Factors in Assimilation: A Comparative Study

Abstract

by TORBEN KRONTOFT P Factors in Assimilation A Comparative Study * THE the Scandinavian thousands of nineteenth-century countries to America emigrants brought from with the Scandinavian countries to America brought with them - along with their keepsakes and their iron-bound trunks - the troubled realization that they must somehow find their place in an utterly strange environment. How would they make a go of it in the new land of promise? Could they be assimilated successfully into the mainstream of American Ufe? What adjustments must they make? What would it cost them in terms of their old-world heritage, which they feared they had left behind them forever? It is clear that the Danes and Norwegians - people of basically the same race, national origin, and religion as the old American stock - would be assimilated quickly because of these similarities. A fundamental consideration would also be the degree to which members of these two national groups settled in concentrated communities of their own people. Which nationality - the Danes or the Norwegians would adapt itself more readily, and for what reasons, to * The author wishes to express thanks to The American-Scandinavian Foundation for a grant which assisted in the preparation of this article. 184 FACTORS IN ASSIMILATION the general society of the new country? Could either survive as individuals outside an enclave of Scandinavians surrounded by Yankee influences? The first problem the immigrants had to face was difficulty with a strange language. The percentage of illiteracy among Scandinavians, aged fourteen years or over, was 0.8 percent in 1900, the lowest of all the transplanted groups.1 Although a few individuals came with some knowledge of English, it was not then common to have had any formal preparation in that language. But the Scandinavians had the advantage of great similarity in vocabulary and structure between American speech and their own. This fact made the transition relatively easy for Danes and Norwegians, who spoke almost the same tongue. At first, they could simply mix English words into their sentences; as time went on, they could transform their speech into fairly good English. There were, however, individual differences. These were caused by age at the time of migration and variations in the need to use the new language daily. In the concentrated Danish settlement at Dannebrog, Nebraska, A. C. Nielsen's neighbors were all Danish. So "most of the year he had no use for this foreign tongue." 2 Peter Ebbesen, on the other hand, had migrated to the same settlement as a child. He became county treasurer and contributed to Danish newspapers , but he admitted that English was more natural for him.3 For some Danes, it was a sacred duty to keep their own speech alive. In the long run, theirs was a lost cause. Contacts with Americans in business and politics were inescapable . As later generations of immigrants and second-generation Danish Americans moved to the cities, with their wider social contacts, Danish was largely abandoned.4 When the 1 Emily Greene Balch, Our Slavic Fellow Citizens , 479 (New York, 1910). 2 Alfred C. Nielsen, Life in an American Denmark , 20 (Des Moines, Iowa, 1962). 3 Anton Kvist, ed., Den gamie pionér fortseller , 176 (Copenhagen, 1935). * Max Henius, Den danskf0ate Amerikaner , 46 (Chicago, 1912). 185 Torben Krontoft influx of immigrants stopped in the 1920s, the old-country language no longer had a renewing influence. This direct break in contact put an end to the use of the mother tongue in Danish- American social organizations and churches. H. A. Pedersen has established that, in Clark County, Wisconsin, where the Danes comprised half of the population, by 1930 "the Danish language [was] not used in organizations any more." 5 In the churches, a transition in language took place at about the same time. The following table indicates at what date English became predominant in the Danish and Norwegian synods: 6 Sunday Schools Religious Services Danish: Danish Church 1929 1940 United Church about 1920 about 1925 Norwegian: Lutheran Free Church 1920 about 1925 Evangelical Lutheran 1 Church before 1920 1925-1930 The reason for the longer life of Danish in the Danish Church was that the members of this synod constituted a small...