an indigenous people of Ecuador and Peru. They are members of the Jivaroan peoples, who are Amazonian tribes living at the headwaters of the Marañón River.-Name:...
  
  people of the amazonic regions of South America are sometimes called "jíbaros".
• "Jíbaro" can also be considered as an insult (referring to a person being a backward country, uneducated, hill billy),depending on the context, in Puerto Rico as well.
• In some parts of Colombia the word is used to describe some one who sells drugs. A "drug dealer".

Further Reading

• El Jibaro. Puerto Rico Off The Beaten Path. Page 157. Accessed January 16, 2011.