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What does «el batey» mean in Dominican Spanish?

el batey

a sugar-mill settlement

Meaninga sugar-mill settlement
Standard Spanishpoblado de una zona cañera
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«Se crió en un batey de San Pedro.»

He grew up in a batey near San Pedro.

A settlement beside the sugar mills, lived in mostly by cane workers and their descendants, many of Haitian origin. The word is Taíno and originally meant the village's central square.

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