The Old World in the New: The Significance of Past and Present Immigration to the American PeopleRoss, Edward Alsworth
History
The Old World in the New: The Significance of Past and Present Immigration to the American People
Ross, Edward Alsworth
Immigrants -- United States; Noncitizens -- United States; United States -- Emigration and immigration
What of change the new-comer notices in us American Norsemen
is good manners; the respect shown to women; the small class
distinctions between rich and poor, high and low; and, finally,
the quickness and practical insight into work and business.
Another pioneer, after revisiting Norway, writes:
I was often surprised to find that persons who had never seen me
before took me at once for an American. It seems that even the
expression of one's face is greatly changed here. During this
visit I discovered that my mode of thinking and my spiritual
life had changed so much during my thirteen years in America
that I did not feel quite at home with my childhood friends....
The Norwegian who has lived a while in America is more civilized
than if he had not been here. He has seen more, experienced
more, thought more, and all this has opened his eyes and
broadened his view. He is more wide-awake, lives a richer life,
and is in a closer correspondence with his surroundings. His
sympathies are widened, and he takes more interest in what is
going on in the world.
CONTRASTS AMONG SCANDINAVIANS
It will not do to shuffle all our Scandinavians into one deck. The
Danes are courteous and pleasure-loving, though moody, and they run
to moderation in virtues as in vices. The Swedes bear the impress
of a society that has long known aristocracy, refinement, and
industrialism. They are more polished in manner than the Norwegians,
although the humble betray a servility which grates upon Americans.
Many show a sociability and a love of pleasure worthy of "the French
of the North." They bring, too, a love of letters, and I am told
that most of the servant-girls write verse. The editor of a Swedish
weekly receives very well written poems and contributions from
his readers. Learning stands high with the Swedes, and since John
Ericsson they have sent us many fine technical men. Only lately
their great chemist Arrhenius hazarded the prediction that, owing
to the tendency of American men of ability to go into business, our
university chairs will some day be filled with scholars of German
and Scandinavian blood.
The Swede is more melancholy than the Norseman, and his letters to
friends in the old country are full of the expression of feeling. He
has the temperament for pietism, which has always been marked among
the Swedish-Americans because they have been dissenters rather than
adherents of the state church. Formerly the Swedes came from the
country, and were conservative; but of late they have been coming
from the cities, and are of a radical and even socialistic spirit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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