Do people in Ireland often get married to people from Sweden? Do people from Italy often get married to people from Germany? I mean in the new world like the US and Canada, it’s literally common for European descendants from the different ethnic background to get married.
For example, I have two White-American friends,
1. His father is of full Italian descent, his mother is of English, Dutch, German, and Scottish descent.
2. His father is of Norwegian and German descent, his mother is of full Hungarian descent.
Edit: Just add more examples.
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They’re not extremely common, but neither are they unheard of, or shunned, or anything like that. There are two major explanations.
1) despite things like the Nordic Union, the Schengen Agreement, and so on, the intra-European migrations are still somewhat limited, with many countries populations being predominantly _of_ the national community. So while we do have Danes and Swedes being married (particularly in the Øresunds-area,) or Germans and Danes in Southern Jutland/Northern Schleswig-Holstein, and nobody bats their eyes at this, it isn’t widespread
2) The notion of ‘heritage’ and of national belonging is considerably different in Europe, compared to the US. Speaking for Denmark, we usually don’t count “fractions of heritage”—to make an exaggeration for the sake of understanding—like they do in the US. Usually, unless your parents are from a different national background, _or_ if you belong to a significant social or historical community—like the Luso-French, or the German minority in Southern Jutland—you’re, in 9/10 cases, counted as simply “Danish.” We don’t have a widespread tradition of identifying with immigrant heritage, like some communities in the US do; thinking of particularly the Irish and Italian Americans.
So we don’t “count” heritage, or descent, in the same way your American friend does.
It’s not that common, simply because many people don’t meet with other nationalities quite often.
>For example, I have a White-American friend, his father is of full Italian descent, his mother is of English, Dutch, German, and Scottish descent…
But this is quite a different situation, both parents were American, right?
Not so much as you described it.
It happens with higher frequencies at the border. I am from Alsace, the French border region with Germany and it’s not unusual to have couples forming with one being from Baden in Germany and the other from Alsace.
Also what greatly changed the dynamic is the [Erasmus program](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erasmus_Programme) which made students study in other countries and meet each other. There is a phenomenon called ‘Erasmus babies’. Here is a 2014 [article](https://www.studyinternational.com/news/1-million-erasmus-babies/).
But you see, if there are such articles and such a significant impact on a student program on inter-country couples, it means it was not so much the case without that.
Lastly, bi-national couples in each country are usually more related to each country’s particular connexion with other countries, and a big minority is present in that country. For example in France, there are a lot of nationals from Algeria, Tunisia, Mali, Cameroon, etc etc that do marry native French very often.
The difference is very simple – in North America those people all live in the same area and speak the same language, don’t they? In Europe they don’t – the Irish live mostly in Ireland, the Swedish live mostly in Sweden etc.
Also – an Irish-American is much closer culturally to a Swedish-American than an Irish person is to a Swede.
They’re a minority of marriages but not in any way unusual. Even though EU countries + friends have freedom of movement, most people still live in their native country and also build a family there. Most native Swedes stay in Sweden, most native French stay in France, etc. This means same-country marriages are the majority. But moving around is also perfectly common, especially for young people, so nobody would be surprised by an international family.
It’s not comparable to the American example you bring up because we don’t really do the whole heritage via ancestors thing. In the example of an Italian-American marrying an English-American, everyone in Europe would just call that a marriage between two Americans. Generally the concepts of ethnicity and heritage are not very similar between the US and EU.
If we applied American standards in the EU, such marriages would be extremely common because multiple countries have a very mixed ethnic composition and therefore a large proportion of population that would, in US terms, have mixed heritage.
Yes. Close to 40% of the population have migration background and around 27% are not in possession of the Swiss citizenship[^(1)](https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/de/home/statistiken/bevoelkerung/migration-integration/nach-migrationsstatuts.html#:~:text=Im%20Jahr%202021%20hatten%202,ab%2015%20Jahren%20einen%20Migrationshintergrund). So yes, it happens quite a lot. Although it’s far more common to see Swiss people getting married to people from neighbouring countries with a somewhat similar culture than people from somewhere else.
I believe is common in cities with more multicultural background/that have international employment opportunities so people from different countries have more chances to meet, like London, Paris, Milan, Bruxelles…
The thing is, your friends are from the same country and speak the same language. It’s absolutely not comparable to a Swede and an Italian marrying.
And since we don’t really care about our ethnicity in Europe (or let’s say we don’t care if you look like everyone else sadly), it may very well be that a Dane with German ancestors marries a Dane with Swedish ancestors, but nobody cares about that, many people probably don’t even KNOW it.
If people from these countries have reasons to meet, then yes.
It’s more geography/language that will make this kind of marriage uncommon, because in a lot of countries people don’t care if your family is from another European country.
Especially if you grew up there, the idea of ethnicity as it’s seen in the US doesn’t really make sense here. There is a huge number of people with Italian names where I live, mostly because their (grand)parents immigrated a century ago… But nobody would think of them as Italian, they are just French people who happen to have some family in Italy.
So when it comes to marriage, it’s really not important.
(1)
Not much. Mainly:
* there were borders everywhere until recently, which demanded visas.
* there is still a language barrier. You mainly speak one language, we don’t. The EU alone has 24 official languages.
(2)
You are just citizens of one country, no matter whatever ideas your society forces on you. No one from your examples is from any of those countries and has absolutely nothing to do with them. Every European from those countries would laugh at the very concept. They are Americans. That’s how a society works.
If you take into account this, it may very well be that Europeans intermarry more between countries, or third countries, than Americans with foreigners.
I mean, what you are describing in your US example is a situation where two people who live in the same area and speak the same language get married despite having different genetic heritage. This is completely normal in Europe and nobody even reacts or thinks about it.
However, Europeans wouldn’t count you as Irish if you were born and raised in Sweden and your parents just happen to be of Irish descent. We would just say that you are Swedish and if you married another person who was born and raised in Sweden it would be considered a marriage between two Swedes.
A marriage between an Irishman and a Swede would by European standards by relatively uncommon, because it would require e.g. the Irish person to move from Ireland to Sweden, find a partner there and decide to stay in Sweden and start their family there, far from their relatives. It happens, but it’s a very small percentage of all marriages, for practical reasons.
The definition of identity works differently in Europe.
For example, my grandfather lived his whole life in the same town, but when he was born that town was in Austria-Hungary, after World War I it was in Czechoslovakia, and then it became part of the Third German Reich for seven years. A little while later it was in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic for 40 years and then the country broke up and he lived out his last decade in the Czech Republic.
There are many people in Austria with Czech surnames like Procházka, Novák or Svoboda. In the Czech Republic there are many people with German surnames like Klaus, Miler (Müller) or Šmíd (Schmidt).
In our country, language is more important than where your parents were born. This is one of the biggest Czech nationalists: Tomio Okamura.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomio_Okamura
His voters do not like foreigners and immigrants.
Borders and peoples in Europe have long been changing and mixing with each other for thousands of years.
This is purely anecdotal, but where I grew up I actually knew quite a few people whose parents were from different countries. I myself am the fruit of one such marriage lmao. I would say that these types of marriages are still the minority though.
Well I have married outside my passport, found some in an Eu country and brought him home, we have few friend who done the same, but that most because hubby is part of the expat group online and that how we meet new friends.
1. It’s not common to marry someone who’s not Romanian, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. It’s simply a numbers game: Romania is a very homogenous country so the chances are you’ll mostly meet other Romanians, so you’ll have relationships with them.
2. Based on your example, they will both the “Americans” for me. The descent doesn’t matter.
I don’t think it’s common. Many people find their partner either via work, study maybe a sports club or going out. Since we have a lot of immigrants or people with immigrant background, it’s not uncommon to marry someone with some foreign background.
The comparison you make is not the same. The USA is one country with one language and culture. It’s an immigrant country so everyone has foreign roots. In Europe the majority of the people is native.
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I’d say it’s reasonably common in certain circles, but not a majority of the general cases.
From my place of origin, it was a very common thing because there was a rather high rate of emigration. So children of a Portuguese national and another nationality were common, but also younger people who emigrated and got married abroad (myself included).
Other than that, for people in an international work setting this also happens a lot. In academia, you’re basically moving countries every few years, and it’s really common for people to meet their significant others during that time, most of them being from a different country.
Then you have people living in border areas, where movement is pretty fluid anyway and it’s not unusual for couples from both sides of the border to form.
To complete my previous answer.
Yes, children of immigrants marry other children of immigrants from a different ethnic background (or form families with them without necessarily marrying). That’s normal and common. What’s less common after 3 or 4 generations is that’s they still identify/feel a closeness with the country of their foreign ancestor(s) unless they’re discriminated for having those origins. For most people it’s just a point of chit-chat.
It doesn’t work like that. You described two white Americans, who happen to know their heritage. Nevertheless, they’re *Americans* and their parents are also *Americans* (I assume they’re not immigrants, just descendants). They live in the same area, they probably speak the same language and they share culture (even if they cultivate their ancestors’ traditions).
In Europe it’s a lot harder to meet someone from outside your country. You have to share a language, for starters. English is a good “middle ground” in some places, but in my country it’s not uncommon to not speak English at all, actually. So you have to find someone who you can communicate with.
There are also cultural barriers. Your friends’ parents share a cultural background because they’re Americans despite being XYZ descendants. But actually integrating into a country is not that easy.
And people here don’t really care about descendants. They care only if they’re half-half (have parents from two different countries). Other than that, if someone was born in Germany and has German parents, then they’re German. Having a mixed background could be an interesting fact about a person, but it’s just it. Most people identify with the country they were raised in.
Of course there are mixed relationships, but not in the sense you described. You described average white Americans who happen to know their ancestors. It doesn’t even count as marrying between people from two countries.
It’s totally normal, but as others have said, for many people the opportunity is lacking. If you ask people who have never moved away from their home town, you obviously get different answers from people who have studied at universities in three countries or had international careers. But in big, multicultural cities, it is very common.
I grew up in Edinburgh, and our neighbours were (wholly, partly or formerly) Norwegian, Russian, English, Chinese, Italian, Pakistani, and West Indian, as well as Scottish, English and Irish, and I had friends who were Iranian, Venezuelan, American, Spanish and Indian in origin. My feeling is the Chinese, Muslims, and to some extent Catholics and Hindus tended to look for partners in their own communities – less so as the years have gone on. But all the other groups were mixing it up.
Here (Hamburg) it’s fairly similar. A lot of people I got to know and only later learned that they had some foreign family background, or realised when I learned their family name.
It’s fairly common in my circles (I’m in a relationship with a Bulgarian, I have friends who are in a relationship with/married to people who either still live abroad in- or recently immigrated from Ukraine, Ireland, Poland, Italy etc.), but overall it’s not too common. It’s quite normal for people of European descent who immigrate/study here to get in a relationship with the “natives”, but cross border relationship where both live in different countries are more rare quite simply due to the distance (although obviously long distance relationships are also still a thing, but they aren’t common).