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In cases in which a person has multiple ancestries and none of them are particularly dominant, is the person most likely to identify with the ethnicity of their surname/maiden name? I thought this would be an interesting question. What are your opinions?
In cases in which a person has multiple ancestries and none of them are particularly dominant, is the person most likely to identify with the ethnicity of their surname/maiden name? I thought this would be an interesting question. What are your opinions?
I don't know about other people, but I identify most with my mothers family, especially on her father's side. Part of it is that I know more about them. I have few deep mysteries on his side. Dad's we have his mother's paternity. He was from Ireland (ulster), his name, and that one day he went to work and never came home. Apparently she took his destination with her and with lots of searching the family got nowhere. And I didn't really ever meet many of them.
My g grandmother (mom's grandmother who was either an englishman named Smith, second husband or another ulster guy named smith, first husband. My mom and grandmother said English. Most people say Irish. Once we find something I'd identify more.
But my mom's father's family all ended up in California and I grew up with not only grandma, (him too, divorced) but his siblings, from both his father's wives. I also knew their kids and grandkids. And there are no deep holes to dig out.
I've threatened to change my name back to my maiden one, but would love to stick my grandfather's family name in there too. I just feel very much a part of them. I have heard many stories and know the mindset and fit in perfectly.
I don't know about other people, but I identify most with my mothers family, especially on her father's side. Part of it is that I know more about them. I have few deep mysteries on his side. Dad's we have his mother's paternity. He was from Ireland (ulster), his name, and that one day he went to work and never came home. Apparently she took his destination with her and with lots of searching the family got nowhere. And I didn't really ever meet many of them.
My g grandmother (mom's grandmother who was either an englishman named Smith, second husband or another ulster guy named smith, first husband. My mom and grandmother said English. Most people say Irish. Once we find something I'd identify more.
But my mom's father's family all ended up in California and I grew up with not only grandma, (him too, divorced) but his siblings, from both his father's wives. I also knew their kids and grandkids. And there are no deep holes to dig out.
I've threatened to change my name back to my maiden one, but would love to stick my grandfather's family name in there too. I just feel very much a part of them. I have heard many stories and know the mindset and fit in perfectly.
It makes sense that if you know more about one side, you would tend to identify with that heritage. I guess my original question was more based on the idea that people tend to judge others' ethnicities from their last names, so it would be easy for someone to just say they were "X ethnicity" if it was part of their name anyway.
I identified with my father's roots because I spent a lot of time with my very Cajun grandparents.
My H identifies more with his mother's side. All of his grandparents lived close by, all retained visible signs of their heritages, his last name made his paternal heritage obvious, he just felt more of a tie to his mother's side. He was always closer to his mom than to his dad; I don't know if that makes the difference.
In cases in which a person has multiple ancestries and none of them are particularly dominant, is the person most likely to identify with the ethnicity of their surname/maiden name? I thought this would be an interesting question. What are your opinions?
Not necessarily especially if one can trace their roots much further back on their maternal side than their paternal side!
I agree, I'll bet everyone approaches this differently. I imagine people who are really into genealogy are less likely to identify only with the ethnicity of their paternal line, because we spend so much time researching all our branches, we come to identify with all of them I think.
Also, women may be less likely to identify with their paternal line only, since we are more used to releasing that name when we marry and taking a new name with no genetic significance to us. I have come across men who are only interested in researching their surname/paternal line but I haven't come across women who do this.
It's difficult for me to say what someone with no dominate ethnicity would feel though since I did somewhat have a dominate ethnicity when I was growing up - Italian-American. This is what I most identified with before I got into genealogy - it was my paternal grandmother's heritage. I did not have an Italian maiden name and only had one Italian grandparent but because it was the most recently immigrated heritage in my family, it became dominate.
Meanwhile, I had always had a fascination with British culture and history - again, before my genealogy obsession kicked in and I had no idea I had British ancestors (probably assumed I did somewhere along the line but didn't really think about it). I married a British man and moved to England for 8 years where I finally got into genealogy and discovered one of my ancestors was from a town just outside the British city I was living in! Suddenly, I identified more with my British heritage than my Italian, because I was actually living in not just the country but the county my English ancestor was from. I felt a part of the culture of my British heritage.
But then came the homesickness - and with it the discovery of many colonial German branches of my tree who were among some of the first settlers of my home state of Pennsylvania. They settled so many of the lands I was already familiar with in and around Philadelphia, and I suddenly felt and overwhelming sense of belonging to these people who founded the very places I call home. And I must admit that my maiden name is German and my mother's maiden name is German and that does add to my identity with these people - but it hadn't really played a part until this discovery. Growing up, I identified with my Italian side, despite having a German surname.
So I now identify with all three, although less so with my original Italian heritage because I have lost touch with most of my Italian cousins I grew up with. I also I don't strongly identify with my Norwegian heritage, I suppose because my Norwegian ancestors settled in Wisconsin, a state I've never even been to. I've never been to Norway either, and my family's culture never really held any Scandinavian influences so I feel much more removed from my Norwegian heritage than the other three.
It makes sense that if you know more about one side, you would tend to identify with that heritage. I guess my original question was more based on the idea that people tend to judge others' ethnicities from their last names, so it would be easy for someone to just say they were "X ethnicity" if it was part of their name anyway.
The funny thing for me was I grew up in California, and my mom was born there, and my grandfather spent most of his life there. But I always thought it odd that people would ask if I was from Iowa. There were very local words and references I'd heard from my grandparents, and parents and at the time I didn't even know they'd come from Iowa. It's interesting the clues we carry with us which don't even seem like clues to us.
What is more fascinating to me is just where did the family lines come from. Some came from Scotland, but a lot were Ulster people and have names of Scots origion. On both sides they followed the same path way but mom's family went to the midwest and dad's to the south. In terms of your question then I'd still be more leaning on Mom's side, since most of the people I knew had midwest/iowa ties. Dad had political differences with his family and I didn't meet that many of them after that. But I have been told that I look very scots, which I think is cool.
My husband and I identify with the oldest lines to come here. Mine are Irish pre-1830 and his are English in the 1620s in Mass. We both have Irish, English and German heritage, but my identity is to my Irish forebears more than the German and his to the English/Welsh.
In cases in which a person has multiple ancestries and none of them are particularly dominant, is the person most likely to identify with the ethnicity of their surname/maiden name? I thought this would be an interesting question. What are your opinions?
Not in my case and only because I was so interested in the USA (and colonies) for so long. That was my mother's family. My father's family came later.
In my case both lines are the same heritage more or less. So I don't really identify one over the other. I cn look at certain parts of me and identify one side over the other. My hands, crappy flimsy wide flat fan shaped fingernails are Daddy's. I have great Grandma mothers side hips, and my lack of height is from Daddy's side, too.
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