Where are you really from

[ShadySands]

Seeing Opportunity In A Question: 'Where Are You Really From?'

 

I always find things like this interesting not because of my own experiences, which have been largely pleasant, but from the stories my biracial (black and Native American) grandmother would tell me about growing up in the 30's and 40's 

 

 

[Gorth]

describing it In six words... that's a bit of a challenge

 

I still find it strange that people keep referring to different ethnic groups as "races" (since technically we are all the of the race homo sapiens, sub group homo sapiens sapiens).

 

As for my native Denmark, until 50 years ago, it was very much a monoethnic, monocultural society (with a small German minority living in the south). Now I live and work with an eclectic mix of Aussies, Kiwis, Poms, Americans, Fijians, South Africans, Dutch, fellow Scandinavian, Philippine, Malaysian, Chinese and Indonesians. Sometimes working together with people from Singapore, Russia, Canada and what have you. The world is getting smaller.

[Leferd]

Ahh, cultural identity in the ethnic salad bowl that is Amerika.

 

I'm not multiracial myself, I've lived abroad and was born in a country where I was not part of the ethnic or religious majority. I have cousins who are multiracial in Europe and Asia and my brother "went native" and now has multiracial kids.

 

Growing up, I've definitely gotten plenty of the "Where are you from?" questions. I was definitely more self-conscious as a kid, but now I fully embrace and own up to my perceived differences.

[BruceVC]

Oh no I am waiting for Oby to comment on this one

 

 

My family came from England and settled in Zimbabwe and South Africa in the last 100 years. I was born in South Africa. Personally I think people  prescribe too much attention to "where are you from". If a person chooses to immigrate to a country and become a citizen then they are from that country.

 

In South Africa I regularly hear from some Black South Africans that White South Africans "aren't really African" as 300 hundred years ago there ancestors came from Europe and so now they can't claim to be African

 

Anyway its irrelevant to me what people think I am, all that matters is what I think I am. And I am South African

[Orogun01]

Oh no I am waiting for Oby to comment on this one

 

 

My family came from England and settled in Zimbabwe and South Africa in the last 100 years. I was born in South Africa. Personally I think people  prescribe too much attention to "where are you from". If a person chooses to immigrate to a country and become a citizen then they are from that country.

 

In South Africa I regularly hear from some Black South Africans that White South Africans "aren't really African" as 300 hundred years ago there ancestors came from Europe and so now they can't claim to be African

 

Anyway its irrelevant to me what people think I am, all that matters is what I think I am. And I am South African

Not really,how a person identifies themselves is important but you're never going to convince me that the white kid in the gansta getup that calls himself the N-word is black.

But yeah, white South African that are born and raised are African even if some would identify more with their white ancestry.

[Oerwinde]

On my mother's side I'm from an English family that immigrated to British Columbia in the 1800s, one of the founding families of the Comox Valley. On my fathers side I'm mostly Welsh, some older immigrants, some newer(Grandmothers parents moved here from Britain, Grandfather's line dates back further). For a British Columbian I'm relatively old blood.

[BruceVC]

 

Oh no I am waiting for Oby to comment on this one

 

 

My family came from England and settled in Zimbabwe and South Africa in the last 100 years. I was born in South Africa. Personally I think people  prescribe too much attention to "where are you from". If a person chooses to immigrate to a country and become a citizen then they are from that country.

 

In South Africa I regularly hear from some Black South Africans that White South Africans "aren't really African" as 300 hundred years ago there ancestors came from Europe and so now they can't claim to be African

 

Anyway its irrelevant to me what people think I am, all that matters is what I think I am. And I am South African

Not really,how a person identifies themselves is important but you're never going to convince me that the white kid in the gansta getup that calls himself the N-word is black.

But yeah, white South African that are born and raised are African even if some would identify more with their white ancestry.

 

 

Sure I agree about your gangsta example. But its not what I am saying, I didn't mean to say your personal identity within a country can't be debatable but in your example that person is still an American. In South Africa third generation white South Africans get told they are not "South African" but "European"

[Pidesco]

I'm Portuguese, which probably means I have a mix of North African and Celtic DNA.

[Walsingham]

Found the perfect image summary:

 

(But it won't let me link!)

 

https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRLe15J-YIEOOVoJZaAUoLbE-pvXDmxzGD9fUMm_A3HOxr8l7mr

[JFSOCC]

"cast out from Fólkvangr for debauchery"

[Enoch]

Found the perfect image summary:

 

(But it won't let me link!)

 

https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRLe15J-YIEOOVoJZaAUoLbE-pvXDmxzGD9fUMm_A3HOxr8l7mr

 

A great-great grandfather of mine fought in the Boer War.  Cornwall Light Infantry.  Not an officer, though, so the silver spoon probably wouldn't fit. 

 

He and his son, however, were the most recent immigrants in my ancestry.  (He moved to Ontario in the nineteen-aughts, re-enlisted to train recruits during the Great War, and them moved his family into the States in the '20s.  My great-grandfather was born in Canada.)  My father's side came out of a mix of Irish and German (or perhaps Danish) Catholics who settled in the coal mining region of Pennsylvania sometime in the middle 1800s.  Others ancestors, via my maternal grandmother, have British-sounding surnames and have lived in central NJ for as long as we can trace.  

 

So I guess the proper six-word response I'd give is:  "New Jersey.  **** you for askin'."

[BruceVC]

 

Found the perfect image summary:

 

(But it won't let me link!)

 

https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRLe15J-YIEOOVoJZaAUoLbE-pvXDmxzGD9fUMm_A3HOxr8l7mr

 

A great-great grandfather of mine fought in the Boer War.  Cornwall Light Infantry.  Not an officer, though, so the silver spoon probably wouldn't fit. 

 

He and his son, however, were the most recent immigrants in my ancestry.  (He moved to Ontario in the nineteen-aughts, re-enlisted to train recruits during the Great War, and them moved his family into the States in the '20s.  My great-grandfather was born in Canada.)  My father's side came out of a mix of Irish and German (or perhaps Danish) Catholics who settled in the coal mining region of Pennsylvania sometime in the middle 1800s.  Others ancestors, via my maternal grandmother, have British-sounding surnames and have lived in central NJ for as long as we can trace.  

 

So I guess the proper six-word response I'd give is:  "New Jersey.  **** you for askin'."

 

 

Wow that's an interesting and prestigious family history

[Malcador]

As with a lot in Trinidad, am a mutt of sorts. Black, Indian, Portuguese and possibly some Arab or Iranian (no one knows where my maternal great-grandfather came from )

[Rosbjerg]

We managed to trace our family back to the late 17th century. So pretty "purebred".. I've always found it amusing talking to Americans or other cultures with a lot of mixed ethnic groups. It seems extremely silly to me to celebrate your 1/16th Cherokee side haha.

 

For me races are simply an aesthetic thing, as in I find the differences of appearance pleasing to look at.

 

But it's culture differences that can get my blood boiling and therefore a lot more interesting to discuss.

[Gfted1]

Italian and German here, 50/50.

[Gorgon]

Danish I think, no clue really, we never did the whole family tree thing. 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Irish, English, and Austrian ancestry personally.

 

oby's about to post so this thread will likely go to **** soon.

[HoonDing]

East Africa.

[Nonek]

English and England, i'm extremely boring in comparison to all of you good chaps.

[ShadySands]

When people ask what I am I always answer American even though I know that's not what they want. That is usually either preceded or followed by them asking where are you from to which I answer Arizona.

 

Going back a ways though... as I said before my maternal grandmother is half black (probably mixed western and/or central African) and half Cherokee and my maternal grandfather was black as well. To Ros' point I don't know much about or associate much with the Native American (more or less) side of the family but they mostly live on reservations in Oklahoma and don't like to travel much. On my dad's side it's a bit easier to trace as my grandpa is of mostly Danish (with a smidge of English) descent and my grandma is Irish Mexican.

 

So that's my ingredients and why it's easier to just say an American from Arizona

[Walsingham]

In terms of how you came to be who you are, it's always going to be a mix.

 

I mean, for starters most of us grew up watching US TV shows. We have different parents, and read different books, and love different cinema and music.

 

I do, however, insist that one should pick a country and show loyalty to it. Modern society is far too ****ing pick'n'mix when it means you might have to sacrifice anything. And I don't mean your life. I mean, anything from a custard bun upwards.

[IndiraLightfoot]

Believe it or not, but I've been doing genealogy since I was nine. I used to sit in the library pouring over microfilms with old handwriting and Gothic script for hours on end. The interest probably stems from my diverse background. My father was a French-German war child escaping death many times during WWII. The last time being when he stood in line, wanting to get aboard MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a German ship which a few hours later got sunk on 30 January 1945 by a Soviet submarine in the Baltic. By one estimate 9,400 people died, which would make it the largest loss of life in a single ship sinking ever. My mother was a Swedish-Norwegian Walloon with Belgian and Breton roots.

 

I have mapped large chunks of my family tree, often going many centuries back. Some of my deepest roots creep into Wales and Bretagne, as well as Liège and Lyon, and this about a millennium ago. I have 15th and 16th century roots in today's France, Belgium, Netherlands, Great Britain, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Hungary, Finland, and Germany. I have, like most others, plenty of ancestors involved in agriculture, but I also have quite a few fishermen, artisans, tinkerers, shopkeepers, musicians and barber-surgeons.

 

Genetically, it turned out I was mostly Western-European Haplogroup R1b and Nordic Haplogroup I1-M253.

Edited November 22, 2013 by IndiraLightfoot

[Azdeus]

From what I've been told of my genealogy from my family, and what little I remember of it, is that my fathers side of the family has some walloon blood, but is otherwise as far as I remember from Sweden. It's also ridiculously large, my grandmother is one out of thirteen siblings, wich each has an average of ten kids, with an average of 6 kids with her being the weird one with only two and two...

 

On my mothers side, my grandmother is from Finland, came here during the war, while my grandfathers family has been from around here for pretty much eternity.

 

So, yeah...

[Walsingham]

 

My father... stood in line, wanting to get aboard MV Wilhelm Gustloff, a German ship which a few hours later got sunk on 30 January 1945 by a Soviet submarine in the Baltic. By one estimate 9,400 people died, which would make it the largest loss of life in a single ship sinking ever. My mother was a Swedish-Norwegian Walloon with Belgian and Breton roots.

 

Gives new meaning to the statement "I'm lucky I got here."

[IndiraLightfoot]

Walsingham: It sure does!  

 

If genealogy teaches you one thing, then it is that there are so many lucky dice rolls over the ages and through the eons that have made it possible for you to come to existence, so being thankful is just not enough. You just have to embrace life for what it is: a complex game of chance, almost like a good-old PnP D&D session with a stern DM. 

 

And like with so many other people with traumatic memories from any war, my parents opted to stay quite about most of this, not wanting their kids to pick up to much from the bad stuff. I only learned about that Gustloff-thing five years ago.