Provinces of the Dominican Republic Provinces of the Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic is divided into thirty–one "provincias" (provinces; singular "provincia"), while the national capital, Santo Domingo, is contained within its own Distrito Nacional ("National District"; "D.N." on the map below). The division of the country into provinces is laid down in the constitution (Title I, Section II, Article 5) and enacted by law. The latter is currently Law 5220 on the Territorial Division of the Dominican Republic ("Ley No. 5220 sobre División Territorial de la República Dominicana"), issued 1959 and frequently amended to create new provinces and lower-level administrative units. The provinces are the
People of the Dominican Republic are most prominent in food, family structure, religion, and music. Many Arawak/Taíno names and words are used in daily conversation and for many foods native to the Dominican Republic. Spanish is the predominant language in the Dominican Republic; the local dialect is called Dominican Spanish, it closely resembles Canarian Spanish, and borrowed vocabularies from the Arawak language. Schools are based on a Spanish educational model, with English and French being taught as secondary languages in both private and public schools. Haitian Creole is spoken by the population of Haitian descent. There is a community of about 8,000 speakers of Samaná