Who's the Fascist?

Walter Hinteler wrote:

flaja wrote:
Actually Roosevelt is a Dutch name, so WASP doesn't quite apply, but we get your intent.

Quote:
[...]
Strictly speaking, many people now referred to as "WASPs" are not Anglo-Saxon, that is the descendants of some Germanic peoples, who settled in Britain between the 5th century and the Norman Conquest. According to some sources, Anglo-Saxon ancestry is not even dominant in England. Even though they are genetically inseparable from the Danish and north Germans [Saxons], which is generally regarded as the Anglo-Saxon heartland.[3] However, in modern North American usage, WASPs may include Protestants, from Dutch, German, Huguenot (French Protestant), Scandinavian, Scottish, Scots-Irish and Welsh backgrounds.[4] Therefore, the term WASP is sometimes applied to individuals who are technically non-Anglo-Saxons, including people with:

Dutch origins, such as the Vanderbilt and Roosevelt families
German descent, such as the Rockefeller and Astor families.[5]
French descent, such as the Du Pont family
Scots-Irish origins, such as the Mellon and the Carnegie families
[...]

3 ^ Celtic ancestry dominant in Briton. Retrieved on 2006-11-29.
4 ^ http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-8762(197812)83%3A5%3C1155%3ARAEIA%3E2.0.CO%3B2-0]
5 ^ Astor family referred to as WASP. Retrieved on 2006-11-28.
Source for quote: Wikipedia

But might be, flaja, you got personal infos from Baltzell, and such have a better knowledge here, too.

Pardon me for being technical and precise. I tend to be this way due to my science training.

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flaja wrote:

Pardon me for being technical and precise. I tend to be this way due to my science training.

Thanks.

Well, I'm just Saxon, with most probably some Franks blood.

(To be historically correct, some Hermandi blood might be there as well.
But even that is more a guess, and only valid up to 1287.)

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Walter Hinteler wrote:

flaja wrote:

Pardon me for being technical and precise. I tend to be this way due to my science training.

Thanks.

Well, I'm just Saxon, with most probably some Franks blood.

(To be historically correct, some Hermandi blood might be there as well.
But even that is more a guess, and only valid up to 1287.)

My bloodlines would scare the living daylights out of you. Between what's documented and what's legendary I have at least 16 different nationalities, but then as a descendant of England's King Edward III, (who has something like 3,000,000 living descendants in the U.K. alone) this isn't hard.

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flaja wrote:

Walter Hinteler wrote:
flaja wrote:

Pardon me for being technical and precise. I tend to be this way due to my science training.

Thanks.

Well, I'm just Saxon, with most probably some Franks blood.

(To be historically correct, some Hermandi blood might be there as well.
But even that is more a guess, and only valid up to 1287.)

My bloodlines would scare the living daylights out of you. Between what's documented and what's legendary I have at least 16 different nationalities, but then as a descendant of England's King Edward III, (who has something like 3,000,000 living descendants in the U.K. alone) this isn't hard.

Wouldn't it be more scientific today to refer to one's ancestral DNA, or family tree, rather than "bloodlines"? In my opinion, using the word "blood" in any description of one's family/ancestry/nationality/ethnicity has a subtle correlation to phrases like "blood of my blood." Not used by people I would want to converse with. Am I being obtuse?

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Foofie wrote:

flaja wrote:
Walter Hinteler wrote:
flaja wrote:

Pardon me for being technical and precise. I tend to be this way due to my science training.

Thanks.

Well, I'm just Saxon, with most probably some Franks blood.

(To be historically correct, some Hermandi blood might be there as well.
But even that is more a guess, and only valid up to 1287.)

My bloodlines would scare the living daylights out of you. Between what's documented and what's legendary I have at least 16 different nationalities, but then as a descendant of England's King Edward III, (who has something like 3,000,000 living descendants in the U.K. alone) this isn't hard.

Wouldn't it be more scientific today to refer to one's ancestral DNA, or family tree, rather than "bloodlines"? In my opinion, using the word "blood" in any description of one's family/ancestry/nationality/ethnicity has a subtle correlation to phrases like "blood of my blood." Not used by people I would want to converse with. Am I being obtuse?

What exactly is it about this phrase that bothers you? The overwhelming bulk of human DNA is shared by all humans so without the little bit that makes you unique from all other humans, talking about your DNA doesn't really say much about your personal ancestral history.

Furthermore, someone's nationality and cultural identity are not functions of DNA. Americans eat hot dogs and hamburgers because they are Americans, not because of their DNA.

And remember that I am not dealing with many in the way of fellow-scientists on this board. When I do insist on precise and totally accurate terms (as with WASP above) I still get attacked.

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Lets get specific about the 'Mericanisity of hamburgers and hot dogs.

According to the History of the Hamburger the origins of the Hamburger traces back to the mongols, Russia, and Germany (Hamburg). The cheeseburger on the other hand is truly 'merican starting in either Louisville, Denver, or Pasadena.

The hotdog history is much older and as interesting. According to history and legend dates to the greeks as it is mentioned in Homer's Odyessy (but not in the 'merican version--O'Brother Where Art Thou"). In the 16th century a butcher in Colberg Germany invented the dachshund or little dog sausage. It proved popular and the butcher moved to a bigger market in Frankfurt. The popular frankfurter moved to austria were it became the weinerwurst---or weiner. But its still not the hot dog---no bread--that happened in St Louis where a German immigrant pushcart vendor put his wursts that he called red hots on a split bun to keep his clients from burning their hands. His brother, a baker supplied him with the first red hot buns. The red hot dog became popular and as a result of the Chicago Exposition and the St Louis Olympics spread throughout the world. The name 'hot dog' is attributed to a vendor at a New York Giants game. This is 'Merican---I mean it is about baseball.

Although Baseball originated from Rounders, which was ultimately from the British Isles. Cricket also has Rounders as an ancestor--which isn't 'Merican.

Rap

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raprap wrote:

Although Baseball originated from Rounders, which was ultimately from the British Isles. Cricket also has Rounders as an ancestor--which isn't 'Merican.

Rap

Just about every year, there is, in spring time, a brouhaha in the New York Times on the subject of when the first baseball game occurred. They usually refer to some game played in New Jersey in, i think, the early 1830s. Several times in the past, i have sent them a letter to point out that in the very opening paragraph of the novel Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen speaks of the central character (a girl!) playing baseball, and spells it in exactly that manner, as one word. I then have pointed out that the work was published posthumously in 1817, and that Austen scholars claim the novel is based on her childhood writings, and that it was completed in 1798, although not published until after her death.

My letters have never been published, and the Times has maintained a stony silence. I shoulda known--after all, suggesting to red-blooded 'Merican he-men that their national sport derives from a game played by girls, in England no less, since the 18th century, was fated to go over like a lead balloon.

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Another attempt by New York to usurp history. First it was the hot dog, and now baseball. My mother was from Cincinnati--the home of the Reds, and the site of the first electrified game and was raised believing, rightly or wrongly, that Cincinnati is the true home of baseball. And to cite Lenin, or Castro (a true fan of baseball and a promising pitcher) "a lie told often becomes the truth." As the "lie told often" was practiced to perfection by Abner Doubleday.

"Jane Eyre", now there is something to which I've got a prejudice. I hate Charlotte Bronte'. I guess it goes back to my early high school years. I was a habitual reader (mom used to open cereal boxes on the bottom to keep me from reading them at the breakfast table - I learned to read upside down), and a high school "Literature" teacher assigned me "Jane Eyre" as a book report. Others got "Richard the III", "A Connecticut Yankee", "Gulliver's Travels", "A Tale of Two Cities", "Grapes of Wrath" but she had to assign a teenage boy "Jane Eyre." (She told mom it was an exercise to have a boy understand the foibles of being a female). It has been a curse with which I've had to live since. Every time I hear that name, I get a spastic colon (~ Smile

. One of the few times in my life where I'd have preferred Dickens---any Dickens. I guess it was worth it though, one of my best friends in this class was dyslexic and was assigned "Huckleberry Finn" so I read it for him and helped him on his report. IMO one of the greatest pieces of fiction ever written.

Rap