Does anyone know if we have any statistics on the ancestors of Americans living in the country today?
How many of those ancestors came on the Mayflower? How many were here in 1776? How many immigrated here after the Civil War? How many came here in the 20th century?
Do you feel any differently if your great great grandparents were here with the founding fathers or they only came here in 1900?
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Most of them are of German ancestry (around 50mio people). For ex. the founders of Goldman and Lehman were Germans, furthermore many finance "titans" are of German descent like Steve Schwarzman, Bill Ackman, Larry Fink... People whose names end with "man", "stein" or "berg" typically have German heritage. Many of them also have jewish heritage which is often the reason why their ancestors fled Germany for the US (just like Einstein).
"many"
*proceeds to pick exclusively Ashkenazi Jewish descendants*
Can´t you read? I literally stated that most of them are of jewish heritage.
The story of German descendant people in Texas Hill Country is fascinating and their influence during the Civil War. They fought for the North yet they were at the southern border/frontier with Mexico.
The story of Germans in North Carolina and their influence on BBQ cuisine is also fascinating. The story I was told was the people living in North Carolina did mostly dry rub BBQ. They thought tomatoes were poisonous. The Germans came and they knew tomatoes were edible and thus the tomato based BBQ sauce was introduced. The rest is a delicious history.
Mayflower-1700s: WASPS
1619-1808: Blacks
1700s to early 1800s: Germans, more WASPS, and some Scots-Irish
Late 1800s to early 1900s: Eastern European Jews, Italians, Irish, Eastern Europeans
1965-Present: Asians
1970s-Present: Hispanics
A plurality of white Americans are of British (English, Welsh, Scottish, Scots-Irish) heritage, the majority of whose families have been in North America since 1600s and 1700s. The next largest groups (Germans and Irish) are largely descended from migrants from the 1700s and 1800s. Smaller groups of Italian, Jewish, and Slavic immigrants came over in the 19th and 20th Centuries. Modern day European immigration is negligible. White Americans are the most distantly connected from their ethnic homelands as the majority are 6+ generations in.
African-Americans are mostly descended from enslaved people from the 1600-1700s, but an increasingly large % of them are descended from more recent Caribbean and African immigrants that have been arriving in large numbers since the 1960s.
Hispanic Americans have been in the US since the early 1800s, but the vast majority of them are descended from people who arrived after 1970. Asian-Americans began arriving in the late 19th Century, but the vast majority of them are descended from people who arrived in the 1970s or later.
If pre-COVID immigration trends continue, the majority of people in 2100 will be descended from people who arrived in the US after 1980.
America is just a country filled with English speaking Germans; many Germans who were hard working and actually ambitious came to the U.S. to fulfill their entrepreneurial aspirations or 'find a better life.' Lot of Jews, Italians, Irish, Dutch and a scattered number of Northern Europeans; although all to a lesser extent than Germans. British people also came over but in less numbers than Germans and some of the aforementioned groups of people. The American 'race' is a mix of all of these. This is the information on European Americans; Hispanics/Asians are a different subject matter. Most Afro-Americans come from Northern/Eastern Africa, mainly Nigeria.
This isn't true at all. When adding up English, Scottish, Scots-Irish/Northern Irish, and Welsh Americans, they outnumber Germans. Not to mention that throughout the 19th Century, one of the top three sources of immigrants was Canada, the majority of whom were of British descent. On top of that, the US experienced substantial immigration from the UK itself even after independence throughout the entire situation (more immigrants came from the UK than from Ireland). Because these immigrants assimilated seamless into the wider Anglo population, they never formed a distinct immigrant ethnic community. Not to mention that British ancestry is substantially underreported in the US. In the 1980 census, Americans of British descent formed an outright majority of whites, but now Germans are suddenly the largest group? Unless millions of Germans arrived in the last 40 years, the explanation is because of changing identities and how people report. There are millions of people who mark their ethnicity as "American", and the majority of these people are concentrated in areas that also were almost exclusively settled by English/Scottish people (Appalachia). When you throw them in, it is clear that those of British descent outnumber Germans. However, because very few of them actually identify as "British" (or English/Scottish), they are underreported. And why would they? Their families have been in North America for hundreds of years. They are Americans.
The idea that white Americans are just Anglicized Germans is an urban legend. While Germans form one of the largest ancestral groups in the country, they certainly do not dominate. Also, the Dutch and Irish are a lot more numerous thank you think.
After British, German, and Irish, the next largest Euro groups are Scandinavians, Slavic people, Italians, French (mostly French-Canadian or Louisianans) and Jews. Spanish would be 4th place if you count the Hispanic population.
Also, European ethnic groups intermixed a lot less frequently in the US than is popularly imagined. The melting pot was more propaganda than reality. Rather than really mixing with other ethnic groups, white ethnics moved to the suburbs and gradually lost their old world ethnic identities, which only happened rather recently (1960s).
Thanks for correcting me on that. I'm aware that the Irish are much more common than believed, but I just never pictured the Dutch being too high in number, particularly because there are so few of them in general. I'd like to think that there are a lot of Dutch in the midwest and a lot of Irish/Italians in the Northeast; I am not aware of which European countries make up the South though. Also, I wouldn't count the Hispanic population as Spanish (I'm hispanic) and I can tell you that there is a big distinction (culturally/ethnically) between Mestizos and actual Iberians.
If you could provide some more color on the south I'd really like to hear what you have to say, as I have held the German-dominance theory for a long time and now I want to learn more.
Australia / Ireland for me
Go back.
You should go back to the womb, asshole, you're not doing too good in life.
I grew up in Chicago and generally British (English, welsh. Scottish) names like Johnson, Jones, Murray respectively were less common there than continental European ethnic names. Namely Polish Germans Italians. Also a lot of Irish. Just my observation though. I grew up in a relatively diverse part of the city (that was in the process of transitioning to becoming very Mexican)
Interesting responses.
Italy and Germany at the turn of the 20th century for me.
Japanese American for me. My grandparents on my dad side arrived in Hawaii in 1904 to work in the sugar cane fields. They had been arriving since 1885 or so, many from the Kyushu region (Kumamoto/Fukuoka) but other areas as well including Okinawa.
The experience in the US of Japanese Americans is different between the Hawaii JAs and the Mainland JAs. The Mainland JAs were put into internment camps during WWII. Hawaii JAs were mostly spared internment, mainly because JAs in Hawaii made up such a large percentage of the population to intern them would have been difficult logistically and economically. Both Hawaii and Mainland JAs volunteered to fight in WWII for America to prove their loyalty despite being alienated resulting in the heralded 442nd regiment and 100th battalion.
Many JA Pre-WWII worked in agriculture and one of history’s greatest steals was the taking of land/property of JAs during the internment years, which would have made JAs major land owners on the West Coast.
There were once over 50 Japantowns in the US. Now the last remaining JTowns are in SF, San Jose, and LA. This trend is mainly due to assimilation of JA into mainstream America, the move to the suburbs and affluence, and lack of new migrants from Japan thus diminishing the need for an ethnic enclave. That said the remaining Japantowns are pretty cool.
The intermarriage rate of JAs with other races is high and I would guess each generation we will see a substantial decrease in full blooded JAs in the US. Immigration from Japan nowadays is de minimus.
Japanese left Japan to the US and Brazil, mainly to work in Agriculture. Brazilian jujitsu is a result of some of this cultural influence.
My personal experience is there are way more, I mean WAY more Chinese, Korean, or Vietnamese people in the mainland. The only place I see lots of Japanese is Honolulu.
Other people might not be able to tell our difference but the different dynamics between Eastern Asians is actually interesting.
Yes, I agree. Japanese is a small sliver (and declining in proportion) of the Asian/Pacific Islander population. Filipino and South Asian population are growing rapidly. Korean immigration I think was mainly post-Korean War (1950s) when South Korea was mainly impoverished (now they are not). I believe there is still a pull for getting educated in the US from mainly Koreans and Mainland Chinese, so that is still a source of immigration.
What is not mentioned is Chain Migration (from anywhere in the world) which is a major source of legal lower wage labor (very vital to our economy). These people might even be educated, motivated and talented but being dropped into a new society creates barriers. Chain migration is when a family member gets to immigrate to the US and they start to bring family members. I know people from Eastern European former Soviet bloc countries that are in the US because of this; but there are so many stories. I think Chain Migration is absolutely critical for the economy.
I will say, and maybe this might be hijacking the conversation, but one trend I see is more diversity in media and pop culture, which pushes greater visibility of non-white/black ethnic groups.
For instance, I love that my kids can watch Asian movie stars or musicians within the mainstream American media; something when I was growing up was just underground or indie. I believe that shift will influence mindsets for the better.
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