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I don't understand your point. Volga Germans used to be germans until they got russified. Then they became russians. Of course your ancestors were not polish or french. They were germans speakers. They were germans. Why would they be polish or french? But the borders have shifted and people were moved with them. You have still a little bit of western pomerania left in Germany but most of it is in Poland and almost all Germans were expelled from there and replaced with Poles. As for France. Young alsatians can't speak german or alsatian dialect of german and they speak french nowadays. They are ceirtanly french. They ancestors were germans, but that does not make them germans. They are french.
I mentioned it because the concept is confusing to some people who don't know the history and geography. One of my cousins recently became interested in genealogy and got one of those DNA tests that tells you what parts of the world your ancestors came from. She reported to us excitedly that we were "part French" because one of her listed regions shows up on a map of France. We knew about our great-grandparent coming from that area, and we had to explain to her that he was an ethnic German who spoke German, and the fact that Lorraine is now in France doesn't mean that he was French.
So you agree with me that german, scottish,english are not ethnicities but nationalities. And you can't be american of german ethnicity. That is good.
If I agree with you I'll say it - no need to try to put words I didn't say into my mouth.
What I have said from the start is that my ANCESTRY includes Scottish, English, German and French ancestors. You can split hairs all you like but I gave you many professional links to professional articles written I'm sure by people a lot smarter than either of us, using terminology that I am using.
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Lol forgotten first language? Some words maybe you could forget with time but never most of your first language. She probably could never speak it good in a first place. Ancestry sicilian, italian? Why not greek? Sicilians and southern italians are descendants of greeks so why does she claim italian ancestry and not greek. By american logic she has greek ancestry and not italian. LOL
There you go trying again to pretend I said things I never said. For instance, I never said that Italian was her "first language." That's something you made up.
As for your other queries, I guess you'd have to ask her. I do know that both her parents had Italian parents, Italian last names, and spoke Italian but that's as far as my knowledge goes.
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So if black families immigrate to United States from Cuba and their grandchildren have no spanish ancestors at all and can't speak spanish at all and speak only english. They are hispanic? Haha . That is like saying black is white and white is black. You can't be hispanic and not speak spanish just as you can't be francophone and not speak french. It is crazy that so many people in certain part of world could think otherwise. if your friends from mexico can't speak spanish then they are not hispanic. It is completely illogical what you are saying. Speaking language and dialect have everything to do whether someone is of certain culture. And I say again what ethnicity? Do you know what that means? Nations are not ethnicities.
I don't know about where you're from but here in the US, "Hispanic" is not a race. It's not a skin tone. And just about everyone knows that. And errr, yes, you absolutely can be "Hispanic" and not speak Spanish. Sheeze.
And to reiterate for about the thousandth time, I know the difference between ethnicity and nationality. I'm starting to wonder if you do, though.
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Only in america is Barrack Obama called first black president. He is not first black president, because he is not black. He is as much white as he is black .He does not look black. He is mullato. Mixed.
Mixed? Mixed what? I thought he was just American.
By the way, you're preaching to the choir on this one. I'll just leave it at that.
And I'm not going to bother responding to the rest of your post because speaking of illogical - it definitely is, and I'm tired of going around in circles with you about it.
If I agree with you I'll say it - no need to try to put words I didn't say into my mouth.
What I have said from the start is that my ANCESTRY includes Scottish, English, German and French ancestors. You can split hairs all you like but I gave you many professional links to professional articles written I'm sure by people a lot smarter than either of us, using terminology that I am using.
There you go trying again to pretend I said things I never said. For instance, I never said that Italian was her "first language." That's something you made up.
As for your other queries, I guess you'd have to ask her. I do know that both her parents had Italian parents, Italian last names, and spoke Italian but that's as far as my knowledge goes.
You said "she grew up in bilingual household" I assumed that meant that she supposedly spoke both languages at home. What did you mean?
What articles? Those written by americans who grew up thinking that they have italian, german ethnicity even though these are nationalities?
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Originally Posted by KathrynAragon
I don't know about where you're from but here in the US, "Hispanic" is not a race. It's not a skin tone. And just about everyone knows that. And errr, yes, you absolutely can be "Hispanic" and not speak Spanish. Sheeze.
And to reiterate for about the thousandth time, I know the difference between ethnicity and nationality. I'm starting to wonder if you do, though.
Well I know hispanic is not a race. I put specifically black people as an example because if I put white people who do not speak spanish as an example then you would tell me that it is their ancestors from Spain that make such people hispanic. So explain to me if particular person does not have any ancestors from Spain, does not speak spanish language. How could such person be called hispanic? What is hispanic about such person? If I found out today that I had spanish speaking great grandparents. Would that make me hispanic in United States? I am honestly curious. It is actualy fascinating to me how different can people think about such easy matters.
You have no idea what ethnic groups are. German is nationality that consist of ethnic groups such as for example : bavarians, swabians, franconians. etc If german is "ethnicity" then what are these groups? You say you know the difference but can't answer on a simple question. Is being german nationality or ethnicity?
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Originally Posted by KathrynAragon
Mixed? Mixed what? I thought he was just American.
By the way, you're preaching to the choir on this one. I'll just leave it at that.
And I'm not going to bother responding to the rest of your post because speaking of illogical - it definitely is, and I'm tired of going around in circles with you about it.
Don't play silly. We are not talking about nationality but about his race in this case. Explain why every mixed, mulatto kid is considered black in United States? And why is Obama called first black president when he is not even black. Is it logical to you? It is as logical as your nonsense that you could be francophone and not speak french or that you could be hispanic and not speak spanish. Just because you repeat lie thousand times does not make it truth.
You said "she grew up in bilingual household" I assumed that meant that she supposedly spoke both languages at home. What did you mean?
What articles? Those written by americans who grew up thinking that they have italian, german ethnicity even though these are nationalities?
Well I know hispanic is not a race. I put it specifically as an example because if I put white person who does not speak spanish as an example then you would tell me that it is their ancestors from Spain that make such person hispanic. So explain to me if particular person does not have any ancestors from Spain, does not speak spanish language. How could such person be called hispanic? What is hispanic about such person? If I found out today that I had spanish speaking great grandparents. Would that make me hispanic in United States? I am honestly curious. It is actualy fascinating to me how different can people think about such easy matters.
You have no idea what ethnic groups are. German is nationality that consist of ethnic groups such as for example : bavarians, swabians, franconians. etc If german is "ethnicity" then what are these groups? Is being german nationality or ethnicity? It can't be both. Simple question to you. Can you answer that?
Don't play silly. We are not talking about nationality but about his race in this case. Explain why every mixed, mulatto kid is considered black in United States? And why is Obama called first black president when he is not even black. Is it logical to you? It is as logical as your nonsense that you could be francophone and not speak french or that you could be hispanic and not speak spanish. Just because you repeat lie thousand times does not make it truth.
You know something - if you weren't so rude in your approach, I'd discuss all of this with you more and maybe we could both understand each other better. But I've lost interest. Sorry.
Believe me - it has nothing to do with running out of argument or points and everything to do with simply not wanting to deal with sarcasm any more.
You know something - if you weren't so rude in your approach, I'd discuss all of this with you more and maybe we could both understand each other better. But I've lost interest. Sorry.
Believe me - it has nothing to do with running out of argument or points and everything to do with simply not wanting to deal with sarcasm any more.
If I came out as rude I apologize. It was not my intention.
Well look at austrians. Till the mid XX century they were ethnic group of germans and considered themselves german and now are separate nation. Nations are not forever. Today californians are part of american nation. If they vote independence they become separate nation. If some group of people decide to go their separate way then new nation is formed. Nations are born and then nations die out and new nations are formed. That is how the world goes.
If Belorussians didn't get their own nation they would become regular russians. Just like they had become regular poles before. Getting their own state basically prevent them from dying out as a nation. Some nations have stronger national pride sense some have less of it.
Irish had their different language and religion which prevented them from becoming british. Irish is taught compulsory in irish schools. Pretty much all of irish can speak irish but simply prefer to speak in english.
If catalans don't consider themselves spanish then they are not spanish. They have separate language and autonomy.
Scots are nation that is located on british isles therefore that makes them also british.
I hope you do realize that russians are not all descendants of slavic people and mixed heavily which is visible. If some minority groups marry russian who speaks russian then 100 years later their descendants will be seen as ethnic russian because they will speak russian even though when you look back at their ancestors many of them would be of different origins. But that would not be important as their first language would be russian. That basically what happened in Russia. Ethnic slavs(russians) started to absorb other elements and even though physical appearance of many of those people clearly have changed they are still considered to be ethnic russians. Why? Because of the russian language.
I do not think you can be of russian nationality and german ethnicity as german is a nationality itself. You can however be russian citizen of german nationality or russian citizen of ukrainian nationality. That makes sense. Citizenship, nationality, ethnic groups that are not part of any nation or ethnic groups within nations. All of these are different concepts.
Just to be clear I agree with you for the most part. I do think that over a few generations most people assimilate into the their host countries society and they become one with them. Also I'm aware that Russian's are not some pure breed and that they are a mix of many people, for instance in the case of my self most of my grandparents are either Ukrainian or partially Ukrainian, either way by blood I'm mostly Ukrainian, however my parents Identify as Russian since they primarily speak Russian and growing up in Crimea they had a closer connection/affinity towards Russia than Ukraine, for them Ukraine was the equivalent to say Texas. Then when they immigrated to the US in the 90s I was raised with that Russian identity, I knew that I had Ukrainian heritage since my great grandmother only could speak in Ukrainian, but when I would I ask them if we were more Ukrainian or Russian they would just say it's complicated and say just stick with Russian since it's less confusing, even though technically it would be russified Ukrainians.
Similarly I think this has happened to countless of other immigrant families for instance these southern Italians of Greek ancestry, it was probably just easier to tell their kids that they were just Italian instead of getting into the specifics since most of them wouldn't understand either way, for instance I still remember how my mom would tell me stories about her life back in the(soviet) Union when I was a kid and it would confuse me a lot since I had little understanding of all the geography/history of the place until I took it upon my self to study it later on. But many of my siblings who are not all that interested and didn't do their homework so to speak they have a harder time grasping the context of the stories my parents tell them, but even then I'm pretty sure there is a lot of things that I still don't grasp, for instance when my parents show me a skit of some famous soviet comedian I usually just stare at them blankly while they are cracking up which they then have to explain to me the joke which by then the humor of the joke is drained out.
So anyway its obvious that no matter what, the decedents of these immigrants/migrants will not be the same as where their parents/ancestors came from, it is however a point of divergence and depending on how large these communities are and how tightly knit they are they can often times create a new culture something akin to Creoles where you have a fusion of the old and new homeland, but often times continue to identify with the old label. And if these communities are accepted into the host countries society then after a few generations, usually when the original immigrants die off then they have fully assimilated and that culture gets washed out, however in many instance these communities experience a lot of discrimination and if this discrimination continues for long enough this cultural identity only deepens such as what happened with the black community in the US, or the Romani and Jews in Europe. However sometimes these identities continue to linger on even if the discrimination has stopped because of a strong sense of pride of who they are as a community and what they have accomplished over the generations such as the case with the Italian Americans. But other times discrimination will only speed up the assimilation as what happened with the German Americans during WWI and WWII and Russian Americans during the cold war.
Just to be clear I agree with you for the most part. I do think that over a few generations most people assimilate into the their host countries society and they become one with them. Also I'm aware that Russian's are not some pure breed and that they are a mix of many people, for instance in the case of my self most of my grandparents are either Ukrainian or partially Ukrainian, either way by blood I'm mostly Ukrainian, however my parents Identify as Russian since they primarily speak Russian and growing up in Crimea they had a closer connection/affinity towards Russia than Ukraine, for them Ukraine was the equivalent to say Texas. Then when they immigrated to the US in the 90s I was raised with that Russian identity, I knew that I had Ukrainian heritage since my great grandmother only could speak in Ukrainian, but when I would I ask them if we were more Ukrainian or Russian they would just say it's complicated and say just stick with Russian since it's less confusing, even though technically it would be russified Ukrainians.
Similarly I think this has happened to countless of other immigrant families for instance these southern Italians of Greek ancestry, it was probably just easier to tell their kids that they were just Italian instead of getting into the specifics since most of them wouldn't understand either way, for instance I still remember how my mom would tell me stories about her life back in the(soviet) Union when I was a kid and it would confuse me a lot since I had little understanding of all the geography/history of the place until I took it upon my self to study it later on. But many of my siblings who are not all that interested and didn't do their homework so to speak they have a harder time grasping the context of the stories my parents tell them, but even then I'm pretty sure there is a lot of things that I still don't grasp, for instance when my parents show me a skit of some famous soviet comedian I usually just stare at them blankly while they are cracking up which they then have to explain to me the joke which by then the humor of the joke is drained out.
So anyway its obvious that no matter what, the decedents of these immigrants/migrants will not be the same as where their parents/ancestors came from, it is however a point of divergence and depending on how large these communities are and how tightly knit they are they can often times create a new culture something akin to Creoles where you have a fusion of the old and new homeland, but often times continue to identify with the old label. And if these communities are accepted into the host countries society then after a few generations, usually when the original immigrants die off then they have fully assimilated and that culture gets washed out, however in many instance these communities experience a lot of discrimination and if this discrimination continues for long enough this cultural identity only deepens such as what happened with the black community in the US, or the Romani and Jews in Europe. However sometimes these identities continue to linger on even if the discrimination has stopped because of a strong sense of pride of who they are as a community and what they have accomplished over the generations such as the case with the Italian Americans. But other times discrimination will only speed up the assimilation as what happened with the German Americans during WWI and WWII and Russian Americans during the cold war.
Good post.
I just clarify that those greeks colonized southern Italy in antiquity so descendants of those people are clearly italian and speak italian or local dialects. Almost all greek speakers became latinized in middle ages. Untill then they were the dominant population of much of southern Italy like for example regions of Calabria or Sicily and many other areas. So I am not even sure if average italian who is not interested in history even knows that.
What is fascinating to me though is that there are still about 20 000 of native grico speakers which is the dialect of greek language living in Italy. After so much time. Unreal.
There's a big difference here between heritage and nationality. Sure, a lot of people around the world have families who came from somewhere else decades or centuries ago. In the US, Australia, Canada, and a lot of other places around the world, many people like to claim they're XXX [heritage]. The controversial part seems to be when people confuse heritage and nationality. If you are an immigrant yourself, perhaps you can, and care to claim both the nationality of your birth, and your new nationality. If you are the child of an immigrant, I would suppose it comes down to a lot of factors: Do you spend significant time in the country where your parents came from? Do you have the passport? Do you speak the language? Do you feel as though you have strong ties to the country of origin? These factors only get more diluted the further down the generational line you go.
Some immigrants and children of immigrants want to assimilate as much as possible to their new country and don't speak the language of their home land at all. I have a friend from LA whose parents both came from China, but they wanted their children to have "as an American experience as possible," so they never spoke Chinese to the kids, brought them up doing traditional American activities (baseball, girlscouts etc.), and as a result, my friend is the most "normal" American dude you'll ever meet, and doesn't speak a word of Chinese. He's been to China, but on his own (he's quite a traveler), and he would never identify as "Chinese." "My parents came from China," he'll say, and it's not that he would be ashamed or embarrassed to call himself Chinese, it's that he has no feeling or ties to being Chinese.
I think a lot of people, especially in the US, when they say "I'm Italian" or Greek, or whatever, somewhat imply the heritage part, and aren't particularly talking about citizenship per se. I think the difference between heritage and citizenship simply doesn't register with most of them. If you grow up in a culture that is identified by heritage, like the Irish in Boston, the Greeks in Melbourne or the Italians in New York, you're going to absorb that as a cornerstone of your identity. Whether that's right or wrong is up to you. But I think a lot of children of immigrants, or descendants of immigrants don't even really consider that them identifying as "italian" [heritage implied] is different from actual citizens of those respective countries. Most people don't really question or think their citizenship until they've traveled, or moved to another country. Most wouldn't even think "maybe it is a bit cringy for me to call myself the same as these people who actually spend their lives here," until they've actually experienced the differences between them being Italian-American, Greek- Australian, or Indian-Canadian and actual Italians, Greeks or Indians until they've been up close and personal with it themselves and seen how much they do, or don't share with the culture they claim. And hopefully the self aware ones will realize with a trip to their ancestor's homeland that they are different, or maybe in some cases are not so different from the people who are actual citizens, speak the language, and participate in the culture every day in the places their ancestors came from.
Nationality= Your country of birth, or the place you have a passport from.
Ancestry= The place where some of your family members came from generations ago.
Race= It is a social classification created in 18th century slave societies of the Americas, in order to differentiate Spanish, British, and French Masters from their West African slaves, and from the local and native Indians of the Americas.
Ethnicity= It is a shared identity influenced by culture language and religion.
A lot of Americans do not know the difference and think that because they had an Italian ancestor several generations ago, then they are Italian by nationality, ancestry , ethnically, and racially.
I want to promise every one of you that the vast majority of Americans who say they are part of a cultural group do NOT mean that they are citizens of whatever culture they partially identify with. Hope that helps some of you relax.
They are simply identifying that CULTURE as having some impact on their self identity. Is there something wrong with that? ETHNICITY. ANCESTRY. Not nationality, people.
Oh and the whole concept of "race" didn't start in the US. China and Europe and the ancient civilizations of Greece and Rome and Islamic and Christian and pagan civilizations throughout history all had developed notions of race - and racial superiority (hint - anyone who looked like them).
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