German in the United States
Encyclopedia
North Dakota
North Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States of America, along the Canadian border. The state is bordered by Canada to the north, Minnesota to the east, South Dakota to the south and Montana to the west. North Dakota is the 19th-largest state by area in the U.S....
and South Dakota
South Dakota
South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...
.
In the United States, German is third in popularity after Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
and French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
in terms of the number of colleges and universities offering instruction in the language.
Pennsylvania Dutch
The AmishAmish
The Amish , sometimes referred to as Amish Mennonites, are a group of Christian church fellowships that form a subgroup of the Mennonite churches...
and other Pennsylvania Germans
Germans
The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....
speak a dialect of German known as Pennsylvania German
Pennsylvania German language
The Pennsylvania German language is a variety of West Central German possibly spoken by more than 250,000 people in North America...
(also called Pennsylvania Dutch, where Dutch is a corruption of Deutsch), a remnant of what was once a much larger German-speaking area in eastern Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
. Most of the "Pennsylvania Dutch" originate from Switzerland, Alsace
Alsace
Alsace is the fifth-smallest of the 27 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the seventh-most densely populated region in France and third most densely populated region in metropolitan France, with ca. 220 inhabitants per km²...
, or the Palatinate area of Germany.
Indiana
There is also a significant population of AmishAmish
The Amish , sometimes referred to as Amish Mennonites, are a group of Christian church fellowships that form a subgroup of the Mennonite churches...
and Old Order Mennonites located in rural areas of Elkhart County and LaGrange County, Indiana, who speak a similar dialect. A much smaller community of Pennsylvania Dutch-speaking Amish is found in Parke County, in western Indiana. Many English words have become mixed with this dialect and it is quite different from High German (Hochdeutsch
Hochdeutsch
Hochdeutsch is a German word which literally translates to "high German".It is commonly used with two meanings:* Linguistically and historically, it refers to the High German languages , or dialects , which developed in the Southern uplands and the Alps, for example, modern central and southern...
), but quite similar to the dialect of the Palatinate region.
Usually, Pennsylvania Dutch (often just "Dutch" or "Deitsch") is spoken at home, but English is used when interacting with the general population. The Amish and Old Order Mennonites of northern Indiana often differentiate between themselves and the general population by referring to them, respectively, as the "Amish" and the "English", noting the difference in language. Pennsylvania "Dutch" is sometimes used in worship services, though this is more common among the Amish than the Mennonites. More mainstream (city) Mennonites may have a working knowledge of the language, but it is not frequently used in conversation or in worship services.
Texas
There is a dying dialect called Texas GermanTexas German
Texas German is a dialect of the German language that is spoken by descendants of German immigrants who settled in the Texas Hill Country region in the mid-19th century. These immigrants founded the towns of New Braunfels, Fredericksburg, Boerne, Schulenburg, Weimar, Walburg, and Comfort...
based in the Texas Hill Country
Texas Hill Country
The Texas Hill Country is a vernacular term applied to a region of Central Texas featuring tall rugged hills consisting of thin layers of soil atop limestone or granite. It also includes the Llano Uplift and the second largest granite monadnock in the United States, Enchanted Rock, which is located...
in the vicinity of the town of Fredericksburg
Fredericksburg, Texas
Fredericksburg is the seat of Gillespie County, in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2010 Census estimate, the city had a population of 10, 530...
.
Hutterites
HutteriteHutterite
Hutterites are a communal branch of Anabaptists who, like the Amish and Mennonites, trace their roots to the Radical Reformation of the 16th century. Since the death of their founder Jakob Hutter in 1536, the beliefs of the Hutterites, especially living in a community of goods and absolute...
communities in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
speak Hutterite German
Hutterite German
Hutterite German is an Upper German dialect of the Austro-Bavarian variety of the German language, which is spoken by Hutterite communities in Canada and the United States...
, an Austro-Bavarian
Austro-Bavarian
Bavarian , also Austro-Bavarian, is a major group of Upper German varieties spoken in the south east of the German language area.-History and origin:...
dialect. Hutterite is spoken in the U.S. states of Washington, Montana
Montana
Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
, North
North Dakota
North Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States of America, along the Canadian border. The state is bordered by Canada to the north, Minnesota to the east, South Dakota to the south and Montana to the west. North Dakota is the 19th-largest state by area in the U.S....
and South Dakota
South Dakota
South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...
, and Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
; and in the Canadian provinces of Alberta
Alberta
Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...
, Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan is a prairie province in Canada, which has an area of . Saskatchewan is bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, and on the south by the U.S. states of Montana and North Dakota....
, and Manitoba
Manitoba
Manitoba is a Canadian prairie province with an area of . The province has over 110,000 lakes and has a largely continental climate because of its flat topography. Agriculture, mostly concentrated in the fertile southern and western parts of the province, is vital to the province's economy; other...
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German as the official US language myth
An urban legendUrban legend
An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...
, sometimes called the Muhlenberg legend
Muhlenberg legend
The Muhlenberg legend is an urban legend in the United States and Germany. According to the legend, Frederick Muhlenberg, the first ever Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, kept German from becoming an official language of the United States...
after Frederick Muhlenberg
Frederick Muhlenberg
Frederick Augustus Conrad Muhlenberg was an American minister and politician who was the first Speaker of the United States House of Representatives. A delegate and a member of the U.S...
, states that English only narrowly defeated German as the U.S. official language. In reality, the proposal involved a requirement that government documents be translated into German. The United States has no statutory official language; English has been used on a de facto basis, owing to its status as the country's predominant language.
In Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
, which had a large German-American population, German was long allowed as the language of instruction in schools, and state documents were available in German until 1950. As a result of anti-German sentiment during World War I, the fluency decreased from one generation to the next and only a small fraction of Pennsylvanians of German descent are fluent in the German language.
German-American Tradition in Literature
The ties between Germany and the United States having been historically strong has brought about a number of important literary authors. In modern German literature, this topic has been addressed frequently by the Boston-born author of German and English lyrical poetry, Paul-Henri Campbell.See also
- American Association of Teachers of GermanAmerican Association of Teachers of GermanThe American Association of Teachers of German is a professional organisation for teachers of German in the United States and Europe. Teachers may be involved in primary, secondary, or university education. Additionally, retired and student teachers are welcome....
- Bennett LawBennett LawThe Bennett Law was a very controversial state law passed in Wisconsin in 1889, that required the use of English to teach major subjects in all public and private elementary and high schools. It affected the state's many German-language private schools , and was bitterly resented by German-American...
- Bilingual educationBilingual educationBilingual education involves teaching academic content in two languages, in a native and secondary language with varying amounts of each language used in accordance with the program model.-Bilingual education program models:...
- German AmericanGerman AmericanGerman Americans are citizens of the United States of German ancestry and comprise about 51 million people, or 17% of the U.S. population, the country's largest self-reported ancestral group...
- German American National CongressGerman American National CongressThe German American National Congress is a national German-American nonprofit organization in the United States. DANK was established to unite Americans of Germanic descent, while preserving their heritage and traditions on a local and national level...
- German-American Heritage Foundation of the USAGerman-American Heritage Foundation of the USAThe German-American Heritage Foundation of the USA is a national non-profit organization that promotes German language, culture, and heritage in the United States and works toward preserving the history of Americans of German ancestry in the building the United States...
Media
- Arbeiter-ZeitungArbeiter-Zeitung (Chicago)The Arbeiter-Zeitung, also known as the Chicagoer Arbeiter-Zeitung, a German language anarchist newspaper, was started in Chicago, Illinois, in 1877 by veterans of the Great Railroad Strike of 1877. It continued publishing through 1931...
, a ChicagoChicagoChicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
German-languageGerman languageGerman is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
newspaper. - New Yorker Staats-ZeitungNew Yorker StaatszeitungThe New Yorker Staats-Zeitung, nicknamed „The Staats“, is the premier German-language weekly newspaper in the United States.-History:...
- Der VolksfreundDer VolksfreundDer Volksfreund was a German language newspaper published in Buffalo, New York, from 1838 to 1943. Its editorial tendencies were Roman Catholic and Democratic. The paper flourished chiefly during the last decade of the 19th century until World War I under its publisher Matthias Rohr...
, a newspaper in Buffalo, New YorkBuffalo, New YorkBuffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...
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External links
- American Association of Teachers of German
- German American National Congress (DANK) - A national organization celebrating German-American heritage.
- Willi Paul Adams: The German Americans. Chapter 7: German or English
- Bastian Sick: German as the official language of the USA?
- The Muhlenberg hoax – Did German lose out to English by just one vote?