Not only in Philadelphia, but also in New York City and Orlando (FL), the migration of Puerto Ricans in the U.S. has left a considerable mark. “#PRIDEUndefeated, 100 Years of Puerto Rican Diaspora” will attempt to document through AL DIA their unknown history.

The old joke is that Puerto Ricans who live in New York are called “Nuyoricans.”

Puerto Ricans who live in Philadelphia are called “PhillyRicans.”

And Puerto Ricans who live in Orlando are called “MickeyRicans.”

In reality, these three great cities on the East Coast of the United States have been the recipients of the greatest migration from the island Puerto Rico over the past 100 years. 

They are in that order, New York, Orlando and Philadelphia, the 3 cities in the US with the largest settlements of the “Puerto Rican Diaspora,” as some academics call one of the greatest migrations of people into the continental U.S.

The “Puerto Rican Diaspora” is made of millions of people, calculated in almost 4 who live in the continental United States, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Hawaii, which makes it as large as that other Diaspora —the Jewish Diaspora in the U.S.— whose larger history lends the name to this dispersion of people from this beautiful island from the Caribbean to all across the globe.

There might be Puerto Ricans in Europe, or South America, but the majority that have left their land has come to Northern part of America, which adopted them as citizens in 1917.

Next year this community, which constitutes the largest segment of Latinos in Philadelphia, will remember that 100 years ago the U.S. Congress passed the law, known as the Jones Act, that contributed to the glaring fact of today: 

That more Puerto Ricans live outside of Puerto Rico, specifically in the U.S., than in the island of Puerto Rico.

Questions like this are part of the quest of the project “#PRIDEUndefeated, 100 Years of the Puerto Rican Diaspora”, which was recently launched by AL DIA in Philadelphia, and now will expand to New York City and Orlando.