Phlegmish posted:

If it's supposed to be a map of the current situation, it's at least partly fictional, I'm pretty sure Cornish is effectively extinct.

Wipfmetz posted:

IBroughttheFunk posted:

How is Germany still so widely spoken in some states? I don't know why this surprises me, but it does. Is it like, mainly German-speaking Amish/Mennonite communities, or something like that? Or is it just that so many Germans settled there that it's still actually spoken by a sizable amount of people, at least at home?

Chicken posted:

I think the only people who still speak German as a first language in North America are Amish/Mennonite/Hutterite communities (maybe some weird Lutheran/Calvinist groups too). Well and German immigrants. But I think it's more that people in NA just don't speak a lot of languages in general. The largest language after English and Spanish in some of those smaller, more rural states would have maybe a few thousand speakers.

Phlegmish posted:

I don't know the stats, but I would bet anything that, say, Nebraska, is in the top ten most English-speaking states in the USA.

Carthag Tuek posted:

^^^ i think most us-german dialects are descended plattdeutsch as opposed to hochdeutsch but im not sure ^^^


also iirc there used to be a fairly big community of german-speakers in texas of all places

Chicken posted:

I think the only people who still speak German as a first language in North America are Amish/Mennonite/Hutterite communities (maybe some weird Lutheran/Calvinist groups too). Well and German immigrants. But I think it's more that people in NA just don't speak a lot of languages in general. The largest language after English and Spanish in some of those smaller, more rural states would have maybe a few thousand speakers.

Carthag Tuek posted:

^^^ i think most us-german dialects are descended plattdeutsch as opposed to hochdeutsch but im not sure ^^^


also iirc there used to be a fairly big community of german-speakers in texas of all places

Badger of Basra posted:

Do any of the Americans itt know anyone who speaks German as an ancestral language? I certainly don't and I grew up close to a pretty large concentration of German Americans (central Texas).

quote:

We measure German-American civil society and organizational strength across time and geography based on historical club directories, newspaper directories and petitioning activity. Comparing votes in the House of Representatives on two near-identical proposals for constitutional amendments—the defeat of the Hobson Prohibition Amendment in 1914 and the successful passage of the eventual Eighteenth Amendment in 1917—we find suppression mattered most in districts located at the middle of the German-American population distribution, where we hypothesize representatives were most persuadable. We estimate that without suppression of German-American organizations the Prohibition Amendment would not have received enough support for passage.

Badger of Basra posted:

Do any of the Americans itt know anyone who speaks German as an ancestral language? I certainly don't and I grew up close to a pretty large concentration of German Americans (central Texas).

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

germans moved in everywhere there was free land for white folks, idk why Texas is special in that regard. Neu Braunfels and her beloved Schlitterbahn would like a word.

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

Koramei posted:

This doesn’t seem right (tbf the methodology looks like they were never trying to be especially accurate), i feel like Korea and Japan are flipped here. Cats are getting more popular but Korea definitely favors dogs, a lot, and my casual impression is Japan is into cats.

FreudianSlippers posted:

Like 50 million Americans are of German descent. A lot of people kept it on the downlow following the War though so there's probably a lot of people who have German grandparents or great grandparents and have no idea.

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

Let’s just sorten things out. All the counties where « hispanic » is the second-most populous is where germans moved. The white second-most parts were stolen from Mexico or happen to be along that there Cretaceous coastline. And the black second-most parts are the primary areas where statues and flags need to get gone. USA germanicity in a nutshell.

abelwingnut posted:

wait, what's going on in the middle of wisconsin? i didn't realize there was a sizable asian population there?

eastern washington too? looks like spokane. that makes more sense to me given its proximity to seattle. i know nothig about spokane whatsoever.

abelwingnut posted:

wait, what's going on in the middle of wisconsin? i didn't realize there was a sizable asian population there?

eastern washington too? looks like spokane. that makes more sense to me given its proximity to seattle. i know nothig about spokane whatsoever.

Badger of Basra posted:

Big difference is in the US those people eventually become citizens (and their kids always do) so they have fewer barriers to assimilating

Family Values posted:

There just isn't a need for a 2nd person plural pronoun. You're either having a one on one conversation, or addressing a group and 'you' applies to the entire group, or you're addressing an individual within a group, in which case you must've specified that individual by name in the previous sentence and context indicates that 'you' means that particular individual.

If you don't believe me, consider that in places where 'y'all' is common you probably use 'y'all' to address individuals!

Offler posted:

The Swedish title mania from about 1800-1940

The Swedish language, like many others, has a formal and an informal way to say "you" where one word - "du" is singular and informal and the other word - "ni" is both plural and/or formal if used for one person, just like "usted" in Spanish or "vouz" in French. Unlike most other languages though, using the formal "ni" to address one person is rarely used in modern Swedish.

In fact, if anyone other than a hotel employee or something addresses me with "ni" it feels more like I'm being mocked than anything else. To attempt to put it into perspective in English - If a work mate asks me "Vill ni har mer kaffe?" (Would you like more coffee) it feels kind of like they are saying "Would his lordship like more coffee?" or something.

The reason for this is that Sweden went through a very rapid and very successful language reform in the 60s/70s where "du" became appropriate in basically every setting. For anyone familiar with how much Swedes like to complain about language change, the fact that this reform was as successful and thorough as it was probably seems a bit strange.

The main reason there wasn't more pushback against everyone becoming "du" with each other is that back in the 60s/70s, calling someone "ni" had only been the norm for politeness for a few decades, so there weren't really much of an old guard around that had grown up with saying "ni" to every stranger. Before that, the Swedish language went through a strange period of about 150 years when everybody became absolutely obsessed with titles. This period is usually called something like "titelsjukan" which means "title sickness" or "title mania".

As Sweden industrialized and urbanized, the new city-dwelling middle class quickly became obsessed with finding new ways to separate themselves from common farmers or labourers. Many took new last names that sounded like they were based on heraldry - this is why so many Swedish last names are basically just two words smashed together like Forsberg (rapids-mountain) or Lindström (linden-currents). But the most important distinction for this new class soon became obtaining a title. Everybody who held any job more complex than a basic labourer got a title, and so did their wives! From now on, if you spoke to a doctor you could no longer simply ask "Would you like some more coffee?" - you had to instead ask "Would the doctor like some more coffee?" The comment I made earlier about their wives wasn't a joke btw, just about every title also had a female form which meant "wife of a [title]".

Since everyone was obsessed with titles, it soon became a horrible faux pass to address someone by anything but their title. This was taken to a truly silly level where people were saying poo poo like "Vill majorskan att jag tar fram majorskans finaste skor?" (Would the Majoress [wife of a Major] like me to bring out the Majoress' finest shoes?)

This was all very unwieldy, which wasn't helped by the social rule that titles could only be dropped at a social gathering at the suggestion of the holder of the highest title, so unless there was a clear "leader" at a gathering no one dared to be so presumptive as to suggest this. Imagine the scandal of a mere Majoress suggesting this when there is a director of a large bank present! In fact, there were other weird informal rules like that a Majoress of course deserved a title out in the provinces where there weren't as many titled people and the army was seen as a large important part of society, but the mere wife of a Major didn't really deserve a title in Stockholm. So you could inadvertently show your country rear end just by addressing her by a title in the capital, you rube! The wife of a Colonel always deserved a title, of course, as did the Major himself. All very clear and easy to follow.

As you can imagine, this complex never-ending list of social rules meant that people had to develop ways to avoid directly addressing each other until they were sure who they were talking to. This is why Swedish still has some bizarre passive sentences like "Får det lov att bjudas på lite kaffe?" which is very hard to properly translate while keeping all the passivity, my best attempt is something like "Would it be permissible if some coffee was offered?" Asked to no one in particular, of course, wouldn't want to be presumptive!