I think that virtually all the countries (perhaps excluding North Corea) are part of the Anglosphere to some degree, specially Western countries , which are in reality more anglicanized than full African members of the Commonwealth because they are avid consumers of American Anglo products: fast food chains (Burger King, McDonalds, Starbuks), clothes (Levi's , Calvin Klein, Carolina Herrera...), Hollywood movies, music, news about celebrities ( Paris Hilton, Britney Spears) , etc.
Anglosphere
That's a valid point, but what about French African colonies? Aren't they a whole lot less Anglo, than British colonies in Africa? But I thick that the Anglosphere only includes the primary colonies: (countries that are essentially cultural branches of Britain) Canada, US, Austrlia, etc. And secondary colonies: (countries that have their own culture but have been greatly influenced by the British Empire's legal system, language, and culture) such as India.
<<because they are avid consumers of American Anglo products: fast food chains (Burger King, McDonalds, Starbuks), clothes (Levi's , Calvin Klein, Carolina Herrera...), Hollywood movies, music, news about celebrities ( Paris Hilton, Britney Spears) , etc. >>
I suspect this will all end fairly soon, as the US rapidly fades into oblivion. Here's a typical economic prediction about the future of the US:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090614_the_american_empire_is_bankrupt/
I suppose we'll all become part of the Chinasphere soon.
I suspect this will all end fairly soon, as the US rapidly fades into oblivion. Here's a typical economic prediction about the future of the US:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090614_the_american_empire_is_bankrupt/
I suppose we'll all become part of the Chinasphere soon.
American Anglo products: fast food chains (Burger King, McDonalds, Starbuks), clothes (Levi's , Calvin Klein, Carolina Herrera...), Hollywood movies, music, news about celebrities ( Paris Hilton, Britney Spears) , etc.
________________
this is AMERICAN products, but not "American Anglo"!!! Not all those people had british ancestors!
________________
this is AMERICAN products, but not "American Anglo"!!! Not all those people had british ancestors!
primary colonies: ... US ...
__________________
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Colonization_of_the_Americas_1750.PNG
Look this map! USA wasn't totally a british colony.
__________________
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b0/Colonization_of_the_Americas_1750.PNG
Look this map! USA wasn't totally a british colony.
According to the U.S. Census conducted in 2000, 42.8 million
Americans identified themselves as being of German
ancestry, representing 15.2% of the total U.S. population.
By comparison, the next largest group, Irish Americans, comprised
10.8% of the population, while African Americans and Americans of
English background each accounted for just under 9%. It is estimated
that between 1800 and the present over seven million Germanspeakers
emigrated to the U.S., the majority of whom arrived
between about 1840 and 1914, with the peak period coming in the
early 1880s. In the nineteenth century many of these immigrants settled
in the states of the Upper Midwest, an area known to this day as
America’s “German Belt.”
Americans identified themselves as being of German
ancestry, representing 15.2% of the total U.S. population.
By comparison, the next largest group, Irish Americans, comprised
10.8% of the population, while African Americans and Americans of
English background each accounted for just under 9%. It is estimated
that between 1800 and the present over seven million Germanspeakers
emigrated to the U.S., the majority of whom arrived
between about 1840 and 1914, with the peak period coming in the
early 1880s. In the nineteenth century many of these immigrants settled
in the states of the Upper Midwest, an area known to this day as
America’s “German Belt.”
SOUPLINER:
"I suspect this will all end fairly soon, as the US rapidly fades into oblivion. Here's a typical economic prediction about the future of the US: "
The trouble with sources such as this is that their vigorous anti-American bias ruins their credibility.
The same article, written with a less-biased slant by a less-biased source, such as BBC, would be much more credible.
"I suspect this will all end fairly soon, as the US rapidly fades into oblivion. Here's a typical economic prediction about the future of the US: "
The trouble with sources such as this is that their vigorous anti-American bias ruins their credibility.
The same article, written with a less-biased slant by a less-biased source, such as BBC, would be much more credible.
>> this is AMERICAN products, but no"American Anglo"!!! Not all those people had british ancestors <<
Ones ancestors have very little to do with ones cultural, language, or even dialect. One learns those things from ones peers in the country in which one grows up.
Ones ancestors have very little to do with ones cultural, language, or even dialect. One learns those things from ones peers in the country in which one grows up.
In many respects, a distinct German-American national identity has
receded over the past century, and the historic connections to the
Old Country are no longer obvious, even though the German heritage
has left an indelible imprint on American mass and local culture.
However, one exceptionally visible community of Americans has successfull
preserved aspects of its European spiritual heritage—namely
the religious group known as the Old Order Amish. Somewhat ironically
for believers who would prefer not to be famous, the popular media have “discovered” the Amish and projected their images around the world, including and especially back to Germany, where fascination with a “deep-frozen” German-speaking society in the midst of the U.S., of all places, runs high.
The Amish trace their origins to the Anabaptist movement in
Central and Western Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. Core tenets of the Anabaptist Christian faith include the
practice of adult (believer’s) baptism and the maintenance of a symbolic
distance from the rest of society. Amish Christians evoke this
symbolic distance more visibly than many other Anabaptist groups,
notably their close spiritual cousins, the Mennonites, by dressing distinctively and accepting only selectively some of the material aspects
of modern life. Underlying their apparently paradoxical lifestyle is
one core virtue toward which the Amish strive, namely humility
(Demut). Though most Amish are of Swiss German descent, nearly all are bilingual in Pennsylvania Dutch and English. A small minority of Amish whose ancestors emigrated directly from Switzerland in the nineteenth century still speak a form of Bernese Swiss German.
In addition to speaking both Pennsylvania Dutch and English natively, the Amish also have a basic reading knowledge of the standard German of the Bible and other religious texts. Although the
core tenets of their faith have remained unchanged since the sixteenth
century, all other aspects of Amish culture, including dress,
foodways, occupations, leisure activities, etc., show unmistakable—
but limited—influences from mainstream America. The current Amish
population is ca. 200,000 in the United States and Canada; there
are no Amish left in Europe. Because of low attrition and large average
family sizes, the Amish population is doubling every twenty
years, thereby securing the future of the Pennsylvania Dutch language
and this modern American counterculture.
Like the history of the Amish in America, the Jewish experience in this country is a rich one, extending back to the colonial era, when Sephardic Jews from Holland settled in New Amsterdam, the forerunner of modern New York. During the early nineteenth century, most Jewish immigrants were German-speaking Ashkenazim from Central Europe, who were strongly influenced by the ideals of the Enlightenment and its Jewish expression, the Haskalah. As ancient restrictions on Jews were lifted across Western Europe, partly in connection with the democratic aspirations of the revolutionaries of 1848, a number of German Jews sought to reshape traditional practices, and the movement known as Reform Judaism was born. Today, even though most American Jews trace their ancestry toYiddish-speaking immigrants from Eastern Europe who came in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Reform Judaism, with its roots in Germany, is the largest branch of the faith in the U.S.
It is also important to note that the International Order of B’nai B’rith, the
world’s oldest continually operating Jewish service organization, was founded in 1843 by a group of German-American Jews in New York who defined as their mission the fostering of a civic identity based on both traditionally Jewish and American values.
After Hitler came to power in 1933, approximately 100,000 German Jews came to the U.S., many of whom settled in New York. In 1934, the German Jewish Club of New York (later renamed the New World Club) began publishing a newsletter, Aufbau, which quickly grew to become one of the most important German-language periodicals in this country among both Jews and non-Jews. Aufbau thrived by changing with the times, incorporating an increasing number of articles in English for its U.S.-born readers, and becoming the world’s premier source of information on Jewish issues in German; Aufbau was one of the few newspapers to report
in detail on the events of the Holocaust as they unfolded.
Many German-speaking Jewish and non-Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution came to southern California, as well as to New York. Some of the more famous among them included Bertolt Brecht, Lion Feuchtwanger, Thomas Mann, Erich Maria Remarque, and Alma Mahler and Franz Werfel.
Although a number returned to Europe after the war, many stayed and made important contributions to the arts and the intellectual life of the region. Hollywood, in particular, benefited from the talents of these new immigrants, and their influence on American popular culture is unmistakable .
The deep interrelationship between American popular culture and its German backgrounds is hinted at through the image shown at right, one of German-born immigrant artist Kurt Wiese’s illustrations for the story
Bambi. Wiese (1887–1974) is known in the U.S. mainly as the illustrator of
over 300 children’s books, including works of authors such as Zane Grey and Rudyard Kipling. Bambi, published in German in 1923, was written by the Hungarian/Austrian Jewish writer Felix Salten (pseudonym for Siegmund Salzmann, 1869–1945) and first appeared in the U.S. in English translation in a 1928 edition that included Wiese’s drawings.Read by Americans, both in the original as a popular story for students of German and in English, Bambi later became one of Walt Disney’s most beloved family movies (1942). While Bambi is associated today with children, Salten originally wrote the novel as an adult allegory alluding to the growing threats confronting European Jews in the period between the World Wars.
The export of Broadway and Hollywood products, especially to
Europe, is well known. One of the most interesting examples of this
is the Sound of Music phenomenon. The Rodgers and Hammerstein
musical (1959) and the film version directed by Robert Wise (1965)
created an image of Austria that bears little resemblance to either
historical or modern reality. (Sorry, “Edelweiss” is not the Austrian
national anthem.) Indeed, The Sound of Music is more an expression
of American postwar popular culture than anything European. The
Sound of Music was not performed on stage in Austria until 2005;
defying critics’ skepticism, the Viennese production has been a popular
success.
Underlying the commercial success of mass cultural products
like Disney films and The Sound of Music are simple storyline
formulas and marketing strategies that have given
American entertainment a reputation for homogeneity. On stage and
screen, viewers want good to triumph over evil, with no question
about who is on which side. The sameness that appeals to so many
consumers of mass culture worldwide is reflected in many American
enterprises that have been exported with great success, notably
McDonald’s. Hungry patrons expect that McDonald’s fries will always
taste the same, whether the restaurant serving them is in Heidelberg,
Kentucky; Heidelberg, Minnesota; Heidelberg, Mississippi; Heidelberg,
Pennsylvania; Heidelberg, Texas; or at any of the five McDonald’s in
old Heidelberg itself.
For decades, the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile™ has been a uniquely American fixture, but behind the successful marketing campaign of this American company lies a long tradition of German- 45 American foodways and entrepreneurship. Like other immigrants, Germans brought with them their own unique culinary traditions, especially in the areas of meat curing and sausage making. Cookbooks published in America for German immigrants list dozens of different sausage recipes, ranging from raw beef sausage and bratwurst to liver balls and bologna. In the multicultural American context, people of various ethnic backgrounds became acquainted German dishes, while German Americans incorporated the food
traditions of their neighbors. Over time a number of historically German food items and dishes were forgotten, while others, such as the “frank(furter),” evolved beyond their European origins to become staples of a new American cuisine. On a more local level, Midwesterners of all ethnicities, especially Wisconsinites, know immediately that a “brat” is a kind of sausage, and not an ill-behaved child.
As with music, cultural contact is often reflected in the transfer of words across languages. Language contact is naturally promoted by large-scale immigration, but it can also occur through other means, including global media, education, and transnational commerce. The mutual influence of German and English on one another is a good example of the way languages can be enriched through contact. Many German-derived words have entered the English lexicon through the immigrants’ everyday language, including “coffee klatch,” “dachshund,” “delicatessen,” “dummkopf,” “frank,” “gesundheit,” “kindergarten,” “kitsch,” “pretzel,” “sauerkraut,” and “waltz.” Other English words, such as “angst,” “bildungsroman,” “doppelganger,” “festschrift,” “gestalt,” “leitmotif,”
“wunderkind,” and “zeitgeist,” came by way of literature, the arts, and education; until about the middle of the twentieth century, German was the most widely taught modern foreign language in U.S. schools and colleges. Even as immigration from German-speaking countries has declined and fewer Americans learn German, words like “foosball” and “poltergeist” still find their way into English. Not just words, but also parts of words from German are productive in English, including “-fest” (“gabfest”), “-meister” (“spinmeister”), and the prefix “über/uber” shown here, which means “over-” or “super-.” In colloquial and regional speech, the expressions “How goes it?”, “Bring it with,” and “The dog wants out” are familiar Germanisms.
The influence of German and other languages on English is not a source of concern among most “language mavens.” In Germany, on the other hand, there are many who lament the increasing use of English-derived words in technology, business, advertising, and everyday speech, leading to a mixture often derisively called “Denglisch” (from “Deutsch” + “Englisch”). Words like “Bestseller,” “downloaden,” “Event,” “fit,” “Kids,” “live” (as in a “live broadcast”), “Lifestyle,” “Management,” “open air,” “relaxen,” “Service,” “shoppen,” and “Wellness,” are ubiquitous, but they comprise only a small percentage of the total German vocabulary and do not generally replace words already in the language. Those who fear the “Überfremdung” (excessive foreignization) of modern German generally
overlook this fact about the contact between English and German.
receded over the past century, and the historic connections to the
Old Country are no longer obvious, even though the German heritage
has left an indelible imprint on American mass and local culture.
However, one exceptionally visible community of Americans has successfull
preserved aspects of its European spiritual heritage—namely
the religious group known as the Old Order Amish. Somewhat ironically
for believers who would prefer not to be famous, the popular media have “discovered” the Amish and projected their images around the world, including and especially back to Germany, where fascination with a “deep-frozen” German-speaking society in the midst of the U.S., of all places, runs high.
The Amish trace their origins to the Anabaptist movement in
Central and Western Europe during the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. Core tenets of the Anabaptist Christian faith include the
practice of adult (believer’s) baptism and the maintenance of a symbolic
distance from the rest of society. Amish Christians evoke this
symbolic distance more visibly than many other Anabaptist groups,
notably their close spiritual cousins, the Mennonites, by dressing distinctively and accepting only selectively some of the material aspects
of modern life. Underlying their apparently paradoxical lifestyle is
one core virtue toward which the Amish strive, namely humility
(Demut). Though most Amish are of Swiss German descent, nearly all are bilingual in Pennsylvania Dutch and English. A small minority of Amish whose ancestors emigrated directly from Switzerland in the nineteenth century still speak a form of Bernese Swiss German.
In addition to speaking both Pennsylvania Dutch and English natively, the Amish also have a basic reading knowledge of the standard German of the Bible and other religious texts. Although the
core tenets of their faith have remained unchanged since the sixteenth
century, all other aspects of Amish culture, including dress,
foodways, occupations, leisure activities, etc., show unmistakable—
but limited—influences from mainstream America. The current Amish
population is ca. 200,000 in the United States and Canada; there
are no Amish left in Europe. Because of low attrition and large average
family sizes, the Amish population is doubling every twenty
years, thereby securing the future of the Pennsylvania Dutch language
and this modern American counterculture.
Like the history of the Amish in America, the Jewish experience in this country is a rich one, extending back to the colonial era, when Sephardic Jews from Holland settled in New Amsterdam, the forerunner of modern New York. During the early nineteenth century, most Jewish immigrants were German-speaking Ashkenazim from Central Europe, who were strongly influenced by the ideals of the Enlightenment and its Jewish expression, the Haskalah. As ancient restrictions on Jews were lifted across Western Europe, partly in connection with the democratic aspirations of the revolutionaries of 1848, a number of German Jews sought to reshape traditional practices, and the movement known as Reform Judaism was born. Today, even though most American Jews trace their ancestry toYiddish-speaking immigrants from Eastern Europe who came in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Reform Judaism, with its roots in Germany, is the largest branch of the faith in the U.S.
It is also important to note that the International Order of B’nai B’rith, the
world’s oldest continually operating Jewish service organization, was founded in 1843 by a group of German-American Jews in New York who defined as their mission the fostering of a civic identity based on both traditionally Jewish and American values.
After Hitler came to power in 1933, approximately 100,000 German Jews came to the U.S., many of whom settled in New York. In 1934, the German Jewish Club of New York (later renamed the New World Club) began publishing a newsletter, Aufbau, which quickly grew to become one of the most important German-language periodicals in this country among both Jews and non-Jews. Aufbau thrived by changing with the times, incorporating an increasing number of articles in English for its U.S.-born readers, and becoming the world’s premier source of information on Jewish issues in German; Aufbau was one of the few newspapers to report
in detail on the events of the Holocaust as they unfolded.
Many German-speaking Jewish and non-Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution came to southern California, as well as to New York. Some of the more famous among them included Bertolt Brecht, Lion Feuchtwanger, Thomas Mann, Erich Maria Remarque, and Alma Mahler and Franz Werfel.
Although a number returned to Europe after the war, many stayed and made important contributions to the arts and the intellectual life of the region. Hollywood, in particular, benefited from the talents of these new immigrants, and their influence on American popular culture is unmistakable .
The deep interrelationship between American popular culture and its German backgrounds is hinted at through the image shown at right, one of German-born immigrant artist Kurt Wiese’s illustrations for the story
Bambi. Wiese (1887–1974) is known in the U.S. mainly as the illustrator of
over 300 children’s books, including works of authors such as Zane Grey and Rudyard Kipling. Bambi, published in German in 1923, was written by the Hungarian/Austrian Jewish writer Felix Salten (pseudonym for Siegmund Salzmann, 1869–1945) and first appeared in the U.S. in English translation in a 1928 edition that included Wiese’s drawings.Read by Americans, both in the original as a popular story for students of German and in English, Bambi later became one of Walt Disney’s most beloved family movies (1942). While Bambi is associated today with children, Salten originally wrote the novel as an adult allegory alluding to the growing threats confronting European Jews in the period between the World Wars.
The export of Broadway and Hollywood products, especially to
Europe, is well known. One of the most interesting examples of this
is the Sound of Music phenomenon. The Rodgers and Hammerstein
musical (1959) and the film version directed by Robert Wise (1965)
created an image of Austria that bears little resemblance to either
historical or modern reality. (Sorry, “Edelweiss” is not the Austrian
national anthem.) Indeed, The Sound of Music is more an expression
of American postwar popular culture than anything European. The
Sound of Music was not performed on stage in Austria until 2005;
defying critics’ skepticism, the Viennese production has been a popular
success.
Underlying the commercial success of mass cultural products
like Disney films and The Sound of Music are simple storyline
formulas and marketing strategies that have given
American entertainment a reputation for homogeneity. On stage and
screen, viewers want good to triumph over evil, with no question
about who is on which side. The sameness that appeals to so many
consumers of mass culture worldwide is reflected in many American
enterprises that have been exported with great success, notably
McDonald’s. Hungry patrons expect that McDonald’s fries will always
taste the same, whether the restaurant serving them is in Heidelberg,
Kentucky; Heidelberg, Minnesota; Heidelberg, Mississippi; Heidelberg,
Pennsylvania; Heidelberg, Texas; or at any of the five McDonald’s in
old Heidelberg itself.
For decades, the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile™ has been a uniquely American fixture, but behind the successful marketing campaign of this American company lies a long tradition of German- 45 American foodways and entrepreneurship. Like other immigrants, Germans brought with them their own unique culinary traditions, especially in the areas of meat curing and sausage making. Cookbooks published in America for German immigrants list dozens of different sausage recipes, ranging from raw beef sausage and bratwurst to liver balls and bologna. In the multicultural American context, people of various ethnic backgrounds became acquainted German dishes, while German Americans incorporated the food
traditions of their neighbors. Over time a number of historically German food items and dishes were forgotten, while others, such as the “frank(furter),” evolved beyond their European origins to become staples of a new American cuisine. On a more local level, Midwesterners of all ethnicities, especially Wisconsinites, know immediately that a “brat” is a kind of sausage, and not an ill-behaved child.
As with music, cultural contact is often reflected in the transfer of words across languages. Language contact is naturally promoted by large-scale immigration, but it can also occur through other means, including global media, education, and transnational commerce. The mutual influence of German and English on one another is a good example of the way languages can be enriched through contact. Many German-derived words have entered the English lexicon through the immigrants’ everyday language, including “coffee klatch,” “dachshund,” “delicatessen,” “dummkopf,” “frank,” “gesundheit,” “kindergarten,” “kitsch,” “pretzel,” “sauerkraut,” and “waltz.” Other English words, such as “angst,” “bildungsroman,” “doppelganger,” “festschrift,” “gestalt,” “leitmotif,”
“wunderkind,” and “zeitgeist,” came by way of literature, the arts, and education; until about the middle of the twentieth century, German was the most widely taught modern foreign language in U.S. schools and colleges. Even as immigration from German-speaking countries has declined and fewer Americans learn German, words like “foosball” and “poltergeist” still find their way into English. Not just words, but also parts of words from German are productive in English, including “-fest” (“gabfest”), “-meister” (“spinmeister”), and the prefix “über/uber” shown here, which means “over-” or “super-.” In colloquial and regional speech, the expressions “How goes it?”, “Bring it with,” and “The dog wants out” are familiar Germanisms.
The influence of German and other languages on English is not a source of concern among most “language mavens.” In Germany, on the other hand, there are many who lament the increasing use of English-derived words in technology, business, advertising, and everyday speech, leading to a mixture often derisively called “Denglisch” (from “Deutsch” + “Englisch”). Words like “Bestseller,” “downloaden,” “Event,” “fit,” “Kids,” “live” (as in a “live broadcast”), “Lifestyle,” “Management,” “open air,” “relaxen,” “Service,” “shoppen,” and “Wellness,” are ubiquitous, but they comprise only a small percentage of the total German vocabulary and do not generally replace words already in the language. Those who fear the “Überfremdung” (excessive foreignization) of modern German generally
overlook this fact about the contact between English and German.
"Ones ancestors have very little to do with ones cultural, language, or even dialect. One learns those things from ones peers in the country in which one grows up."
I don't think I can agree with this completely.
I believe heritage influences, but not compels, cultural norms. In my own admittedly unscientific observations, our culture seems to reflect German ideals stronger than those of any other nation, e.g. areas such as privacy, punctuality, etc.
I don't think I can agree with this completely.
I believe heritage influences, but not compels, cultural norms. In my own admittedly unscientific observations, our culture seems to reflect German ideals stronger than those of any other nation, e.g. areas such as privacy, punctuality, etc.
<<American Anglo products: fast food chains (Burger King, McDonalds, Starbuks), clothes (Levi's , Calvin Klein, Carolina Herrera...), Hollywood movies, music, news about celebrities ( Paris Hilton, Britney Spears)>>
The best of USA , huh ? :p
The best of USA , huh ? :p
>> I believe heritage influences, but not compels, cultural norms. In my own admittedly unscientific observations, our culture seems to reflect German ideals stronger than those of any other nation e.g. areas such as privacy, punctuality, etc <<
I don't see how those values are exclusively German.
I was simply saying that ones own ancestors usually have very little impact on ones culture. The culture of the country in which one lives seems to be a much stronger influence. Just because my great-grandfather was Bulgarian, doesn't mean that I am culturally Bulgarian.
I don't see how those values are exclusively German.
I was simply saying that ones own ancestors usually have very little impact on ones culture. The culture of the country in which one lives seems to be a much stronger influence. Just because my great-grandfather was Bulgarian, doesn't mean that I am culturally Bulgarian.
Hitler would have subjugated the UK with ease if it weren't for the unrelinquishing imperial might of Great Russia and her Soviet comrades surging forth from the never-ending steppes of the Eurasian continent. Russia saved Britain and yet Britain is so ungrateful, refusing to hand over ruthless warlords and mafia-masterminds like Berezovsky and Chechen hate-mongers.
>>>> I believe heritage influences, but not compels, cultural norms. In my own admittedly unscientific observations, our culture seems to reflect German ideals stronger than those of any other nation e.g. areas such as privacy, punctuality, etc <<
I don't see how those values are exclusively German.
I was simply saying that ones own ancestors usually have very little impact on ones culture. The culture of the country in which one lives seems to be a much stronger influence. Just because my great-grandfather was Bulgarian, doesn't mean that I am culturally Bulgarian.<<
The problem with this analogy, though, is that in the case of areas like the Upper Midwest this does not concern isolated immigrants in preexisting society but rather very large numbers of immigrants who effectively created the society in which the settled, and which were only later truly assimilated into the greater polity of which the areas they settled were part. They never were completely assimilated in the sense that areas like the Upper Midwest really cannot be considered to be culturally Anglo to date, even though linguistic assimilation of non-recent European immigrant groups is near-complete here (aside from some groups such as some Norwegian-speakers in Minnesota and North Dakota and some Polish-speakers in the Chicago area).
I don't see how those values are exclusively German.
I was simply saying that ones own ancestors usually have very little impact on ones culture. The culture of the country in which one lives seems to be a much stronger influence. Just because my great-grandfather was Bulgarian, doesn't mean that I am culturally Bulgarian.<<
The problem with this analogy, though, is that in the case of areas like the Upper Midwest this does not concern isolated immigrants in preexisting society but rather very large numbers of immigrants who effectively created the society in which the settled, and which were only later truly assimilated into the greater polity of which the areas they settled were part. They never were completely assimilated in the sense that areas like the Upper Midwest really cannot be considered to be culturally Anglo to date, even though linguistic assimilation of non-recent European immigrant groups is near-complete here (aside from some groups such as some Norwegian-speakers in Minnesota and North Dakota and some Polish-speakers in the Chicago area).