Talk:Danes

Major cleanup

Danes are citizens of Denmark and some voluntary possibility of "being Danish" without being a citizen, article was adjusted for this.--Johanneswilm (talk) 07:24, 14 February 2011 (UTC) The categories used for the statistics cited for Denmark are explained [here]. "Immigrant Ancestry" according to this are those born in another country. "Descendants" are those born to two foreign citizens within Denmark. According to this, a person has Danish ancestry, if at least one parent is a Danish citizen and is born in Denmark. These figures are completely incompatible to those given by the US, Canadian, Australian and Norwegian census, see explanation given at Talk:Norwegians, Talk:Germans and Talk:Austrians. The links to statistics from New Zealand and Germany are dead, the link to Argentinia has no figures, the figures from UK, Ireland and Iceland refer to people born in Denmark and therefore also incomparable, the figure for Greenland seems to be a rough estimate by the Wikipedia user writing this article, the French figure comes from someones private webblog without authoritative reference, the Swiss number comes from a secondary source and lists Danish citizens, the Dubai/Emirates doesn't contain any concrete figure, the Chinese figure seems to be someone's personal estimate, the figures from Luxembourg, Faeroeye Islands, Greece and Portugal are user submitted numbers on a website that claims not to be sure of the data's validity, the Mexico figure is unreferenced, the interview with the Danish ambassador in Lebanon indicates that they only have partial overview of Danes living in Lebanon, the same is true for the Chilean figure which is presented on a webforum for children.--Johanneswilm (talk) 07:24, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

The only figures that correctly reflect the numebr correctly and are comparable is that given for Austria -- Danish citizens living in Austria by an authorative source. Given that it is the only valid figure listed, I will remove all the figures and instead replace the number with the population of Denmark. If someone in the future is doing the necessary research to find all the right numbers of Danish citizens living abroad, please use the Austrian statistics from statistik.at.--Johanneswilm (talk) 07:24, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

For some reason much of the intro is duplicated from the origins section. Should be trimmed or removed. FunkMonk (talk) 08:16, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Germanic

I am removing Alphasinus unsourced changes introducing the notion that Danes are a "Germanic ethnic group". This classification is is unsourced and arbitrary, Germanic is a linguistic category not an ethnic one and we could equally well write "indo-European ethnic group", but that also contributes no relevant information. Danes are an ethno-national group that speak a germanic language. ·Maunus·ƛ· 02:56, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

So Poles, Russians, Bulgarians, Serbians, Croatians, Ukranians, Slovenians, Czechs, Slovaks, Ruthenians, FYROM Macedonians are not Slavs? Denmark have not received any large immigrants groups in 2000 years that have changed the ethnic make up of the Danes. The majority of Danes are still descended and can trace their lineage back to the Germanic tribes. A Germanic tribe. A ethnic-linguistic group. By the same reasoning you should remove all reference to Iranian People on Pashtun, Balochi wiki etc Wis (talk) 17:39, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

"Germanic" is not about "ethnic makeup" whatever that mihgt be - it is about language. I am not making any claims about Slavs - as far as I know there may be something of a pan-Slavic identity. There is nothing such for Germanic. Germanic is a linguistic grouping - there are no "Germanic peoples" the last time such a concept had any political or cultural meaning was in the 1940'es. You claim about what Danes can trace their roots back to is not only unsourced but also unsourceable. There is no way to ascertain which amount of Danes can trace their ancestry back to which Germanic tribe. There isn't even any actual historical knowledge about such a tribe and its relations to the formation of the Danish state in the 10th century. And furthermore genealogy and tracing ancestry only has any relation to Danish identity for that tiny minority of Danes that are members of one of the small national movements. Danish people can have a wide range of ethno-national and linguistic backgrounds and be "Danes" just as much as someone who could trace his lineage to Gorm the Old. ·Maunus·ƛ· 19:08, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

So you are telling me that the people who have lived in Denmark since the Germanic migration period are not Germanic and belong to what ethnic sub group of the Indo-Europeans? What makes the different Iranian people a ethnic-linguistic people and why is there not a Germanic ethnic-linguistic people, but a Slavic? Both Slavs and Germanic people are Indo-Europeans. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavic_peoples Is is not just because of the Nazis, their Germanic ideology and the Holocaust. That you are pushing a agenda of there not being a Germanic people? Provide some proof of when the descendants of the Germanic people of the Danii stopped being Germanic and who they mixed with so that they became "mixed". There have never been a case of a large influx of immigrants to Denmark which caused the people to become mixed. Wis (talk) 21:31, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

A human lifespan is ca. 100 years. The Germanic migration happened ca. 1500 years ago. There are no people who have lived in Denmark since the Germanic migrations. I don't need tyo provide proof you would need to supply a reliable source that calls the Danes a "Germanic people". You quite obviously also know nothing of Danish migrational history, or about history or ethnicity in general. Do some reading then present a coherent argument backed up by sources rather than touting ethnic groupings from random Roman historians as if they had some kind of relevance for current the current identity of Danes. ·Maunus·ƛ· 22:42, 22 May 2011 (UTC) t

What are you talking about ? why does then Russians have east slavic in the intro and Germans does have "Germanic" or Kazakhs have Turkic in the intro , please stop reverting without a real argument and by the way what do you mean not all people are germanic , you should know that theres a diffrence between citizenship and ethnicityKids4Fun/TALK 15:02, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Get a source that calls modern Danes "a germanic people". The fact that other articles are similar is no argument if they are sourced then that is the reason it is included there - if it is not sourced then it should probably also be removed there.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 16:29, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Also, I am quite aware of the difference between citizenship and ethnicity - but one can be an ethnic Dane and not have any "germanic ancestry". Being ethnically Danish is about culture not ancestry - unless you ask the DNSB of course, but they are not really the mainstream view.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 16:31, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

oh its about the culture then good please contribute to danish culture related articles and avoid reverting edits on this article, and you dont have to be a nazi just to know that one of the main things about ethnicity is actually about ancestry ,and yes ethnicity is also about culture but that doesent change peoples ethnicity , so you mean you could choose to be russian one year just because you do russian traditions and speaking russian and the next year say "oh am a german i can speak german celebrate german traditions" and so on, so your arguemtens doesent actually work hereFREESAVELIY^talk 17:34, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Danish ethnicity is not about ancestry and you have not provided a single reliable source that supports that view. Not even Dansk Folkepárt}i thinks of danish ethnicity in terms of ancestry - onloy in terms of culture. You obviously have not read much about the complex topic of ethniocity and less about Danish cultural history. I suggest you start paying attention to policies or you will find it hard to keep editing here.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 00:10, 8 July 2011 (UTC)·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 18:49, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

please avoid personal attacks like "you dont know anything about it" and so on because i am very well informed about the the subject and there are plenty of Reliabile like both academic ones and simple ones done by a simple google search: anyway thats not the point its a claim that the ethic group olny about culture and do you have sources yourself ?!FREESAVELIY^talk 13:34, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I am not trying to introduce any claims into the article so I don't need to present sources. None of the sources that you present are both reliable and support your claim. Some of them are reliable but do not support the claim. As for personalizing the dispute you were the one who started that.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 18:51, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

thats not what i was talking about, i did not insult you, you didFREESAVELIY^talk 19:33, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

I did notinsult you - I stated the obvious fact that you are not well versed with either the concept of ethnicity as it is used in social sciences or with Danish cultural history. If you assumed good faith you would take that as an invitation to make yourself more acquainted with the topic you are editing about, rather than as an insult.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 19:44, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

References

Categories

I'd think that categories such as Danish cuisine, culture, arts, etc. would fit better into the Denmark article. Is it really relevant to the article that this many Denmark-related categories be added? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sandertams (talk • contribs) 18:03, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

No they should be removed.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 19:47, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Related groups

Ive removed the field "related ethnic groups" because it is basically an arbitrary choice which groups are considered to be related and which aren't. Different groups are related in different ways, and there are no agreed upon criteria for excluding some groups and including others. Related groups could be Germanic speaking ethnic groups, Indo-European speaking ethnic groups, Greenlanders, populations of Nordic countries, populations of former Danish colonies, ethnic with significant immigrant presence in Denmark etc. It is arbitrary to choose certain groups over others, since the relation can not be based on any exclusive it is impossible to find adequate sources. Better to leave out the field all together - anyone reading the article will realize that Danes are related to their neighboring countries and to other groups speaking Germanic languages anyway.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 21:23, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Problems caused by moving article

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was move per request.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:21, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

---

Danish people → Danes – I don't know where this article was originally located, but following the example of Norwegians, Swedes, Finns and Germans this article should really be named Danes. It was clearly moved from Danes - but the result is that clicking "discussion/talk" now points to Talk:Danes/Archive 1, which means the article is now unassessed. I think we need both the talk page and the article located at "Danes" and "Talk:Danes" or "Danish people" and "Talk:Danish people". -- Peter ^{Talk page} 12:32, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

The problem with the talk page is caused by Talk:Danish people redirecting to Talk:Danes/Archive 1. All pages need to be moved manually. -- Peter ^{Talk page} 12:33, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

I have just fixed this. I moved Talk:Danes to Talk:Danish people and Talk:Danes/Archive 1 to Talk:Danish people/Archive 1 as an interim measure while discussion is ongoing. — Mr. Stradivarius ^{(have a chat)} 20:48, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I did change the direct of Talk:Danish people to Talk:Danes, but I was a bit apprehensive about renaming the talk pages when the liklihood was they'd have to be moved back. I think that the article was moved to the current title recently without discussion, and poorly. --Peter ^{Talk page} 20:53, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

• Support move. Though this will take some cleaning up, it should probably be handled asap in line with the cited precedents. Cheers, Zaldax (talk) 20:01, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Edit request 20 June 2014

First para reads "They also have the ability to speak Danish." I have the ability to speak Danish, too, but that doesn't make me a Dane. Sadly, I am unable to edit (is it locked?) 155.213.224.59 (talk) 17:38, 20 June 2014 (UTC)

Definition of Danes?

This article does not have a clear idea about what the definition of Danes are; three different, slightly related, ideas are mixed in the article -- biological inheritance (i.e. people descending from the Dani), cultural inheritance or adoption and, finally, citizenship. There has been more than one "debate" on the topic before. Personally I think all three should be presented separately -- it is possible to trace, through genetics, if you are a "true" Dane (i.e. descendant of the Dani), there is a distinct culture and there is a clear definition of having Danish citizenship; all three forms of "Dane" is being used and at least two are used, consciously, very often by a lot of people.

I propose the article starts with a clear definition and explanation of the three different ways of types of "Dane" -- and yes, I do consider myself to part of a Germanic people, as a Dane, and no, I am not a Nazi; the fact that I even feel that I have to point that out should make someone feel ashamed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.130.79.38 (talk) 22:10, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

Why do you even need to state that your not a Nazi? Danes are a Germanic ethnic group. That's reality. 107.144.132.45 (talk) 23:19, 26 October 2024 (UTC)

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Danes in Finland

Theres 526 danes in Finland, more than in Japan and Lebanon, so i wan't to add it but you can't edit this page (sorry im new to here) Finlandestonia (talk) 11:56, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 June 2018

In the section "Danish nation in a political context" I suggest removing "formerly Norwegian" from the below paragraph. If all articles should include reference to the history in this manner, we have a lot of editing to do, and I really do not see the need for that here.

Also the double use of "as well as members" in the sentence should be avoided. "Excluded from this definition are people from the formerly Norwegian Faroe Islands and Greenland as well as members of the German minority as well as members of other ethnic minorities."

I suggest therefore to change the paragraph to: "Excluded from this definition are people from the Faroe Islands and Greenland as well as members of the German minority and other ethnic minorities." Janmark~nowiki (talk) 15:59, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

 Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit extended-protected}} template. While unsourced, the information objected to here is contextually important. The concept of "Danishness" was related to a specifically historical dispute and it is as necessary to state which subjects of the Kingdom of Denmark were and were not included in the definition as it is to state which non-subjects were. I hope this helps. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 16:34, 3 June 2018 (UTC)

Danish/Dane is and national and ethnic term

Moxy, on the source that you posted writes that the term Danish is a national, not ethnic term, but here are sources which demand that, so, you think that's a relevant source to be in the article?

https://books.google.mk/books?id=PY6S53UbOC8C&pg=PA81&dq=Ethnic+Danes&hl=bg&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjr8qaGs6DgAhUBtIMKHcgdDooQ6AEIZTAI#v=onepage&q=Ethnic%20Danes&f=false

https://books.google.mk/books?id=cKUnBwAAQBAJ&pg=PA1&dq=Ethnic+Danes&hl=bg&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjr8qaGs6DgAhUBtIMKHcgdDooQ6AEIdzAL#v=onepage&q=Ethnic%20Danes&f=false

https://books.google.mk/books?id=y6JXAAAAYAAJ&q=Ethnic+Danes&dq=Ethnic+Danes&hl=bg&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjr8qaGs6DgAhUBtIMKHcgdDooQ6AEIcTAK

https://www.britannica.com/place/Denmark/People Denmark is almost entirely inhabited by ethnic Danes.

https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/ethnic-groups-living-in-denmark.html 9 out of 10 residents of Denmark identify as ethnic Danes... Sashko1999 (talk) 16:50, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 28 January 2023

Change kroborg to Kronborg, under the picture of Holger Danske 188.181.82.169 (talk) 06:15, 28 January 2023 (UTC)

• Done. Tammbeck^talk 10:05, 28 January 2023 (UTC)

North Germanic ?

According to Germanic peoples, The Germanic peoples were historical groups of people that once occupied Central Europe and Scandinavia during antiquity and into the early Middle Ages. The six sources to support the claim are either referring to language / literature or to the historical origin of the Danes. While nobody objects to calling Danish a North Germanic language or to claiming that North Germanic groups are at the origin of the modern Danish nation, the claim that 21st century Danes are a "North Germanic ethnic group" doesn't make any sense to me. A recent discussion led to the deletion of the category "Germanic ethnic groups". Rsk6400 (talk) 07:48, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400 Well @Nederlandse Leeuw seems to have been tackling this dillema recently so might be able to shed some more light. The problem I see is that there are some references including recent ones referring to for example Norwegians as "North Germanic" as can be seen in the ones removed here. If those sources are overwhelmingly the minority though then it probably shouldn't be more than a mention somewhere in the article. TylerBurden (talk) 15:57, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

@TylerBurden @Rsk6400 Thanks for the tag! Yes, it is as Tyler says, in many articles and categories, from time to time, you see certain people trying to argue that

• people from a modern country in Europe,
• where the majority of the population has a native language,
• that is a member of the Fooian language family,
• is therefore "a Fooian people" or "a Fooian ethnic group".

This is actually often WP:OR or WP:SYNTH. Very broad generalisations that seek to reduce people to the language family that their native language just so happens to belong to. Even if they never think of themselves as "Germanic", and may have never even heard of the term (except in history or language class, where it is appropriate; this wouldn't be a topic in civics class, for example). It also disregards anyone in a given country who does not share the native language of the majority. This may lead to weird situations in which they are not counted/categorised as ("real") "Danes" or "Danish people" (even if they have Danish nationality/citizenship). Or: they are incorrectly counted/categorised amongst the native Danish therefore "Germanic" majority, because the majority gets to define the "nation".

One of the problems is that there are some arguable "reliable sources" (with the emphasis on arguable) which list alleged modern "Germanic peoples/nations". These are then sometimes cited on Wikipedia as "proof" that this or that modern population is "Germanic" or whatever-language-groupic. Example: Minahan, James (2011). One Europe, Many Nations: A Historical Dictionary of European National Groups. Greenwood Publishing Group. ISBN 0313309841. That seems reasonable! Until you look at Minahan's list of "Germanic nations":

Alanders, 24-27; Alsatians, 36-41; Austrians 60-66; Bavarians, 104-8; Danes, 206-10; Dutch, 221- 25; English 226-33; Faeroese, 241-44; Flemish, 251-55; Frisians, 263-67; Germans, 287-94; Icelanders, 315-19; Liechtensteiners, 411-13; Luxembourgers, 433-36; Norwegians, 506-10; Rhinelanders, 538-43; Saxons, 597- 601; Scanians, 602-6; Swabians, 649- 53; Swedes, 654-58; Tyroleans, 697-701; Volga Germans, 725-30; Vorarlbergers, 731-34

Last I checked, a Rhinelander is just a person from Rhineland, Vorarlbergers don't exist, Alsatians (people) are a blend of German and French influences.[1] rather than a "Germanic nation", and so on. I could cite a 100 different classifications in other arguable "reliable sources" that say something else, because they are all arbitrary and just cannot be properly applied to modern times. Long story short: Category:Germanic people by century stops categorising people as "Germanic" after the 12th century (a decision confirmed by consensus at a CfD). I think we should apply that principle everywhere on Wikipedia, unless and only unless we are talking about the language families that languages like Danish belong to. Otherwise it is WP:NONDEFINING. Cheers, Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 16:36, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Thanks, Nederlandse Leeuw. That was really helpful. I looked it up because I couldn't believe it: He really calls Vorarlbergers a "people" and has Austrian "nations" in plural.[1] Rsk6400 (talk) 19:01, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

You're welcome! I was rather amused by it, but no longer surprised. Attempts to pigeonhole modern populations into "peoples", "nations", "ethnic groups" etc. are bound to fail sooner or later due to the arbitrariness and subjectivity of selection criteria. Fortunately, Wikipedia has rules against that like WP:SUBJECTIVECAT and WP:ARBITRARYCAT, so we can clean up any mess someone else has created when they've taken another go at putting people in neat little boxes in which they will never fit. Cheers, and good night! Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 22:04, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Agree, this makes sense. The lede looks pretty good right now, although I'm not sure whether these two sentences are meant to contrast each other:

Danes generally regard themselves as a nationality and reserve the word "ethnic" for the description of recent immigrants, sometimes referred to as "new Danes". The contemporary Danish national identity is based on the idea of "Danishness", which is founded on principles formed through historical cultural connections and is typically not based on racial heritage.

As someone who doesn't really know anything about Danish national identity, I can't make sense out of that paragraph. —DIYeditor (talk) 07:20, 26 April 2023 (UTC)

Should that only be applied to Germanic speaking European nation states? Or are we soon going to erase "ethnic group" from groups such as Greeks, Ukrainians, Vietnamese and Somalis? Knoterification (talk) 06:21, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

French people doesn't define its group as an "ethnic" one, and French surely is no Germanic language. It's always a question of RS, see WP:NOR. Rsk6400 (talk) 08:39, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

Yes, the French are defined as a nation.

"The French are, paradoxically, strongly conscious of belonging to a single nation, but they hardly constitute a unified ethnic group by any scientific gauge"

On the other hand the articles about the Dutch and Germans, those nationalities are simply defined vaguely, as "people from those countries",

In the article about France, French people are never referred to as a single ethnic group, and their national identity from the very beginning trnscended (or even, via French universalism, excluding ethnic identities), the Dutch (or the Germans) are referred to have been considered ethnic groups until very recently.

"...the 19th and 20th centuries never really caught on in the Netherlands, and this, together with being a relatively mono-ethnic society up until the late 1950s"

The article about the Dutch simply does not explain how all of a sudden the concept of the Dutch being an ethnic group vanished. Knoterification (talk) 16:26, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

I don't think this is the right place to discuss other articles. Rsk6400 (talk) 05:12, 20 June 2023 (UTC)