"I'm Irish American"

[MacMahon]

I've noticed that to many Americans their Irish, Scots, Italian etc. roots are a big part of their current identity. As a nation of immigrants in a New World I can see why this link to earlier generations is interesting and important.

But it's also something I find confusing.

I live in Yorkshire. I'm English. I have Irish ancestors on both side (great grandparents and great x2 grandparents). If I was in America this would quite possibly be a big deal. I'd be an Irish American and identify with the struggles and persecution that my people suffered at the hands of the English. But I wasn't born in America, I was born in Leeds, and my Irish ancestry play zero role in my identity.

I'm on an ancestry group and Americans are getting that DNA test done and finding out that, contrary to family lore that they are Cherokee or Mexican or Italian Americans, they're actually pretty much 'just' 100% British.

It makes me wonder how authentic this celebrating or identifying with their Irish/First Nations/Italian roots is, and how much is just (mistaken) tribalism and division.

I agree with Iced I don’t recognise this exceptionalism you claim to counter

Your posts seem overly negative to me as someone who grew up o/s and sees a lot of positives in the culture here.

Mn seems to thrive on it though for some reason.

I also find it pretty easy to find positives in many cultures, having travelled a fair bit

What I did say is that English culture has been extremely influential. That's simply a fact. Well that is the academic debate because “influence” is not a one way process, it is not a fact, it is an exchange mediated by a lot of factors and that included guns, imperialism and racism as well as creativity and enterprise.

The only people who seek to present our history in those terms of influencing the world out of proportion to our size are driven by political factors not trying to understand the reality.

@thepinknecklace

How likely is someone to turn up at an office in Glasgow or get on a bus in Edinburgh wearing full tartan and kilt?

As a Glaswegian I can honestly say if someone turned up to work in an office in a kilt there would be some raised eyebrows and folk would definitely talk.

I agree. And not many men have their 'own' kilt. They are usually hired for events. The outfit consists of so many parts and it can be HORRENDOUSLY expensive to buy your own proper kilt for an outfit that only gets worn a couple of times a year at best.

On any given day in Edinburgh, the only folk wearing kilts in Princes Street are usually the guys playing the bagpipes for tourist money - buskers!

The only people who seek to present our history in those terms of influencing the world out of proportion to our size are driven by political factors not trying to understand the reality.

Are you suggesting England or Britain's influence on the world has been in proportion to its size?

Because it's clear to me that it has not. That's not to say English influence has always been benign, anymore than that of any other country, but it has certainly been extremely important over the past 4 centuries.

I don't think pointing that out is politically motivated, although I do think your attempts to downplay the influence of English culture, and see it only in a negative light, certainly are.

Anyway I am now off to join the huge crowds celebrating Halloween in our high street, a Celtic festival that was not at all a feature of English culture twenty years ago when I first encountered the American phenomenon. It grew in importance in America, in no small part due to the immigration from Ireland, where it has always been celebrated, during the famine. American culture flew with it and now so has England…

Reminds me of being asked - in Boston of all places - what the Brits thought about 9/11. I said truthfully that it was an appalling tragedy, but since the subject was terrorism I also mentioned how regrettable it was that some in the US had funded our own IRA for years

How fucking rude

And they weren't your IRA, that was sort of the whole point

Out of curiosity, do British people know that it was not only Irish Americans who sympathised with the IRA?

I agree that it is strange to associate back so far into the past.

I'm English with a very obviously Irish surname and live in Wales. My DD was born in Wales and will be raised bilingually in welsh school (we are in a majority Welsh speaking area) and will no doubt describe herself as 'Welsh', and that is how I see her.

I find it revealing that the English people who start these threads (and they regularly do) always focus on Irish-Americans. They'll throw in other ethnicities a bit but really it's the Irish-Americans they're annoyed with. Why? Who knows, it has nothing to do with English people.

My theory is that it is because of the English that there are millions of Irish-Americans. Historically, Cromwell rounded up significant % of the population when he invaded and deported them to America to make room for English colonists. Then there was the Great Famine where the English were forcibly exporting grain from Ireland despite the blighted potato harvest failures, causing millions to flee to America as starving refugees.

@Emilyontmoor

Anyway I am now off to join the huge crowds celebrating Halloween in our high street, a Celtic festival that was not at all a feature of English culture twenty years ago when I first encountered the American phenomenon. It grew in importance in America, in no small part due to the immigration from Ireland, where it has always been celebrated, during the famine. American culture flew with it and now so has England…

I’m not disputing the American influence on Halloween, but Halloween was definitely a thing twenty years ago.

Are you suggesting England or Britain's influence on the world has been in proportion to its size? More like in proportion to the fast flowing streams, steep sided valleys and Protestant ethic that created the wealth that came from having the first industrial revolution, or alternatively the fall of the Mughals and silver crisis of the eighteenth century that caused the Chinese economy (the largest mercantile economy ever to have existed on earth) to collapse which enabled the East India company and Jardine and his ilk to clean up (Jardine of course enlisting the help of the British navy against the instincts of Palmerston and a sizeable proportion of Parliament and public opinion who misguidedly thought we were immorally peddling drugs - though most of the Opium consumed in China was grown in China - Jardine was just exploiting the top end of the market).

Those or a myriad of other factors that made up the complicated reality

I think once you get past one or two generations it all means fuck all.

Every single living person on this planet has something of note in their ancestry but I don't get the fascination with it.

I’m not disputing the American influence on Halloween, but Halloween was definitely a thing twenty years ago. Definitely not ‘oop north where we prefer to burn our own and post poop through our neighbour’s doors on “mischief night” (and worse on the preceding kissing Friday)

celebrating Halloween in our high street, a Celtic festival that was not at all a feature of English culture twenty years ago when I first encountered the American phenomenon

Eh?! I have memories of bobbing for apples and carving faces into vegetables in the 80s. What on earth makes you think we didn't celebrate Halloween 20 years ago?

@Emilyontmoor

I’m not disputing the American influence on Halloween, but Halloween was definitely a thing twenty years ago. Definitely not ‘oop north where we prefer to burn our own and post poop through our neighbour’s doors on “mischief night” (and worse on the preceding kissing Friday)

Oh, well I grew up in the SE, and am 29 and we definitely had Halloween parties, and trick or treating when I was under 10.

Did you really put poo through letter boxes..?

@OffMyCloud

My DD (mentioned above is at Uni in Ireland). She has applied for an Irish passport to give her additional flexibility in career going forward. Great grant parent and being in Ireland for 3 years were accepted.

Like most English people I have zero/limited interest in Ireland, but DD does. I'm happy that she has done that for career flexibility.

This attitude is so obnoxious. Like most English people I have zero/limited interest in Ireland. Why? It's England's oldest colony, and Irish history and English history are totally intertwined. Give me Americans who identify as Irish due to their ancestry any day over English people who cynically cheer on the exploitation of the system.

@Emilyontmoor

Are you suggesting England or Britain's influence on the world has been in proportion to its size? More like in proportion to the fast flowing streams, steep sided valleys and Protestant ethic that created the wealth that came from having the first industrial revolution, or alternatively the fall of the Mughals and silver crisis of the eighteenth century that caused the Chinese economy (the largest mercantile economy ever to have existed on earth) to collapse which enabled the East India company and Jardine and his ilk to clean up (Jardine of course enlisting the help of the British navy against the instincts of Palmerston and a sizeable proportion of Parliament and public opinion who misguidedly thought we were immorally peddling drugs - though most of the Opium consumed in China was grown in China - Jardine was just exploiting the top end of the market).

Those or a myriad of other factors that made up the complicated reality

Not so much complicated as incoherent, and certainly not an answer to my question.

In any case, I thought you'd gone out to celebrate with the huge crowds?

@CSJobseeker

On the 'scotch' thing, DH's family background is Scottish (recent, not generations back) and we spend a fair bit of time in Scotland. I have never, ever heard a Scottish person refer to a human being as 'Scotch'. Eggs and whisky, yes, but not people.

Is it only Americans who use the term in that way?

I think "Scotch" used to be widely used in the UK but is no longer. If you read anything Victorian, Scottish people are often referred to as "Scotch".

Sick not personally, shitting on doorsteps was very much a male pursuit, but if your response to wtf was that to “Kissing Friday” then that was that was exactly what I thought in my primary school loos aged 9 … Mumsnet would literally light up if it was a culturally sanctioned thing today….

This thread is so depressing. Calling another culture - i.e. American -'weird' and 'strange' - utter xenophobia. Identity works differently in different cultures. In America, it just so happens that some people use a hyphenated way of describing themselves. So what?!

As many have said, the deep anti-Irish (and anti-Catholic) prejudice in England is likely to have had a major impact on how Irish people identified themselves. Having moved to England in the 1990s, I experienced it first-hand - so many stupid jokes about the famine, the IRA, thick paddies, asked if my dh was a navvy etc. My nephew was badly bullied in school by other kids putting potatoes in his locker, calling him a leprechaun, throwing fake bombs at him etc.

The complete ignorance of Irish history in the UK is incredible - the history curriculum for GCSEs and A-Levels for example, compared to other European countries. Comments on here about the troubles in NI and its causes are a case in point.

I find the phenomenon quite bizarre, especially when the 'culture' they claim is so far removed from modern day culture in that country.

I've got more Irish blood than most of them but I'd never call myself Irish 😂

That's your choice @Patapouf just like it's theirs to choose to celebrate their Irish heritage.

As I said before, they're not doing any harm and actually being Irish is pretty great, so who can blame them.

I’m not disputing the American influence on Halloween, but Halloween was definitely a thing twenty years ago*

it did exist but not like now. We didn't really do trick or treating as kids & often went to Ireland for the holiday as it's much bigger over there. I live pretty much where I grew up & my dc get a bucket load of sweets.

I think "Scotch" used to be widely used in the UK but is no longer. If you read anything Victorian, Scottish people are often referred to as "Scotch".

Even further back, we were referred to as North Britons. And Scotland was North Britain - the Balmoral hotel in Edinburgh will always be the North British to me.