Personal qus: British/Irish ancestry among Americans, Canadians, and Australians?

24 February 2006 | NZerFromHK

[NZerFromHK]

Does anyone have a summary of what proportions of Americans with British and Irish ancestry? I'm currently looking at the data for New Zealand and I note that in the 2001 Census, it was recorded 75% of all New Zealanders have majority British/Irish ancestry, and 5% have European ancestry from outside Britain and/or Ireland. Maori comprises 14.7% and Pacific Islanders 6.5%.

The definition of British/Irish ancestry that I use is: anyone who has 50% or more ancestral blood who came from what we call the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland today.

In addition, does anyone have a comparable set of figures for the cases of Canada and Australia as well?

Thanks for your help.

[Irish_Thatcherite]

There is something about the Welsh and mining - the two are inseparable!! LOL

[Wallace T.]

Another pocket of English ancestry predominance in America is in Utah and areas of the adjacent states settled by Mormons. The Latter Day Saints were originally recruited from upstate New York, Vermont, northern Ohio, and similar areas largely settled by Yankees in the original sense, descendants of 17th Century English Puritan settlers. The early Mormon converts were the core group that followed Brigham Young to Utah. Through several generations of large families, they built up the numbers necessary to dominate Utah, southern Idaho, eastern Nevada, etc.

Their non-Mormon, mostly liberal Protestant or Unitarian kinsmen who stayed in the Northeast had small families for the most part. As a result, Catholicism is the predominant religion of the Northeast (except PA, with its strong German influence and ME, where the old-line Yankees are still numerous) and Irish-Americans or Italian-Americans are the predominant ethnicity.

[tuliptree76]

The definition of British/Irish ancestry that I use is: anyone who has 50% or more ancestral blood who came from what we call the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland today.

Looks like I don't qualify.

[Irish_Thatcherite]

You prob have enough in you!!

[NZerFromHK]

It appears that here in New Zealand British and Irish descents don't differentiate each other too much. Everyone seems to have mixed into a generic British-Irish descents and the indicator of their father's ancestry seems to be their nominal religious affiliation.

In the United States it is the other story - people would classify quite deeply into Scots-Irish, Irish, English etc. The anti-British attotudes of some otherwise politically conservative Irish-Americans also astounds me. Their rhetorics read like apologists of the hardline IRA for instance which Irish descent Australians on a whole would not make. Meanwhile in New Zealand it seems the Irish descents have made peace with the British descents.

[Irish_Thatcherite]

The anti-British attotudes of some otherwise politically conservative Irish-Americans also astounds me.

Don't I know it!! See some of the comments on this thread I posted yesterday:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1585507/posts