Nordic and Scandinavian Americans

Scandinavian Americans

Total population
11,890,524 3.8% of U.S. population (2012)
Regions with significant populations
Minnesota	1,603,124
California	1,224,541
Washington	739,043
Wisconsin	728,248
Illinois	575,991
Michigan	403,888
Florida	355,458
Oregon	339,031
Iowa	338,161
Utah	333,405
Languages
American English Danish Faroese Finnish Greenlandic Icelandic Norwegian Sami Swedish Scandinavian languages
Religion
61% Protestant; 22% Roman Catholic, 14% other (no religion, Mormonism, etc.)
Related ethnic groups
Scandinavians, Scandinavian Canadians

Scandinavian Americans are Americans of Nordic, or part-Nordic ancestry, defined in this article to include Danish Americans (estimate: 1,453,897), Faroese Americans (no estimates), Finnish Americans (estimate: 677,272), Greenlandic Americans (estimate: 352), Icelandic Americans (estimate: 51,234), Norwegian Americans (estimate: 4,602,337), Sami Americans (estimate: 30,000), Swedish Americans (estimate: 4,293,208). Also included are persons who reported 'Northern European' ancestry (estimate: 230,027) or 'Scandinavian' ancestry (estimate: 582,549). According to 2010 census data, there are approximately 11,890,524 people of Scandinavian ancestry in the United States.

Background

The broad definition of Scandinavia includes Norway, Sweden, Denmark (without Greenland and the Faroese Islands), the semi-independent Finnish territory of Åland and the Swedish-speaking people of Finland (mostly concentrated in Western Finland). The joint ruling of Denmark and Norway from the mid-14th century until 1814, and then the joint rule of Sweden and Norway until 1905, have contributed towards a coherent culture and language. The Scandinavian languages are all descended from old Norse, and unlike Faroese and Icelandic, which have kept more of the old Norse grammar and spelling, the Scandinavian languages have undergone more or less the same simplifications and are mutually intelligible and readable, although the degree of ease with which people understand each other varies depending on country (and region) of origin.

The term Scandinavia is often misused when the term Nordic is meant. The Nordic countries consists of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Greenland (a semi-independent Danish realm), the Faroese Islands (a semi-independent Danish realm), Åland (a semi-independent Swedish-speaking Finnish realm) and Finland. Sometimes also Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are included, due to the tiny group of Estonian Swedes in the archipelago of Northern Estonia. Unlike the three linguistically Scandinavian countries, the Nordic countries have languages that are only partially mutually intelligible (closest being Icelandic-FaroeIslandish on one hand and Danish-Norwegian-Swedish on the other) so therefore English is often used as a common language when Nordic people communicate. The Nordic countries have a lot of common history, as they have all been invaded/colonized by Scandinavians at one time, but even if there are close historical ties, these countries are also more culturally and genetically diverse than the Scandinavian countries with Greenlanders, Samis and Finns having a unique origin apart from the Germanic Norsemen known as Scandinavians.

Populations

Scandinavian Americans by state

State Rank	State	Scandinavian Americans	Percent Scandinavian Americans
-	United States	11,269,320	3.8%
1	Minnesota	1,580,776	32.1%
2	California	1,510,541	3.6%
3	Washington	739,043	12.5%
4	Wisconsin	728,248	13.5%
5	Illinois	575,991	4.6%
6	Michigan	403,888	4.0%
7	Texas	359,360	1.4%
8	Florida	355,458	2.1%
9	Oregon	339,031	9.9%
10	Iowa	338,161	11.5%
11	Utah	333,405	14.9%
12	Colorado	291,488	5.9%
13	Arizona	281,388	4.3%
14	New York	254,474	1.3%
15	North Dakota	231,875	36.1%
16	Massachusetts	182,339	2.8%
17	Nebraska	177,522	9.9%
18	South Dakota	172,941	21.5%
19	Pennsylvania	169,294	1.3%
20	Ohio	164,005	1.4%
21	Montana	136,688	14.1%
22	Idaho	136,620	8.9%
23	Missouri	135,340	2.2%
24	Virginia	130,099	1.6%
25	Kansas	124,017	4.4%
26	New Jersey	119,267	1.3%
27	Indiana	118,989	1.8%
28	North Carolina	110,362	1.1%
29	Nevada	102,638	3.9%
30	Connecticut	100,530	2.8%
31	Georgia (U.S. state)	97,209	1.0%
32	Maryland	79,656	1.4%
33	Tennessee	75,615	1.2%
34	Oklahoma	62,145	1.7%
35	Alaska	61,259	8.9%
36	Wyoming	51,755	9.7%
37	New Hampshire	47,955	3.6%
38	Maine	44,955	3.4%
39	Alabama	43,899	0.9%
40	South Carolina	43,306	0.9%
41	New Mexico	41,073	2.0%
42	Arkansas	38,308	1.3%
43	Kentucky	34,592	0.8%
44	Hawaii	30,976	2.4%
45	Louisiana	29,175	0.6%
46	Rhode Island	26,476	2.5%
47	Mississippi	19,501	0.6%
48	Vermont	18,378	2.9%
49	West Virginia	14,519	0.8%
50	Delaware	11,232	1.2%
-	District of Columbia	7,523	1.3%
-	Puerto Rico	641	0.0%

Scandinavian languages by state

State Rank	State	Total	Percent
-	United States	200,630	0.0%
1	California	32,745	0.1%
2	Minnesota	17,998	0.3%
3	Florida	14,628	0.0%
4	New York	13,543	0.0%
5	Washington	12,524	0.2%
6	Michigan	8,825	0.0%
7	Texas	7,849	0.0%
8	Illinois	7,528	0.0%
9	Wisconsin	6,929	0.2%
10	Massachusetts	6,599	0.1%
11	New Jersey	5,518	0.0%
12	Oregon	4,510	0.1%
13	Utah	3,838	0.1%
14	North Dakota	3,364	0.5%
15	Iowa	2,407	0.0%

See also

• Nordic countries
• Vinland
• New Sweden

Further reading

Main articles: Danish Americans § Bibliography, Norwegian Americans § Further reading, and Swedish Americans § Further reading

• Barton, H. Arnold. "Where Have the Scandinavian-Americanists Been?." Journal of American Ethnic History 15.1 (1995): 46-55. in JSTOR
• Brøndal, Jørn. Ethnic Leadership and Midwestern Politics: Scandinavian Americans and the Progressive Movement in Wisconsin, 1890-1914 (University of Illinois Press, 2004).
• Brøndal, Jørn. "'The Fairest among the So-Called White Races': Portrayals of Scandinavian Americans in the Filiopietistic and Nativist Literature of the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries." Journal of American Ethnic History 33.3 (2014): 5-36. in JSTOR
• Evjen, John O. Scandinavian Immigrants in New York 1630-1674 (Genealogical Pub. Co., Baltimore, 1972)
• Hoobler, Dorothy, and Thomas Hoobler. The Scandinavian American Family Album (Oxford University Press, 1997).
• Lovoll, Odd S. ed., Nordics in America: The Future of Their Past (Northfield, Minn., Norwegian American Historic Association. 1993)
• Norman, Hans, and Harald Runblom. Transatlantic Connections: Nordic Migration to the New World After 1800 (1988).
• Thernstrom, Stephan, ed. Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups (1980) online; scholarly coverage of all groups
• Wisby, Hrolf. "The Scandinavian-American: His Status." The North American Review 183.597 (1906): 213-223. online

External links

• Media related to American people of Scandinavian descent at Wikimedia Commons
• Chicago Foreign Language Press Survey: English translations of 120,000 pages of newspaper articles from Chicago's foreign language press from 1855 to 1938, many from Scandinavian language papers.