Hyphenated American
The term hyphenated American is an epithet from the early 20th century to refer to Americans who consider themselves of a distinct cultural origin other than the United States, and who claim to hold allegiance to both.
The first term typically indicates a region of origin or ancestry; it is paired with "American", sometimes by a hyphen, as in African American, Italian American, Irish American, German American, Indian American, Jewish American, and Japanese American. The hyphen is traditionally seen as grammatically correct only when the compound term is used as an adjective. Hence, correct forms include an African American and an African-American man.
The linguistic construction functionally indicates ancestry, but also may connote a sense that these individuals straddle two worlds—one experience is specific to their unique ethnic identity, while the other is the broader multicultural amalgam that is Americana.
Usage
The hyphenated or compound term is most often used with pride or respectfully—xenophobic usages tend to drop everything after the hyphen or space. Modern style guides most often recommend dropping the hyphen between the two names except when the compound is used as an adjective; some recommend dropping the hyphen even for the adjective form. [1] On the other hand, compounds with name fragments, such as Afro-American and Indo-European, are recommended to be hyphenated.
Latin-American controversy
"Latin American" refers to the Spanish-speaking people of America including Mexico, Central America, and South America. In the U.S., people of Latin-American descent are thus often referred to as "Hispanic Americans", or by their specific country of origin, e.g., "Mexican Americans". In Spanish, the word americano means "of or relating to the Americas" and "a person from anywhere in the Americas"; for those of the U.S. specifically, the term is estadounidense.
Hyphenated-American identities
Most usage experts recommend dropping the hyphen because it implies to some people dual nationalism and inability to be accepted as truly American. The Japanese American Citizens League is supportive of dropping the hyphen because the non-hyphenated form uses their ancestral origin as an adjective for "American."
By contrast, other groups have embraced the hyphen, arguing that the American identity is compatible with alternative identities and that the mixture of identities within the United States strengthens the nation rather than weakens it.
'European American,' as opposed to White, Caucasian, or Non-Hispanic White, has been coined in response to the increasing racial and ethnic diversity of the U.S., as well as to this diversity moving more into the mainstream of the society in the latter half of the 20th century. The term distinguishes whites of European ancestry from those peoples of Middle Eastern or North African descent. It is also meant to discourage a dichotomous view of the racial landscape, in which "Whites" are conceived as separate from the rest of the racial groups, which have hyphenated terms denoting ancestry. The term nonetheless has many detractors who criticize it for collapsing the pronounced cultural differences between Europe and the United States.
History of the term "hyphenated American"
The term "hyphenated" was in slang use by 1893, and was common as a derogatory term by 1904. During World War I the issue arose of the primary political loyalty of ethnic groups with close ties to Europe, especially German Americans and also Irish Americans. Former President Theodore Roosevelt insisted to an Irish Catholic audience in 1915 that ,
- "There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. When I refer to hyphenated Americans, I do not refer to naturalized Americans. Some of the very best Americans I have ever known were naturalized Americans, Americans born abroad. But a hyphenated American is not an American at all. ... The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities, an intricate knot of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, English-Americans, French-Americans, Scandinavian-Americans or Italian-Americans, each preserving its separate nationality, each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality, than with the other citizens of the American Republic. ... There is no such thing as a hyphenated American who is a good American. The only man who is a good American is the man who is an American and nothing else."
President Woodrow Wilson regarded "hyphenated Americans" with suspicion, saying, "Any man who carries a hyphen about with him carries a dagger that he is ready to plunge into the vitals of this Republic whenever he gets ready."
Opposition to hyphenated identities outside the U.S.
Some Canadian newspaper writers have attempted to promote "dehyphenated Canadianism" in the 1990s. The trend of Canadian English in this aspect follows that of the American English in general.
Views of hyphenated Americans
While some "hyphenated" Americans do hold to loyalties to other countries, which draws criticism from some Americans, others do not, and some claim that the critics miss important points.
There are many "hyphenated Americans" who do not define or desire to define themselves as such, but rather are defined as such by other people, both with linguistic descriptions, and with different treatment. The result is that even if these Americans are, in Roosevelt's words, "American and nothing else," they still may end up having a different experience, and for that reason may develop shared understandings with others of their type, whether they want that or not. This in itself becomes, ironically, a reason for them to be interested in their "hyphenated" identity, as they learn how to cope with the unique experiences dealt them.
There are many American immigrants or children of immigrants - a rapidly increasing number of whom claim dual citizenship - with profound and immediate connections to their homelands. Whether their loyalities be mixed or not, they require hyphenated identities because they cannot sacrifice half of who they are. Moreover, while criticism of "mixed loyalties" may perhaps be warranted in the political sphere, it is very often a cultural inevitability. As globalization has changed patterns of immigration to the U.S., having "mixed loyalities" may have become merely one among the wide range of political biases that people hold.