Why do North Americans insist on saying they're Irish American/Canadian, German, Italian, etc. when after 3 generations you know little about such?

Question

Seriously. By 3 generations you're more American or Canadian than you're Irish or Scottish or German or Italian.

It's oftentimes insulting to people who ARE Irish or Scottish or German or Italian (and why Europeans can often be offended by Americans saying they are X),

It's simply ignorant and embarrassing by North Americans when majority of time you don't know anything about that culture, food, traditions etc of that group.

.

What's worse is there's people who are 7+ generations claiming they're German or Italian or Irish American and well they know less than a rock does about such ethnicities - the culture, history, etc.

I spoke here on GAG as someone who is Irish to some "Irish" American who knew jackshit about the reason why there's North Ireland & Ireland and thought they'd merge back together.

zagor · Accepted Answer

There is what you "are" in terms of the culture you grew up in, and what your ancestry is. If I meet someone while traveling and ask them where they're from, if they were born and grew up in the US I'd expect them to say "American", regardless of their ancestry. If they said they were Irish, I would expect that they at least grew up in Ireland - though if they really were from Ireland I'd likely hardly understand a word they said, based on my experience.

But if people are referring to your ethnic background, saying you're Irish or whatever is perfectly accurate, as that is a genetic question, not related to your knowledge of history or music.

Phoenix98 · Accepted Answer

Well I can confidently say that I'm part this, this and that because I have personal generational hand written records of our family history going back over a 100 years plus DNA tests done by both my parents showing what each of them possess in terms of ethnicity and how much of it of each kind we possess.

And I am interested in my family history and my ancestors, where they came from I find that kind of stuff interesting. I like to be able to trace that back, culture, history and tradition are very interesting topics especially when it concerns your family line.

purplepoppy · Accepted Answer

It's a get out clause. When things go well they're American but when things go tits up they're Irish American and so only half to blame.

Smoke-n-Growls · Accepted Answer

Lol, are you white? You sound like a Karen who just visited a diverse space for the first time.

ODC2112 · Answer

The United States is a Protestant country with different churches, and this make a huge difference. Being a Protestant country with different churches makes it sectarian. This sectarianism reverberates on the society that becomes separative. Every religious segregation becomes ethnic. American assimilation or the melting pot are fairy tales, white Americans don't really exist. There are many communities. This is not a problem of DNA it is a cultural problem, purely cultural.

The worst thing about this is that the countries of origin have evolved differently and no longer recognize descendants as part of their community. Italian Americans and Americans have almost nothing to do. Same thing the Germans and the American counterpart, etc.

This could have disappeared years ago, but then American society changed because of the underlying problems of American society. That is, the disappearance of the American left, and the creation of the present liberal non-right. There is a horizontal left and a vertical left, the non-right. The horizontal left segment that has now been increasingly occupied by the right has always dealt with economic problems of economic and social inequality etc.

The vertical left stems from the reformism of the US Democrats of the 1960s, led by the Kennedys. The vertical left is a pseudo-left, the vertical left is not interested in true social equity. Interested in having an enemy to justify one's existence. The "oppressed" of the American system of the vertical pseudo-left apply a tactic of divide and rule over society, over themselves. This is one of the reasons why, since the late 1970s, the American identity-type pseudo-left has been unable to achieve anything other than the month of shit. More than a left in European terms, it should be called a non-right made up of politically powerless people. This being a left based on identity, it cannot be unitary and unite the population, it does not say "you are all Americans", but it says "you are Italian-Americans, you are German-Amercians, you are Afro-Americans," then it says you are heterosexual, homosexual , transsexuals and other separations. If all these separations are maintained, there will never be a cohesive society.

NamerOfStars · Answer

Because cultures don't emerge from a vacuum, silly. Where do you think American culture came from? Hell, where you do think Europe'S cultures came from? Shakespeare has as much in common with modern Charleston as he does with modern London.

Ah, Europe. Still thinking it's the center of a world it doesn't understand.

CloudMassacre · Answer

I say that because that’s where my families are from

Still-alive · Answer

well aren't you a pleasant ray of sunshine :)

Anonymous · Answer

Were descendants.

Why do North Americans insist on saying they're Irish American/Canadian, German, Italian, etc. when after 3 generations you know little about such?

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Why do North Americans insist on saying they're Irish American/Canadian, German, Italian, etc. when after 3 generations you know little about such?

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