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Scottish Americans

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Scottish American
Ameireaganaich Albannach
George Marshall
Johnny Cash
Notable Scottish Americans:
David Dunbar Buick · James Stewart · George Marshall · Gilbert Stuart · Douglas MacArthur · Johnny Cash · Alexander Graham Bell
Regions with significant populations
Appalachia, New England, Western United States
Languages
American English, Scots, Scottish Gaelic
Religion
Predominantly Protestant
Related ethnic groups
British Americans (Scots-Irish Americans, English Americans, Welsh Americans), Irish Americans

Scottish Americans or Scots Americans (Scottish Gaelic: Ameireaganaich Albannach) are citizens of the United States whose ancestry originates in Scotland. Scottish Americans are closely related to Scotch-Irish Americans, descendants of Ulster Scots, and communities emphasize and celebrate a common heritage.[7] The majority of Scotch-Irish originally came from the lowlands and border country of Scotland before migrating to Ulster Province in Ireland (see Plantation of Ulster) and thence, beginning about five generations later, to North America in large numbers during the eighteenth century.

Number of Scottish Americans

Tartan Day parade in New York City.

The number of Americans of Scottish descent is estimated to be 20 to 25 million[1][2][3][4] (up to 8.3% of the total US population), and Scots-Irish, 27 to 30 million[5][6] (up to 10% of the total US population), the subgroups overlapping and not always distinguishable because of their shared ancestral surnames. In the 2000 Census, 4.8 million Americans self-reported Scottish ancestry, 1.7% of the total US population. Another 4.3 million self-reported Scots-Irish ancestry, for a total of 9.2 million Americans self-reporting some kind of Scottish descent. These self-reported numbers are regarded by demographers as massive under-counts, because Scottish ancestry is known to be disproportionately under-reported among the majority of mixed ancestry,[8] and because areas where people reported "American" ancestry were the places where, historically, Scottish and Scots-Irish Protestants settled in America (that is: along the North American coast and the Southeastern United States.[citation needed] Scottish Americans descended from nineteenth-century Scottish immigrants tend to be concentrated in the West, while others in New England are the descendants of immigrants from the Maritime Provinces of Canada, especially in the 1920s.[citation needed] Given Scotland's population (just over 5 million), there are almost as many self-identified Scottish Americans as there are native Scots living in their home country.[9]

Scottish Americans and African Americans

There has been a long tradition of influences between Scottish and the African American community. The great influx of Scots Presbyterians into the Carolinas introduced the African slaves to Christianity and their way of worship and singing. Even today, psalm singing and gospel music are the backbone of African American churchgoers. It has been long thought by the wider African American community that American Gospel music originated in Africa and was brought to the Americas by slaves. However recent studies by Professor Willie Ruff, a Black American ethno-musicologist at Yale University, concludes that African American Gospel singing was in fact was introduced and encouraged by Scottish Gaelic speaking settlers from North Uist.[10] His study also concludes that the first foreign tongue spoken by slaves in America was not English but Scottish Gaelic taught to them by Gaelic speakers who left the Western Isles because of religious persecution.[10] Traditional Scottish Gaelic psalm singing, or "precenting the line" as it is correctly known, in which the psalms are called out and the congregation sings a response, was the earliest form of congregational singing adopted by Africans in America. Professor Ruff focuses on Scottish settler influences that pre-date all other congregational singing by African Americans in America and found, in a North Carolina newspaper dated about 1740, an advertisement offering a generous reward for the capture and return of a runaway African slave who is described as being easy to identify because he only spoke Gaelic.[11] Such cultural influences have remained until modern times, even a church in Alabama where the African American congregation worshipped in Gaelic as late as 1918, giving a clue to the extent to which the Gaels spread their culture - from North Carolina to Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi.[12]

Historical population

1790 U.S Ancestry
Based on Evaluated census figures[13] 		2000 U.S Ancestry
from the official U.S census[14]
Ancestry group Number
(1790 estimate) 		% of
total 		Ancestry Number
(2000 count) 		% of
total
English 1,900,000 47.5 German 42,885,162 15.2
African 750,000 19.0 African 36,419,434 12.9
Scotch-Irish 320,000 8.0 Irish 30,594,130 10.9
German 280,000 7.0 English 24,515,138 8.7
Irish 200,000 5.0 Mexican 20,640,711 7.3
Scottish 160,000 4.0 Italian 15,723,555 5.6
Welsh 120,000 3.0 French 10,846,018 3.9
Dutch 100,000 2.5 Hispanic 10,017,244 3.6
French 80,000 2.0 Polish 8,977,444 3.2
Native American 50,000 1.0
Scottish
 4,890,581 1.7
Spanish 20,000 0.5 Dutch 4,542,494 1.6
Swedish or other 20,000 0.5 Norwegian 4,477,725 1.6
British (Total) 2,500,000 62.5
Scotch-Irish
 4,319,232 1.5
Total 3,929,326[15] 100 Native American 4,119,301 1.5
Swedish 3,998,310 1.4

2006 American Community Survey

Scottish Americans by state

The states with the most Scottish & Scots-Irish populations:

Scottish

Scots-Irish

The states with the top percentages of Scottish:

Scottish

File:Scottish1346.gif
'Scottish ancestry' is in Dark red and brown colors which indicate a higher density: highest in the east and west (see also Maps of American ancestries)

Scots-Irish

US presidents of Scottish and Scots-Irish descent

At least twenty three presidents of the United States have some Scottish or Scots-Irish ancestry, although the extent of this varies. For example, Ronald Reagan's great grandfather was a Scot and Woodrow Wilson’s maternal grandparents were both Scottish. To a lesser degree Bill Clinton, James K. Polk and Richard Nixon have less direct Scottish, Scots-Irish ancestry.

  1. George Washington 1st President.
  2. Thomas Jefferson 3rd President
  3. James Monroe 5th President
  4. Andrew Jackson, 7th President 1829-37
  5. William Henry Harrison, 9th President
  6. James Knox Polk, 11th President 1845-49
  7. James Buchanan, 15th President 1857-61
  8. Andrew Johnson, 17th president 1865-69
  9. Ulysses S. Grant, 18th President 1869-77
  10. Chester A. Arthur, 21st President 1881-85
  11. Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24th President 1885-89, 1893-97
  12. Benjamin Harrison, 23rd President 1889-93
  13. William McKinley, 25th President 1897-1901
  14. Theodore Roosevelt, 26th president 1901-09
  15. Woodrow Wilson, 28th President 1913-21
  16. Harry S. Truman, 33rd President 1945-53
  17. Lyndon B. Johnson, 36th President 1963-69
  18. Ronald Reagan, 40th President 1981-89
  19. George H. W. Bush, 41st President 1989-93
  20. Bill Clinton, 42nd President 1993-2001 (his fathers surname was Blythe)
  21. George W. Bush, 43rd President 2001-2009
  22. Barack Obama,[17] 44th President 2009-present

Other American presidents of Scottish descent

  1. Sam Houston, President of Texas 1836-38 and 1841-44

Scottish Gaelic language in the United States

In the 17th and 18th centuries, tens of thousands of Scots from Scotland, and Scots-Irish from the north of Ireland arrived in the American colonies. Today, an estimated 15 million Americans are of Scottish ancestry. The province of Nova Scotia, Canada was the main concentration of Scottish Gaelic speakers in North America (Nova Scotia is Latin for New Scotland). According to the 2000 census, 1,610 people speak Scottish Gaelic at home.[18]

Culture

See also: Culture of Scotland and Culture of the United States
Massed bands at the 2005 Pacific Northwest Highland Games

Some of the following aspects of Scottish culture can still be found in some parts of the USA.

National Tartan Day

National Tartan Day, held each year on April 6 in the United States and Canada, celebrates the historical links between Scotland and North America and the contributions Scottish Americans and Canadians have made to US and Canadian democracy, industry and society. The date of April 6 was chosen as "the anniversary of the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320—the inspirational document, according to U.S. Senate Resolution 155, 1999, upon which the American Declaration of Independence was modeled".[20] "Scottish Heritage Month" is also being promoted by community groups around the United States and Canada.[21]

Highland Games

Scottish culture, food, and athletics are celebrated at Highland Games and Scottish Festivals throughout North America. One of the largest of these occurs yearly at Grandfather Mountain, North Carolina. However, in recent years, the games at Pleasanton, California have surpassed them in size. In addition to traditional Scottish sports such as the Caber toss and the Hammer throw, there are Whisky tastings, traditional foods such as Haggis, and traditional Scottish dance.

Scottish placenames

Aberdeen, WA, a town with a Scottish name.
Dunedin's Scottish-American Society maintains Dunedin's Scottish heritage.
Main article: Scottish placenames in the United States

Some Scottish placenames in USA include:

See also

References

Template:Celts and Modern Celts sidebar

  1. ^ a b James McCarthy and Euan Hague, 'Race, Nation, and Nature: The Cultural Politics of "Celtic" Identification in the American West', Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Volume 94 Issue 2 (5 Nov 2004), p. 392, citing J. Hewitson, Tam Blake and Co.: The Story of the Scots in America (Edinburgh: Canongate Books, 1993).
  2. ^ a b Tartan Day 2007, scotlandnow, Issue 7 (March 2007). Accessed 7 September 2008.
  3. ^ a b Scottish Parliament: Official Report, 11 September 2002, Col. 13525.
  4. ^ a b Scottish Parliament: European and External Relations Committee Agenda, 20th Meeting 2004 (Session 2), 30 November 2004, EU/S2/04/20/1.
  5. ^ a b James Webb, Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America (New York: Broadway Books, 2004), front flap: 'More than 27 million Americans today can trace their lineage to the Scots, whose bloodline was stained by centuries of continuous warfare along the border between England and Scotland, and later in the bitter settlements of England’s Ulster Plantation in Northern Ireland.' ISBN 0767916883
  6. ^ a b James Webb, Secret GOP Weapon: The Scots Irish Vote, Wall Street Journal (23 October 2004). Accessed 7 September 2008.
  7. ^ Celeste Ray, 'Introduction', p. 6, id., 'Scottish Immigration and Ethnic Organization in the United States', pp. 48-9, 62, 81, in id. (ed.), The Transatlantic Scots (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2005).
  8. ^ Mary C. Walters, Ethnic Options: Choosing Identities in America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), pp. 31-6.
  9. ^ QT-P13. Ancestry: 2000
  10. ^ a b The line connecting Gaelic psalm singing & American Music (2007) Line Singing Conference at Yale.
  11. ^ Ben McConville (31 August 2003). "Black music from Scotland? It could be the gospel truth". Scotland on Sunday. Retrieved 2007-12-18. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  12. ^ Ben McConville (4 June 2005). "Black America's musical links to Scotland". The Scotsman. Retrieved 2007-12-18. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  13. ^ The Source: Gen
  14. ^ The Source: Gen
  15. ^ U.S 1790 Census
  16. ^ 2006 American Community Survey
  17. ^ "Obama receives Scots invitations". BBC News. 2008-11-05. Retrieved 2000-02-21. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  18. ^ Scottic Gaelic, Modern Language Association, citing Census 2000, retrieved 2008-02-22
  19. ^ http://www.worldburnsclub.com/supper/burns_supper_intro.htm
  20. ^ Edward J. Cowan, "Tartan Day in America", in Celeste Ray (ed.), The Transatlantic Scots (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2005), p. 318.
  21. ^ National Scots, Scots-Irish Heritage Month in the USA, ElectricScotland.com

External links

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