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Panamanian NYC

Panamanian NYC is centered in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. New York City’s main Panamanian festival is the Panamanian Parade and Street Fair.

Panamanian Archive

Panamanian Festivals in NYC

New York City’s big Panamanian festival is the Panamanian Parade and Festival on the first or second Saturday of October. It’s the biggest Panamanian parade outside of Panama. The Panamanian diaspora comes from all over the East Coast to join the parade and festivities.

Panamanian New York City

Little Panama

New York City’s “Little Panama” used to be on Franklin Avenue in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. Today it is spread out across Flatbush, Crown Heights, Carnarsie, Bed-Stuy and Clinton Hill.

Cafe con Libros bookstore in Crown Heights is Panamanian. cafeconlibrosbk.com

Panamanian New Yorkers

Salsa singer-songwriter Rubén Blades is the most famous Panamanian New Yorker. He was a lawyer before he came to New York. Rubén rides the subway and he’s really cool. If you think, OMG, is that Rubén Blades? It probably is.

Blades played an important role in the development of salsa dura (hard salsa) in 1970s New York. He made many famous hits and is still making great music and winning Grammy Awards.

Panamanian Culture

Panama has its own unique blend of Indigenous, Hispanic and African people and culture.

Today Panama has West Indian culture blended in. Jamaican workers helped finish the Panama Canal. Was this the beginning of reggaeton?

Reggaeton started as pregones (selling songs) on freelance buses in poor neighborhoods of Panama City. Panamanians brought this early form of reggaeton to New York City where it jumped to Puerto Rico and developed before spreading to Colombia and around the world. It’s the popular music of today’s youth around the world.

Panamanian Polleras

Panamanian Folk Dancers (Gualberto Becerra/Dreamstime)
Panamanian Folk Dancers (Gualberto Becerra/Dreamstime)

The woman wears a Panamanian pollera with a beautiful crown. Polleras are based on Spanish Andalusían peasant dress from the Colonial Era. Today they are a folk costume.

Polleras are worn in many Hispanic countries, but Panamanians have their own style of Panamanian pollera. They are some of the most beautiful polleras in the world.

The man wears a sombrero campesino, a farmer’s hat. The patterns in the hat may represent a particular town or region.

Visit Panama

North and South America meet in Panama, and so do the Atlantic and Pacific. The Panama Canal joins the oceans. The Darién Gap is a roadless forest that joins the Americas.

The country offers a rich combination of modern city, pretty colonial towns, rainforests and beaches. Hispanic culture is strong in Azuero and Coclé. African cultural traditions continue in the Caribbean city Colón.

UNESCO World Heritage Sites

  • Portobelo-San Lorenzo
  • Darien National Park
  • Talamanca Range – La Amistad Reserves / La Amistad National Park
  • Panamá Viejo
  • Coiba National Park and It’s Special Zone of Marine Protection
Panamanian Separation Day (Gualberto Becerra/Dreamstime)
Panamanian Separation Day (Gualberto Becerra/Dreamstime)
North American

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