Why do some ethnic groups have more than one word to describe them?

Question

Recently my friend from Poland said that he was Polish but that he's not a Pole.  I guess I was thinking that they were interchangeable.  He explained that he was born and raised in Poland but that his parents were Lithuanian so he considers himself to be Polish but not a Pole.

I have also heard something like this in the UK.  If you say you are English that just means you are from England.  But if you are an Englishman is means that your ancestors came from England.  Then there's Scot vs Scottish, Spaniard vs Spanish, Turk vs Turkish, Persian vs Iranian, etc.

When I went to Rome with a friend born in the US both of whose parents were Italian, the people in Italy didn't understand how he could claim to be Italian.  They would say, maybe your parents were Italian but you are American.  I know for the most part ethnicity is a choice, but why do some ethnic groups have multiple terms?

? · Accepted Answer

I guess they're cool like that

Anonymous · Answer

Ethnicity is not mostly a choice, and your questions isn't about different words for the same ethnicity (the answer to that is that chauvinists prefer their own name for a people over the one that that people uses itself).

Your question is about *nationality* ( a legal status you can have from birth. Citizenship comes when you are old enough to vote) and *ethnicity* (the language and culture you were raised in) .
Some Polish people are ethnically also Kashub. Some Dutch people are ethnically also Frisian or Limburgian. Some Germans are ethnically also Sorbian.

In general, if you don't even speak the language, people will not acknowledge you as part of their ethnicity - even if both your parents and all your grandparents are

Magui · Answer

I believe Pole is a noun and Polish an adjective. That is the difference. The same is applied to Scot vs Scottish, Spaniard vs Spanish, Turk vs Turkish. Also English is an adjective and Englishman a noun.
Persian is an ethnicity and Iranian a nationality.
Your friend is Italian descent but not Italian.

Anonymous · Answer

Honestly, Italian is one of the more confusing concepts out there.

A big problem is Americans miss use the word Latin .... well it would be if it weren't for the Germans who keep claiming they've replaced all the original people in Italy.

You're friend is actually Latini or Latinu(s), which has nothing to do with Mesoamerican Indios.

And to head off any arguments, the Itali were a specific tribe native to Italy. If you claim a different blood line, you're not an original. I don't care what your citizenship says.

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Why do some ethnic groups have more than one word to describe them?

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