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Message: <blockquote data-quote="billd91" data-source="post: 8493329" data-attributes="member: 3400">Consider it the legacy of a country built on waves of immigration. Each wave of immigration tended to provoke a backlash from the preceding groups - which may be one of the reasons virtually nobody calls themselves English or British-Americans. Most of the hyphenates were in reaction to difficulties in penetrating into the cultures established by the original colonists. And most of the anti-hyphenate reaction (very strong in the late 19th and early 20th centuries) came from that culture as well. One additional feature is probably that we have the room for many of these groups to form their own significant regional political power bases and further maintain the strength of the identity - something that waves of post-war and post-imperial immigration into Europe may lack.</blockquote>