Belarusian American

Belarusian American
Беларусы ЗША

1st row: Larry King  · Michael Mukasey  · Ralph Lauren 2nd row: Harrison Ford  · Lisa Kudrow  · Steve Ballmer 3rd row: Michael Douglas  · Andrei Arlovski  · Kirk Douglas
Total population
600.000 0.24% of the US population
Regions with significant populations
New York, New Jersey, Cleveland, Chicago, Los Angeles, Detroit.
Languages
Belarusian, Russian, American English
Religion
predominantly Orthodox and Roman Catholic.

Belarusian Americans (Belarusian: Беларусы ЗША) are Americans whose ancestors where born in the territory of Belarus.

History

It is believed that the first Belarusan immigrants that arrived to United States likely settles the early 1600s in Virginia in together to a most English people, already that could had been brought by Captain John Smith, that visited Belarus in 1603. Is known that the mass emigration from Belarus did not begin until slowly during the final decades of the nineteenth century, extending until World War I. They emigrated to United States, from Libava and northern Germany. When they arrived, most settles in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Baltimore. However, this most of first Belarusians were registered as Russian, except those were who Roman Catholics,that were registered as Poles. Most of Belarusans that immigrated to United States after World War I were political immigrants, mainly from western Europe and Poland. This immigrants were thousands of people, between which were counted some Jews between the late 1930s and the end of 1941. After of the post-World War II period, from 1948 to the early 1950s, many Belarusans arrived to United States. During this period about 50,000 Belarusan immigrated to the United States, most by them left Europe for political reasons. Not all of them came from Belarus, already the also came from many countries in which they settled after of the World War II. In fact, the majority of them from West Germany and Austria, but also had many Belarusian that came from Great Britain, France, Italy, Belgium, Denmark, and other countries in South America and North Africa. These immigrants were former prisoners of war of the Polish and Soviet armies, persons who had worked in Germany as Ostarbeiters during the World War II, former emigres that left Belarus shortly after war same or in 1939, when the Soviets attacked Poland, refugees who had fled Belarus in 1943 or 1944, and defectors and dissidents after World War II. During the 1980s and 1990s the waves of Bielorrusos that emigrated to United States are relatively small if we the compare with previous waves. People have emigrated for reasons political, economic, and filial (to reunite with families that already had settled in United States). However, most of these immigrants are of the Jewish religion. The 1980 U.S. census counted 7,328 Belarusan that live in United States but the 1990 census registed only 4,277 Belarusan living here.

Demography

The total estimate of Belarusian immigrants to the USA is between 650,000 and 750,000 (this estimate includes only actual immigrants, and not people of Belarusian descent born in the United States). A precise number of Belarusian Americans is difficult to determine, since historically, census and immigration statistics did not recognize Belarusians as a separate category. Many of them were recorded as Russian or Polish, depending on the region of Belarus in which they were born.

The largest concentrations of Belarusian Americans are in the metropolitan New York area, New Jersey (especially Highland Park and South River), Cleveland (and its suburbs), Chicago (recent immigrants concentrated around Wheeling), Los Angeles, and Detroit.

There were several waves of influx of Belarusians into the USA, one before the Russian Revolution, then in 1919-1939 from West Belarus, then in late 1940s - early 1950s (after the Second World War), and after the collapse of the USSR in the 1990s.

One major group of Belarusian immigrants to the U.S. are Belarusian Jews who migrated starting in the mid-19th century, facing discrimination in the Russian Empire of which Belarus was part of at the time.

According to the Census Bureau report in 2000 in the USA lived 38,505 people who were born in Belarus. From them - 1,363 spoke Belarusian language at home.

Assimilation

There several organizations in United States that have developed a system secondary schools in the places which there American communities of Belarusian descent. This organizations have as goal teach the language, culture, and religious traditions of Belarus. Thus, the Belarusian culture is represented by choirs, theatrical groups, musical and dance ensembles. One of the associations more prominents is The Belarusan American Association.

Notable Belarusian Americans

• Ralph Lauren
• Michael Mukasey
• Larry King
• Kirk Douglas
• Michael Douglas
• Janice Dickinson
• Harrison Ford
• Lisa Kudrow
• Paul Mazurkiewicz
• Steve Ballmer
• Yury Shulman
• Paul Baran

External links

• News of Belarusian diaspora
• The Belarusan-American Association
• Union of Belarusian Youth in the USA
• The international seminar Belarusian Diaspora: Past and Present took place in Minsk