Hi my name is Amy and I am doing a project on the Immigration of Czech's to the U.S. I was wondering if anyone could provide any of the following information or good websites to find it from? ~Main Causes for Immigration ~Timeline of Immigration ~Demographics of Czechs in U.S. today ~Maintaining Identity in U.S. today ~Spoken Czech language demographics in U.S. ~Stats of ppl who claim Czech heritage in U.S. today and demographics of those people Thanks so much if you can provide any info! It'll be greatly appreciated. Amy Kolb
Hmm, I think, czech people go in USA because they think they get a better job (and better paid) than here. I even know czechs who hate CR (for different reason i don't understand very well, e.g. the goverment, politics) and want (and try) to leave it. Ad maintaining identity: as i know, czechs assimilate very strong in other countries when they want to stay there (e.g. they don't say they are from CR (thus official numbers of czechs living abroad are much lower than reality), don't teach their childrens their language, ...).
Yeah, I heard about some Czech, who live in US and don't want to pass the language to their children. Last month I met mother of English teacher. She is American and she came to Czech Republic do TEFL certificate and now she teach English in Prague. She doesn't speak Czech. And I met her mother, she's Czech and speak PERFECTLY Czech. And her daughter doesn's speak Czech. That's terrible.
Hi Amy, I only know little on the subject, but here it is anyway: I think that most Czechs are fairly pragmatic and I agree with Ladislav that Czech immigrants to the US usually seek better economic conditions. There, however, have been emigration waves caused by political oppression, such as after the Warsaw Pact Soviet-led military invasion to Czechoslovakia in late summer of 1968. Even at such times, I believe, a lot of emigrants preferred the US or Canada to West European countries for not only greater liberties, traditionally expected to thrive in North America, but also for higher standard of living in the US, which is nearly proverbial in Central Europe. I have a vague notion that a lot of Czechs (and Moravians and Slovaks) came to the US in the 19th century. Then probably within the immigration waves from Europe in general, such as after the World War II. As far as I know the strongest Czech communities in the US today are in the states of Texas and Nebraska. Those are basically Americans with Czech ancestry. I have the impression that mostly the senior generation is trying to keep the Czech traditions and language alive while the young ones do not care so much. I know there are some Czech festivals organized mainly in the two states I mention above where people wear traditional costumes, play, listen and dance to Czech folk music, cook and eat Czech traditional food, drink Czech beer, try to speak Czech, sometimes with vocabulary and grammar that are not used in modern Czech any longer and alsmost always with a strong American accent. I only know Czech is taught at some universities, and again the senior generation probably knows more of Czech then their children or grandchildren. Why, English is so much easier than Czech to learn and Czech is basically useless in North America. Perhaps you could find some stats on nationmaster.com... Jirka
