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Zonie63 -> RE: Gotta love that,...."Multiculturalism!" (7/22/2013 12:18:25 PM)
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ORIGINAL: graceadieu
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ORIGINAL: tazzygirl
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Back in the "old days"
Define "old days". Ellis Island had a literacy test. It was a federal law that anyone over the age of 16 had to pass one starting in 1917.
I don't recall that from my visit to the museum there a few years ago, but I'll take your word on it. I was speaking of even earlier immigrants, the Pennsylvania Dutch in particular, who came here in the 18th and 19th centuries, and had newspapers in German, public school classes taught in German, etc, for generations.
Also, was that just an Ellis Island thing? Ellis Island is famous, but it was only one station.
One guy I know now, a successful businessman, when he came here, he could barely speak any English, let alone write the Latin alphabet, so he did his best and now his official legal name in the US is misspelled. His kid (who he gave an English name that he can't pronounce correctly) can barely write her own name in the alphabet of her parents' native tongue. That's speedy assimilation.
My paternal grandparents grew up speaking Dutch in some rather insular farm communities in the northern Midwest. They were actually third-generation Americans (their families arrived in the 1830s, I believe), but since they grew up on farms around other Dutch people, that's the language and culture they grew up in. However, by the time my father's generation was born, they were speaking English at home. My father left the area after he graduated H.S., so I grew up in a more heavily "assimilated" suburban culture several states away.
My maternal grandfather grew up speaking French at home, although his people were absorbed into the United States due to the Louisiana Purchase. Although the backcountry Cajuns like my grandfather's family didn't really assimilate that readily, as they still spoke French at home. But my grandfather left home at an early age, and traveling through other areas of the country, he felt strong pressures to assimilate.
My maternal grandmother was the only one out of my four grandparents who started out speaking English at home. She was born and raised in Missouri, but went to college in California, which is where she met my grandfather.
Of course, by the time I was born, our family spoke English only.
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