Irish Boston, Italian Philadelphia

[JManc]

I haven't heard "WASP" used in a long time and a rather outdated term considering white America has intermingled so much since it was coined. Hell, even "Anglo" has evolved to be more or less a differentiation from Latino. I'm of Italian descent and am considered Anglo.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by JManc

I haven't heard "WASP" used in a long time and a rather outdated term considering white America has intermingled so much since it was coined. Hell, even "Anglo" has evolved to be more or less a differentiation from Latino. I'm of Italian descent and am considered Anglo.

In Texas. No one uses the term "Anglo" in the Northeast. WASP is frequently used. "Anglo" would probably be commonly misconstrued to mean Angolan or something.

[Docere]

An interesting article from the NYT archives, quoting former mayor John Lindsay and sociologist Digby Baltzell. Lindsay says WASPs represent no more than 6% of the NYC population.


https://www.nytimes.com/1985/12/03/a...-new-york.html

[Docere]

[double-post]

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Crawford

In Texas. No one uses the term "Anglo" in the Northeast. WASP is frequently used. "Anglo" would probably be commonly misconstrued to mean Angolan or something.

Born and raised in the northeast and am back there often...I literally haven't heard WASP used in decades in any meaningful way. I see it more mentioned on this forum than anywhere else.

Anglo used to mean English now it means English speaking (white) American of any ethnicity as opposed to Spanish speaking. Basically non-Hispanic white which is used more often than 'anglo'

[Docere]

There isn't really a WASP identity, so it's not really used that much. There is Italian and Irish identity in the Northeast. People do say they're Italian or Irish. Italians are still pretty visible and culturally distinct, Irish a little more subtle.*

People rarely say they are WASPs, outside of very elite circles I don't think. Intellectuals, media commentators and so on do talk about WASPs (often their decline though). It's rarely on its own, but sometimes used to contrast with "ethnics." Of course these differences are much less salient than in say, 1965 or even 1985.

WASPs in the big Northeastern metros tend to be high-status, so they're found in elite urban districts, gentrified areas and old money suburbs. But they don't "dominate" the elite anymore by any means. I don't know if there's any WASP-plurality suburb in the New York area except maybe in Connecticut. In Boston, there's probably more Irish Americans than WASPs in the most prestigious suburbs (though they're more common in Boston than NYC area). And these areas don't have any explicit "WASP" character, they just have an "establishmentarian" character and often some historical remnants like a very prominent Episcopalian church.


* And I can say this freely without a certain former troll poster accusing me of being an anti-Italian bigot lol

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Docere

There isn't really a WASP identity, so it's not really used that much. There is Italian and Irish identity in the Northeast. People do say they're Italian or Irish. Italians are still pretty visible and culturally distinct, Irish a little more subtle.*l

Polish too. The funny thing is that most Italians, Irish and Polish are rarely 100% Italian, Irish or Polish but a mix of one or more and several generations removed but yes, they do hang onto the identity. Especially the Italians because...Rigatoni and Tony Soprano.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by Quixote

In the most literal sense, it could be said that Boston is the most WASPy metro, but a good amount of those claiming English ancestry probably assimilated into the Catholic culture.

Boston is historically America's most Catholic city, and WASP is obviously defined in contrast or opposition to that. So yeah, the English (and Scottish) descendants who assimilated into the Irish Catholic community would be excluded. And there may be more than one thinks.

Scituate

Irish 46.1%
English/American 28.9%
Scottish 3.5%

Cohasset

Irish 41.7%
English/American 19%
Scottish 6%


These communities have an Irish American character, it's unclear to what extent these descendants of New England Yankees (and likely, Canadian Maritimers) have become part of the Irish community, or if they're just living alongside them.

[Docere]

Religion among whites

Boston

Protestant 22% (evangelical 6%, mainline 16%)
Catholic 31%
Unaffiliated 34%

Philadelphia

Protestant 33% (evangelical 12%, mainline 21%)
Catholic 34%
Unaffiliated 24%

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by Docere

People rarely say they are WASPs, outside of very elite circles I don't think. Intellectuals, media commentators and so on do talk about WASPs (often their decline though). It's rarely on its own, but sometimes used to contrast with "ethnics." Of course these differences are much less salient than in say, 1965 or even 1985.

Personal anecdote:

My therapist has called herself a "WASP." Originally from McLean, VA, she has a German surname, but said that she's mostly of Irish descent (her dad was from Massachusetts). She's brunette and has brown eyes.

Extrapolating her comment, "WASP" to her meant North/Western European ancestry (British Isles, Germanic, and French*). Shawn and (I think) iheartthed have essentially said that being "ethnic" Irish is more a socioeconomic thing than anything else, and less to do with cultural heritage.

Italian is a different thing, especially if we're talking southern Italians (most Italian Americans' ancestors). Different language, darker complexions, a fundamentally isolated social culture, and (initially) a very different relationship with the Catholic Church.

* If Wikipedia is correct, then most Francophone Americans/Canadians came from northwestern France.

[Docere]

There's a bit of an "underdog" image with being Irish, Biden frequently invokes it. During the last election he stated that when he was growing up, people like Trump looked down on the Irish.

Italians seem to have the mentality of an ethnic group that "made it" but don't feel the need to assimilate into the dominant non-ethnic professional class culture (though some obviously have). The "Italian way" is just as good or better. In the NYC suburbs they vote like they're WWC even when they're not, which is quite interesting. Nassau, Bergen and so on should vote 10 points more D than they actually do.

[Docere]

You can see ancestry maps at town level for Boston here:

https://statisticalatlas.com/metro-a...oston/Ancestry

You can see the Irish concentration in the South Shore, Italian concentration in the North Shore. Not detecting any real pattern for English ancestry.

[Quixote]

^ Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.

Probably as stereotypically WASPy as it gets.

Barnstable, MA MSA (population 214,703)

Irish 26.2%
English 15.9%
Italian 12.3%
German 9.2%
American 9.1%
Portuguese 5.1%
Scottish 4.0%
Polish 3.9%
French Canadian 3.2%

Manchester, NH MSA (population 404,948)

Irish 20.7%
French 14.4%
English 13.1%
Italian 10.3%
French Canadian 10.1%
German 8.2%
Polish 4.7%
American 4.3%
Scottish 3.2%

Once you get into New Hampshire, French / French Canadian together overtakes Irish and English/American is much closer to Irish.

The English are to Boston what the Irish are to NYC in that both groups are large in numbers, but they tend to be more heavily concentrated at the periphery.

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by Docere

There's a bit of an "underdog" image with being Irish, Biden frequently invokes it. During the last election he stated that when he was growing up, people like Trump looked down on the Irish.

What non-English immigrant populations, other than perhaps the Dutch and Danish, were not mocked or discriminated against at any point? That includes German and Scottish, which Trump is.

The Irish spoke English and were Catholic, poor, came from a small nation colonized by their larger, more dominant neighbor, and arrived in large ("threatening") numbers. They were an easy target.

[Quixote]

And while I understand that "white ethnic" isn't meant to carry racist undertones, it also isn't doing any favors. Furthermore, saying that one group (e.g. German) isn't "ethnic" is not unlike saying that someone with an "accent" is pronouncing a certain word "incorrectly." "I don't I have an accent. This is just the way I talk."

Why doesn't the Grand Rapids, MI area not count as having a "white ethnic" component when it's 20% Dutch across a population of over 1.1 million? Dick and Betsy DeVos are both 100% Dutch. They are clearly cultural products of the Calvinist immigrants of the 19th century. And even clearer is that having such a dense concentration of Dutch ancestry makes the Grand Rapids / Holland area a cultural anomaly.

[Docere]

Two contiguous Irish concentrations: the South Shore of Boston and Delaware County (using a 35% cutoff).

South Shore:

Scituate 46.1%
Marshfield 45.9%
Whitman 45.9%
Norwell 42.1%
Cohasset 41.7%
Braintree 40.4%
Duxbury 39.9%
Hanover 39.8%
Weymouth 38.3%
Abington 38.1%
Hingham 38%
Milton 37%
Kingston 36.9%
Halifax 36.2%

Irish Americans: 110,000

Delaware County:

Ridley Park 45.4%
Glenolden 42.5%
Springfield Township 40.4%
Norwood 40.1%
Ridley Township 37.6%
Haverford 35.8%

Irish Americans: 48,000

[mrnyc]

96k irish born living in nyc as of 2021.

[montréaliste]

Originally Posted by JManc

I haven't heard "WASP" used in a long time and a rather outdated term considering white America has intermingled so much since it was coined. Hell, even "Anglo" has evolved to be more or less a differentiation from Latino. I'm of Italian descent and am considered Anglo.

I once had a debate with a French poster on another webforum about the word Anglo. He claimed that word didn’t exist in the US the way it did in Quebec to differentiate French from English speakers, and I followed up with examples of American news articles where it was used. The thing is, this differentiation relates to language as a differentiator as opposed to Wasp versus other religious/ethnic groups.

So, the use of Latino/Anglo and Franco/Anglo in North America exists in regions where the two languages cohabitate. In Quebec, an Italian will be considered an Anglo if he adheres predominately to English Speech rather than French. The contrary is also true, in other words, language use is very much an allegiance, or not, depending on your personal, familial history.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

I once had a debate with a French poster on another webforum about the word Anglo. He claimed that word didn’t exist in the US the way it did in Quebec to differentiate French from English speakers, and I followed up with examples of American news articles where it was used. The thing is, this differentiation relates to language as a differentiator as opposed to Wasp versus other religious/ethnic groups.

So, the use of Latino/Anglo and Franco/Anglo in North America exists in regions where the two languages cohabitate. In Quebec, an Italian will be considered an Anglo if he adheres predominately to English Speech rather than French. The contrary is also true, in other words, language use is very much an allegiance, or not, depending on your personal, familial history.

WASP, to me, is very much a U.S. construct, but I guess it applies to English speaking Canada as well. When I use the term "anglo" I'm usually speaking in a global colonialism context. I suspect most of the usage of "anglo" in American media is similar. Latino is an ethnic group in the U.S., like WASP, but Franco and Anglo are not.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

So, the use of Latino/Anglo and Franco/Anglo in North America exists in regions where the two languages cohabitate. In Quebec, an Italian will be considered an Anglo if he adheres predominately to English Speech rather than French. The contrary is also true, in other words, language use is very much an allegiance, or not, depending on your personal, familial history.

Ethnic origin of Montreal English speakers (2016)

Italian 120,215 19.4%
Irish 91,660 14.8%
English 86,950 14%
Scottish 72,490 11.7%
Jewish (religion, 2011) 56,495 9.1%

Indeed, and Italian is the most common ancestry group among Montreal "anglos." There's a sort of mini-NY or Northeast Corridor vibe.