This is the problem with heritage BS. If you are not from said region, you are not that region’s ethnicity, because you are not apart of that region’s culture. It’s that fuckin simple.
If you’re from Scottish ancestry, but born and raised in New York, you’re a fucking New-Yorker. At best, you are a Scottish-American New-Yorker. Your kids will just be New Yorkers, though.
You’re absolutely correct and this is something Native Americans bring up all the time to Americans who claim to be Native because of dubious “Cherokee ancestry.”
Bold take. I think it depends. I’m thinking of examples of ethnic enclaves in the US (e.g. Chinatowns) where the language and (a version of the) culture are laboriously preserved and passed down.
For most white Americans you’re bang on the money, because racism didn’t corral them into those sorts of communities where they maintained and preserved their community out of a sense of necessity, defiance, etc.
Those enclaves are seperate cultures from mainland China’s and over time each culture will likely diverge from one another.
Cultures are physically manifested through direct interactions between individuals. Because of that, cultures constantly shift and evolve over small increments, and physical space has a large impact on how those shifts occur. Even if concerted effort is put into making the local enclave’s culture the same as mainland China’s, that enclave has surrounding influences from the American culture it’s inserted into, and it will thus shift differently from the mainland somewhat. The lived experience of each culture is also going to be different in various ways.
Because of this, I think it’s reasonable to state that a person born and raised in New York Chinatown is going to be culturally distinct from a person born and raised in LA Chinatown, and they both would be distinct from a person born and raised in mainland China.
On your point, IIRC the modern American English accent is closer to how the language was spoken in England than what the people in Ingerland speak currently
Edit: I’m wrong and stupid and dumb, the people below me know more about linguistics than I ever will
There is no one way people in England speak currently. Britain has massive diversity in accents.
As far as I understand, Shakespearean English sounded most like modern-day West Country English (imagine a stereotypical pirate). This accent is rhotic, similar to many American accents, but unlike the modern south-eastern or RP accents that most foreigners identify as “British”.
I’m pushing back gently on this as it’s one of those common internet fun facts, which is somewhat true but more complicated.
Both American English and UK English have gone through a dialectical (get it) change since points of separation.
Both have different idiosyncrasies left from their shared original early modern English. But both are also still quite different and changed by time and material conditions.
This is the problem with heritage BS. If you are not from said region, you are not that region’s ethnicity, because you are not apart of that region’s culture. It’s that fuckin simple.
If you’re from Scottish ancestry, but born and raised in New York, you’re a fucking New-Yorker. At best, you are a Scottish-American New-Yorker. Your kids will just be New Yorkers, though.
You’re absolutely correct and this is something Native Americans bring up all the time to Americans who claim to be Native because of dubious “Cherokee ancestry.”
Bold take. I think it depends. I’m thinking of examples of ethnic enclaves in the US (e.g. Chinatowns) where the language and (a version of the) culture are laboriously preserved and passed down.
For most white Americans you’re bang on the money, because racism didn’t corral them into those sorts of communities where they maintained and preserved their community out of a sense of necessity, defiance, etc.
Those enclaves are seperate cultures from mainland China’s and over time each culture will likely diverge from one another.
Cultures are physically manifested through direct interactions between individuals. Because of that, cultures constantly shift and evolve over small increments, and physical space has a large impact on how those shifts occur. Even if concerted effort is put into making the local enclave’s culture the same as mainland China’s, that enclave has surrounding influences from the American culture it’s inserted into, and it will thus shift differently from the mainland somewhat. The lived experience of each culture is also going to be different in various ways.
Because of this, I think it’s reasonable to state that a person born and raised in New York Chinatown is going to be culturally distinct from a person born and raised in LA Chinatown, and they both would be distinct from a person born and raised in mainland China.
On your point, IIRC the modern American English accent is closer to how the language was spoken in England than what the people in Ingerland speak currentlyEdit: I’m wrong and stupid and dumb, the people below me know more about linguistics than I ever will
There is no one way people in England speak currently. Britain has massive diversity in accents.
As far as I understand, Shakespearean English sounded most like modern-day West Country English (imagine a stereotypical pirate). This accent is rhotic, similar to many American accents, but unlike the modern south-eastern or RP accents that most foreigners identify as “British”.
I’m pushing back gently on this as it’s one of those common internet fun facts, which is somewhat true but more complicated.
Both American English and UK English have gone through a dialectical (get it) change since points of separation.
Both have different idiosyncrasies left from their shared original early modern English. But both are also still quite different and changed by time and material conditions.
Specific southern accents.
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Yeah I was gonna say… as someone who works in a town where they pretend they’re scottish… nah.