Why did so many Germans emigrate to the Americas?

[♥ Lily ♥]

I can speak and read French pretty well and I think it was quite easy because the similarities between French and English Vocab is very strong. Like you said the Norman invasion introduced French and gave us words like Pork and Beef.

I do not think French or English have the harshness of German. I do not know much about German but English grammar is similar to German vs the Latin languages due to the masculine and feminine distinction and English being an original Germanic language. The vocab in English some estimate to be between 40-50% from Latin. Much this occurred from the French Norman conquest.

At secondary school as a teenager, I loved French lessons and was even eager as a child to learn the language prior to secondary school. I've always been very keen on both the French and Italian languages from an early age, and I know lots of French vocabulary but struggle with the grammar, whereas my sister speaks fluent High German. She studied both Latin and German at her Grammar School and she said she finds German easier than French.

I can recognise the meanings of words in Italian and Spanish, and entire sentences sometimes in Spanish (even though I've never had any Spanish lessons,) due to learning French at secondary school. I see similarities with the Romance languages and with the French and English vocabularies.

But Welsh, Cornish, Gaelic, Irish, and Manx words are more difficult for English people to recognise similarities with the modern English language, and it's easier to recognise similar words to the English vocabulary in French, German, Danish, Norwegian, Italian, and Spanish.

Something I've noticed is that most of the civilised, sophisticated, and cultivated words in the English vocabulary have a French origin, eg; art, music, ballet, diplomat, government, restaurant, medicine, dance, cuisine, fragrance, perfume, elegant, silhouette, et cetera.

A lot of beautiful terms used in the language of music have Italian origins, such as opera, piano, concerto, largo, moderato, allegro, et cetera.

And a lot of brutal and coarse words in the English vocabulary have either Norse or Germanic origin (the Viking settlers brought 600 words of Norse origin into the English language,) such as 'brute', 'troll', 'blood,' 'knife', etc.

Scientific and medical terms in the English vocabulary all have either sophisticated ancient Greek and Ancient Latin terms and names (introduced to the English language via the Roman Empire.)

[JohnSmith]

At secondary school as a teenager, I loved French lessons. I've always been keen on the French and Italian languages from an early age, and I know lots of French vocabulary but struggle with the grammar, whereas my sister speaks fluent High German. She studied both Latin and German at her Grammar School and she said she finds German easier than French.

I can recognise the meanings of words in Italian and Spanish, and entire sentences sometimes in Spanish (even though I've never had any Spanish lessons,) due to learning French at secondary school. I see similarities with the Romance languages and with the French and English vocabularies.

But Welsh, Cornish, Gaelic, Irish, and Manx words are more difficult to understand than French to many native English speakers.

Something I've noticed is that most of the civilised, sophisticated, and cultivated words in the English vocabulary have French origin, eg; art, music, ballet, diplomat, government, medicine, cuisine, etc.

And a lot of brutal and coarse words in the English vocabulary have either Norse or German origin (the Viking settlers brought 6000 words of Norse origin into the English language,) such as 'brute', 'troll', 'blood,' 'knife', etc.

Scientific and medical terms in the English vocabulary all have either ancient Greek and Latin names.

As a computer programmer learning grammar is much more in my wheel house vs the vocab. I think French is somewhat easy to learn. Most of the verbs follow rules that are easy to follow. I did study Italian before and it was difficult for me. It is not as similar to English as French. Also, grammar is a bit different than French, plurals are different in Italian as the o becomes an i and no s is added. I also thought Italian had more verbs that were irregular and did not follow rules.

I would think if I studied German it is probably not very difficult to learn due to similarity with English.

I here a lot of people speaks Spanish in the USA and Spanish seems to have a much more of a "s" or "z" sound than English. I suppose word like "Lopez"

[CertifiedCracker]

I can speak and read French pretty well and I think it was quite easy because the similarities between French and English Vocab is very strong. Like you said the Norman invasion introduced French and gave us words like Pork and Beef.

I do not think French or English have the harshness of German. I do not know much about German but English grammar is similar to German vs the Latin languages due to the masculine and feminine distinction and English being an original Germanic language. The vocab in English some estimate to be between 40-50% from Latin. Much this occurred from the French Norman conquest.

I feel like I should know more French, ya know, being Cajun and all, but I dont. I took French and hated it. Its pretty uesless. I do, however, know a fair bit of German and Pennsylvania Dutch. German and English are extremely similar. To the point to where I can read a paragraph in German and without even knowing any of the words be able to get the just of what was said. Same with Dutch and Afrikaans.

[♥ Lily ♥]

I think there is some quasi masculine and feminine aspects in English, for certain words like Actor and Actress. I would think German has the same type of distinction.

Also blond (masculine) and blonde (feminine.)

[JohnSmith]

I feel like I should know more French, ya know, being Cajun and all, but I dont. I took French and hated it. Its pretty uesless. I do, however, know a fair bit of German and Pennsylvania Dutch. German and English are extremely similar. To the point to where I can read a paragraph in German and without even knowing any of the words be able to get the just of what was said. Same with Dutch and Afrikaans.

I think you can do the same with French also. Read a paragraph and still know what is being said. I do not know much about German I suppose it is quite similar but I never learned German. I was more interested in French.

German I think uses word combinations to form words. I assume it is something like a compound word;however, English does not use many compound words. I think German uses a lot of them.

[Bloody]

I have been to the Midwest and those motha fuckas do not look anything like the English and Irish that settled the South and New England parts of the country. They are much taller and robust looking. Many of the women are more robust looking compared the British women. They are on average just bigger framed people that are taller.

I didnt say there arent predominantly germanic people in the States (Germans, Dutch, Scandinavians), I just claimed British Isleander+ Irish both who are a core genetic group, tent do be dominant in most of the population, by a large distance. Most people know up to 2-3 generations back hence the inflated self-report of German and other more recent migrations from continental Europe in comparison to the lower self-report numbers of English, Scotch-Irish. Scottish and Welsh. As a whole White Americans dont look that different from WHite Australians or Anglo-Canadians who are Overwhelmingly of British Isles ancestry.

[JohnSmith]

I didnt say there arent predominantly germanic people in the States (Germans, Dutch, Scandinavians), I just claimed British Isleander+ Irish both who are a core genetic group, tent do be dominant in most of the population, by a large distance. Most people know up to 2-3 generations back hence the inflated self-report of German and other more recent migrations from continental Europe in comparison to the lower self-report numbers of English, Scotch-Irish. Scottish and Welsh. As a whole White Americans dont look that different from WHite Australians or Anglo-Canadians who are Overwhelmingly of British Isles ancestry.

I know.