Dutch is the official language of Suriname, the South American country on the Guiana coast.
Suriname was colonized by the Netherlands and remained known as Dutch Guiana until it became independent in 1975. Dutch therefore became the language of government, education, law, and formal national communication.
Suriname is linguistically diverse. Sranan Tongo is a widely used creole language, while communities also speak Javanese, Hindustani varieties, Maroon languages, Chinese languages, and several Indigenous languages. Many Surinamese people use more than one language in daily life.
A frequent mistake is assuming that Spanish or Portuguese is official because those languages dominate much of South America. Suriname is culturally distinct from its Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking neighbors, and Dutch-speaking Suriname is linked historically and geographically with Guyana and French Guiana.