The German diaspora (, ) consists of Germans and their descendants who live outside of Germany. The term is used in particular to refer to the aspects of migration of German language speakers from Central Europe to different countries around the world. This definition describes the "German" term as a sociolinguistic group as opposed to the national one since the emigrant groups came from different regions with diverse cultural practices and different varieties of German. For instance, the Alsatians and Hessen were often simply called "Germans" once they set foot in their new homelands.
Terminology
Volksdeutsche ("ethnic Germans") is a historical term which arose in the early 20th century and was used by the
Nazism to describe
Ethnicity Germans, without German citizenship, living outside of
Nazi Germany, although many had been in other areas for centuries. During World War II,
Hitler forbade the use of the term because it was being used in a derogatory way against the many ethnic Germans in the SS. It is used by many historians who either deliberately or innocently are unaware of its
Nazi history.
Auslandsdeutsche (Adjective auslandsdeutsch) is a concept that connotes German citizens, regardless of which ethnicity, living abroad, or alternatively ethnic Germans entering Germany from abroad. Today, this means a citizen of Germany living more or less permanently in another country (including such as long-term academic exchange lecturers and the like), who are suffrage in the Republic's elections, but who usually do not pay taxes to Germany but in their resident states. In a looser but still valid sense, and in general discourse, the word is frequently used in lieu of the ideologically tainted term Volksdeutsche, denoting persons living abroad without German citizenship but defining themselves as Germans (culturally or ethnically speaking).
Distribution
Ethnic Germans are a minority group in many countries. The following sections briefly detail the historical and present distribution of ethnic Germans by region, but generally exclude modern
, who have a presence in the United States,
Scandinavia and major urban areas worldwide. People of partial German ancestry form an important minority group in several countries, including Canada (roughly 10% of the population), Brazil (roughly 5% of the population),
Australia (roughly 4.5% of the population),
Argentina (roughly 4% of the population),
Chile (roughly 4% of the population),
Namibia and in
Central Europe and eastern Europe—(Poland, Hungary, Romania, and Russia).
Distribution of German citizens and people claiming German ancestry (figures are only estimates and actual population could be higher, because of misleadingly formulated questions in censuses in various countries (for example in Poland)
Europe
Alpine nations
Austria, Switzerland, and
Liechtenstein each have a German-speaking majority, though the vast majority of the population do not identify themselves as German anymore.
Austrians historically were identified as and considered themselves Germans until after the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of World War II. Post-1945 a broader Austrian national identity began to emerge, and over 90% of the Austrians now see themselves as an independent nation.
East-Central Europe
Aside from the Germans who migrated to other parts of Europe, the German diaspora also covered the Eastern and Central European states such as Romania, Croatia, Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia, along with several post-Soviet states. There has been a continued historical presence of Germans in these regions due to the interrelated processes of conquest and colonization as well as migration and border changes.
During the periods of colonization, for instance, there was an influx of Germans who came to
Bohemia and parts of Romania as colonizers. Settlements due to border changes were largely 20th century developments caused by the new political order after the two world wars.
Baltic states
Belgium
In Belgium, there is an ethnic German minority. It is the majority in its region of 71,000 inhabitants.
Ethnologue puts the national total of German speakers at 150,000, not including Limburgish and Luxembourgish.
Bulgaria
Czech Republic and Slovakia
Before World War II, some 30% of the population in
Czech Republic were ethnic Germans, and in the border regions and certain other areas they were in the majority.
There are about 21,000 Germans in the Czech Republic (number of
Czechs who have at least partly German ancestry probably runs into the hundreds of thousands).
Their number has been consistently decreasing since World War II. According to the 2011 census, there remain 11 municipalities and settlements in Czech Republic with more than 6% Germans.
The situation in Slovakia was different from that in Czech Republic, in that the number of Germans was considerably lower and that the Germans from Slovakia were almost completely evacuated to German states as the Soviet army was moving west through Slovakia, and only a fraction of those who returned to Slovakia after the end of the war were deported with the Germans from the Czech lands.
Denmark
In Denmark, the part of
Schleswig that is now South Jutland County (or Northern Schleswig) is inhabited by about 12,000–20,000 ethnic Germans
They speak mainly Standard German and
South Jutlandic. A few speak
Schleswigsch, a Northern Low Saxon dialect.
France
In France, over 100,000 German nationals residing in the French country. The exact number is not known; some statistics indicate more than 300,000 Germans in France, but they are not officially sanctioned. There, the Germans live mainly in the northeastern area of France, i.e., in regions close to the Franco-German border (i.e.
Alsace), and the island of
Corsica.
Hungary
Prior to World War II, approximately 1.5 million Danube Swabians lived in Hungary, Romania, and Yugoslavia.
Today, the German minority in Hungary have minority rights, organisations, schools and local councils, but spontaneous assimilation is well under way. Many of the deportees visited their old homes after the fall of the
Iron Curtain in 1990. Around 178,000 Germans live in Hungary.
Italy
There are smaller, unique populations of Germans who arrived so long ago that their dialect retains many archaic features heard nowhere else: the Cimbrians are concentrated in various communities in the
Carnic Alps, north of
Verona, and especially in the
Sugana Valley on the high plateau northwest of
Vicenza in the
Veneto region; the
, who originated in the Swiss
Valais, live in the provinces of
Aostatal,
Vercelli, and Verbano-Cusio-Ossola; the Mòchenos live in the Fersina Valley. Smaller German-speaking communities also exist in the Friuli-Venezia Giulia region: the Carinthians in the
Canale Valley (municipalities of
Tarvisio, Malborghetto Valbruna and
Pontebba) and the
Sauris and
Timavo Germans in
Carnia.
Contrarily to the before-mentioned minorities, the German-speaking population of the province of South Tyrol cannot be categorized as "ethnic German" according to the definition of this article, but as Austrian minority. However, as Austrians saw themselves as ethnic Germans until the end of World War II, they can technically also be called Germans.
Germans have been present in the Iglesiente mining region in the south west of Sardinia since the 13th century.[Stefano Musso, op. cit., p. 314]
Norway
In Norway, there are 27,770 Germans making them the ninth largest ethnic minority in the country, thus constituting 0.52% of Norway's total population, and 2.94% of all foreign residents in Norway.
Immigration from Germany to Norway has occurred since the
Middle Ages. There have been many Germans who migrated to
Bergen during the Middle Ages and also during Norway's union with Denmark. During the Union with Denmark, a lot of German miners migrated to the town of
Kongsberg.
As of 2020, there are 1,446 Germans in the city of Bergen, making up 0.51% of the total population, and in the town of Kongsberg there are 114 Germans, making up 0.41% of the total population respectively. The city with the biggest population of Germans is
Oslo. 3,743 Germans live in the city, thereby making up 0.55% of the total population.
Germany is also the country that sends the most foreign exchange students to Norway, in 2016, 1,570 exchange students came to Norway from Germany.
Poland
The remaining German minority in Poland (109,000 people were registered in the 2011 census
) enjoys minority rights according to Polish minority law. There are German speakers throughout Poland, and most of the Germans live in the Opole Voivodeship in
Silesia. Bilingual signs are posted in some towns of the region. In addition, there are bilingual schools and German can be used instead of Polish in dealings with officials in several towns.
Portugal
As of December 2022, there are 20,500 German nationals residing in Portugal.
This number only include foreign nationals and thus excludes German citizens who have acquired Portuguese citizenship (around 400 people since 2008), as well as Portuguese people of German descent.
Around 6,000 Germans live in the municipalities of
Lisbon, Oeiras,
Sintra or
Cascais, in the Portuguese Riviera.
On the other hand, around 5,000 Germans live in the southern region of
Algarve.
The German community is especially noticeable in Lisbon and
Porto. Each city hosts a German Evangelical Church, a German school and offers German libraries. There is also a German church as well as a German school in Algarve while
Madeira hosts a German Evangelical Church.
Lisbon also hosts a Catholic German Church and a German cemetery since 1821.
Many Luso-Germans have acquired fame throughout the years. Individuals of the community include
Alfredo Keil (1850–1907), composer of
A Portuguesa, the Portuguese
national anthem, archaeologist Virgínia Rau (1907–1973), banker and industrialist António Champalimaud (1918–2004), architect Francisco Keil do Amaral (1910–1975) and former prime minister Ernesto Hintze Ribeiro (1849–1907). Contemporary figures of German descent include football player
Diego Moreira, Eurovision song contest winner
Salvador Sobral, surfer Nic von Rupp, actresses Catarina Wallenstein and
Vera Kolodzig, and tennis player Maria João Koehler. Amongst the most notable Luso-Germans there is undoubtedly João Frederico Ludovice, who was commissioned the project for the Mafra National Palace in 1711.
Romania
As of 2022, according to the Romanian Census, there were circa 22,900 ethnic Germans recorded in Romania.
Since the High Middle Ages, the territory of present-day Romania has been continuously inhabited by German-speaking groups, firstly by Transylvanian Saxons then, gradually, by other immigrant groups of ethnic German origin. They are all politically represented by the Democratic Forum of Germans in Romania (FDGR/DFDR).
Spain
There are 138,917 residents of German descent living in Spain in 2014, and
112,000 German citizens. Settlement of German-speaking settlers began during Middle Ages, an example is the Preysler family, with ancestors moved to Spain from Austria and was involved in the trading of Austrian bred horses being brought to Spain in the mid-19th century.
Before World War II broke out, sudeten Germans Prince Maximilian Eugene of Hohenlohe-Langenburg decided to take refuge in Spain. Similarly, after the war, all of his assets were confiscated through the Beneš Decrees. However, the fortune of his wife's family prevented him from falling out of favor. In Spain, one of his sons, Prince Alfonso, founded the Marbella Club Hotel, thus beginning the Marbella Golden Mile, which he catapulted as a destination for international luxury tourism, which since then has generated great wealth for Spain.
Sweden
During the 11th century, Sweden was visited by missionaries from Germany. During the Middle Ages, Hanseatic merchants had a great influence on Swedish trade and also the Swedish language. According to a survey, the proportion of German loanwords in Swedish is 24–30 percent (slightly depending on how you calculate). During the period of great power, a number of German congregations were formed in Sweden. Including Karlskrona German parish, which then became part of Karlskrona Admiralty parish. Today, there are two more active German congregations in Sweden. They are part of the parishes of the Church of Sweden, the German Christinae parish and the German St. Gertrude's parish consists of German citizens or Swedes of German origin.
In connection with the two world wars, several German children of war came to Sweden. Between the late 1940s and early 1990s, many East German refugees also came to Sweden. On 31 December 2014, there were 49,359 people in Sweden who were born in Germany, of whom 23,195 were men (47.0%) and 26,164 women (53.0%). The corresponding figure for 31 December 2000 was 38,155, of which 16,965 men (44.5%) and 21,190 women (55.5%). There were 28,172 people in Sweden with German citizenship. In 2019, according to Statistics Sweden, German immigrants together with the Chinese were the most highly educated who migrate to Sweden, with a proportion of 70 per cent who are highly educated, which is well above the average for Sweden's population which is 30 per cent. Around 29,505 German Citizens living in Sweden in 2020.
United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, a German-Briton ethnic group of around 300,000 exists. Some are descended from 19th-century immigrants. Others are 20th-century immigrants and their descendants, and others are World War II prisoners of war held in Great Britain who decided to stay there. Others arrived as spouses of English soldiers from post-war marriages in Germany, when the British were occupying forces. Many of the more recent immigrants have settled in the
London and southeast part of England, in particular, Richmond (South West London).
The British royal family are partially descended from German monarchs.
Due to Brexit, the number of Germans in the UK has declined significantly. In 2021, there were only 135,000 Germans in the UK.
Africa
During the long decline of the Roman Empire and the ensuing great migrations Germanic tribes such as the
Vandals (who sacked Rome) migrated into
North Africa and settled mainly in the lands corresponding to modern
Tunisia and northeastern
Algeria. While it is likely that some of the people living there at present are descended from these Germanic peoples, they did not leave visible cultural traces.
Cameroon
The first German trading post in the Duala area on the Kamerun River delta was established in 1868 by the Hamburg trading company
C. Woermann. The firm's agent in Gabon, Johannes Thormählen, expanded activities to the Kamerun River delta. In 1874, together with the Woermann agent in Liberia, Wilhelm Jantzen, the two merchants founded their own company, Jantzen & Thormählen there. At the outbreak of World War I, French, Belgian and British troops invaded the German colony in 1914 and fully occupied it during the Kamerun campaign. The last German fort to surrender was the one at Mora in the north of the colony in 1916. Following Germany's defeat, the Treaty of Versailles divided the territory into two League of Nations mandates (Class B) under the administration of Great Britain and France. French Cameroun and part of British Cameroons reunified in 1961 as Cameroon, though some Germans still remain in Cameroon.
Namibia
Germany was not as involved in colonizing Africa as other major European powers of the 20th century, and lost its overseas colonies, including German East Africa and German South West Africa, after World War I. Similarly to those in Latin America, the Germans in Africa tended to isolate themselves and were more self-sufficient than other Europeans. In
Namibia there are 30,000 ethnic Germans, though it is estimated that only a third of those retain the language. Most German-speakers live in the capital,
Windhoek, and in smaller towns such as
Swakopmund and Lüderitz, where German architecture is highly visible.
South Africa
In South Africa, a number of
Afrikaners and
Boers are of partial German ancestry, being the descendants of German immigrants who intermarried with Dutch settlers and adopted
Afrikaans as their mother tongue. Professor JA Heese in his book
Die Herkoms van die Afrikaner (
The Origins of Afrikaners) claims the modern Afrikaners (who total around 3.5 million) have 34.4% German ancestry.
Germans also emigrated to South Africa during the 1850s and 1860s, and settled in the Eastern Cape area around Stutterheim, and in Kwazulu-Natal in the Wartburg area, where there is still a large German-speaking community.[Deutsche Wanderung nach Südafrika im 19. Jahrhundert by Werner Schmidt-Pretoria.] Mostly originating from different waves of immigration during the 19th and 20th centuries, an estimated 12,000 people speak German or a German variety as a first language in South Africa.
Tanzania
When mainland
Tanzania,
Rwanda, and
Burundi were under German control, they were named German East Africa; they received some migration from German communities. After Tanganyika and
Ruanda-Urundi became British and Belgian mandates following Germany's defeat in World War I, some of these communities remained.
North America
In the United States are ca. 160,000 German Citizens Registered.
-
Belize: 5,763 Mennonite Low-German speakers.
-
Canada (3.3 million, 9,6% of the population), see also .
-
Mexico: See German immigration to Mexico, 22% of Mennonites also speak Low German which is not Standard German but derived from Old Saxon, 30% speak Spanish, 5% speak English and 5% speak Russian as a second language.
[ International Encyclopedia of Linguistics: 4-Volume Set, Volumen 1 Page 94] Sources estimate that there are around 15,000 German citizens and Mexicans of German-citizen origin account for about 75,000 today.[Horst Kopp Area Studies, Business and Culture: Results of the Bavarian Research Network Forarea (2003)] Also of note, the 'Colegio Alemán Alexander von Humboldt', or Alexander von Humboldt school in Mexico City is the largest German school outside Germany.
-
In the United States, German American has been the largest self-identified ancestry group since 1990. There are around 50 million German American in the United States, or 17% of the U.S. population, the country's largest self-reported ancestral group.
[From Census Bureau, "S0201. Selected Population Profile in the United States" 2006-2008 data ] including various groups such as the Pennsylvania Dutch. Of these, 23 million are of German ancestry alone ("single ancestry"), and another 27 million are of partial German ancestry, making them the largest group in the United States, followed by the Irish. Of those who claim partial ancestry, 22 million identify their primary ancestry ("first ancestry") as German. The 22 million Americans of primarily German ancestry are by far the largest part of the German diaspora, a figure equal to over a quarter of the population of Germany itself. Germans form just under half the population in the Upper Midwest.[ Who's Counting? The 1990 Census of German-Americans . On the site of The Tricentennial Foundation German American Community Service. Accessed 12 February 2006.][ Contents of ANCESTRY Table on the site of the United States Census Bureau. Accessed 12 February 2006.]
-
Central America: In 1940, there were 16,000 Germans living in Central America; half of them in Guatemala, and most of the remainder were established in Costa Rica and a few in Nicaragua.
South America
[[File:Maps of German colonies in southern Brazil.jpg|thumb|right|German population in Southern Brazil:
]]
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Argentina: Those of German ancestry constitute about 8% of the Argentine population — over 3 million — most of them Volga Germans alone — about 2 million.
[ The German embassy in Argentina estimates that 660,000 Argentines, or 1.5% of the total population, are descendants of Germans who emigrated directly from Germany (It means that it doesn't include other ethnic Germans who emigrated from Austria, Switzerland, Russia/USSR, etc.).][
]
- Nazi Minister Walther Darré was born in Argentina. After the Second World War, almost a thousand prominent Nazi leaders and politicians fled to Argentina. Adolf Eichmann and Josef Mengele were among them. Kurt Tank, who developed some of the greatest World War II aircraft fighters, also entered Argentina in the late 1940s.
- There are about 500,000 German-speakers in Argentina,
[ Handwörterbuch des politischen Systems der Bundesrepublik (in German). Source lists "German expatriate citizens" only for Namibia and South Africa!] slightly over 1% of population.
- Furthermore, a wave of Ashkenazi immigrants came after the rise of Nazism in 1933, followed by as many as 19,000 German Jews. From 1939 until the end of World War II, immigration was put to a halt by anti-immigrant feelings in the country and restrictions on immigration from Germany.
-
Bolivia: There are two different German groups: the descendants of those who emigrated from Germany and Brazil (estimated in about 160,000, 2% of Bolivian population)
[ Los Menonitas en Bolivia CNN en Español] Germans are 237,000 or 2,5% of Bolivian population.[ German in Bolivia. Joshua Project. Retrieved 27 July 2020.]
- There are over 20,000 Standard German-speakers,
[ Bolivian Reforms Raise Anxiety on Mennonite Frontier, New York Times]
-
Brazil: Mostly living in Southern Brazil. Brazil received 250,000 Germans between the 19th and 20th centuries. According to Born and Dickgiesser (1989, p. 55) the number of Brazilians of German descent in 1986 was 3.6 million. According to a 1999 survey by IBGE researcher Simon Schwartzman, in a representative sample of the Brazilian population 3,6% said they had German ancestry, a percentage that in a population of about 200 million amount to 7.2 million descendants.
[Many authors. Os Alemães no Sul do Brasil, Editora Ulbra, 2004 (2004).] In 2004, Deutsche Welle cited the number of 5 million Brazilians of German descent.
- By 1940, the German diaspora in Brazil amounted about a million.
- Around 14,000 German Citizens Registered in Brazil.
- There are 3 million German-speakers in Brazil,
-
Chile: The German-Chilean Chamber of Commerce estimated at 500,000 the descendants of Germans, about 3% of the total population of Chile estimated at 16 million (in the same source),
[ Handwörterbuch des politischen Systems der Bundesrepublik (in German).]
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Ecuador: Ecuador has only few people of German descent. Notable is a small German population on the Island of Floreana (Galapagos): Between 1929 and circa 1950, roughly half a dozen Simple living were living on the Island. In 1934 three of them died under unclear circumstances, these events caused international media attention called Galapagos-affair. Today, the descendants of the Floreana-Germans have been assimilated into the local Ecuadorian population or re-immigrated to Germany.
-
Paraguay : 166,000 Standard German-speakers (including 18,000 Mennonites, who don't speak Plattdeutsch or Mennonite Low German), most Germans in Paraguay are of Brazilian descent and Portuguese speakers;
[
]
- Those of German ancestry are 290,000, or 4.4% of Paraguayan population.
-
Peru: The communities of Oxapampa, Pozuzo District, and Villa Rica in the high jungles of the Peruvian Amazon basin were settled in the middle of the 19th century by Austrian and Prussian immigrants. Many of its present-day inhabitants speak German
-
Uruguay: By 1940, there were 50,000 Germans living in the country.
[
]
-
Venezuela:
Asia
In Japan, during the
Meiji period (1868–1912), many Germans came to work in Japan as advisors to the new government. Despite Japan's isolationism and geographic distance, there have been a few
Germans in Japan, since Germany's and Japan's fairly parallel modernization made Germans ideal
O-yatoi gaikokujin. (See also Germany–Japan relations) In South Korea, there are Germans in Korea. In China, the German trading colony of
Jiaozhou Bay in what is now
Qingdao existed until 1914, and did not leave much more than breweries, including
Tsingtao Brewery.
In Indonesia, some of them became well-known figures in history, such as C.G.C. Reinwardt (founder and first director of Bogor Botanical Garden),
Walter Spies (German of Russian origin, who became the artist that made
Bali known to the world), and Franz Wilhelm Junghuhn (owner of a big plantation in the south of
Bandung and dubbed "the Humboldt of the East" because of his ethno-geographical notes).
Members of the German religious group known as Templers settled in Palestine in the late 19th century and lived there for several generations, but were expelled by the British from Mandatory Palestine during World War II, due to pro-Nazi sympathies expressed by many of them. Communist East Germany had relations with Vietnam and Uganda in Africa, but in these cases population movement went mostly to, not from, Germany. After the German reunification, a large percentage of "guest workers" from Communist nations sent to East Germany returned to their home countries.
Oceania
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Australia has received a significant number of ethnic-German immigrants from Germany and elsewhere. Numbers vary depending on who is counted, but moderate criteria give an estimate of 750,000 (4% of the population). The first wave of German immigration to Australia began in 1838, with the arrival of Prussian Lutheranism settlers in South Australia (see German settlement in Australia). After the Second World War, Australia received a large influx of displaced ethnic Germans. In the 1950s and 1960s, German immigration continued as part of a large post-war wave of European immigration to Australia.
There have been ethnic Germans in Australia since the founding of the New South Wales colony in 1788, Governor Arthur Phillip (the first Governor of New South Wales) had a German father. But, the first significant wave of German immigration was in 1838. These Germans, mostly Prussian immigrants (but also winegrowers from the Hesse-Nassau state and the Rheingau). From there after, thousands of Germans emigrated to Australia until World War I. Also, German Australian was the most identified ethnicity behind English and Irish in Australia until World War I. After World War II, large numbers of Germans emigrated to Australia to escape war-torn Europe. Manu German Australians speak a dialect developed in Australia called Barossa German, a German dialect developed in Barossa Valley.
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New Zealand has received modest, but steady, ethnic German immigration from the mid-19th century. Today the number of New Zealanders with German ancestry is estimated to be approximately 200,000 (5% of the population). Many German New Zealanders anglicized their names during the 20th century due to the negative perception of Germans fostered by World War I and World War II. New Zealanders of German descent include the late former Prime Minister David Lange. The vast majority of Germans in New Zealand settled in the North Island, with a couple settling in the Christchurch area. Cities such as Tauranga, Nelson and, to a lesser extent, Auckland have been somewhat influenced by German culture and values.
History
From
Celts times, the early
Germanic peoples settled from the
Baltic Sea all the way to the
Black Sea until the great migrations of the 4-6th century AD.
Medieval Germans migrated eastwards during the medieval period Ostsiedlung until the flight, evacuation and expulsion of Germans after World War II; many areas in Central Europe and Eastern Europe had an ethnic German population.
The Nazi government termed such ethnic Germans Volksdeutsche, regardless of how long they had been residents of other countries. (Now they would be considered Auslandsdeutsche). During World War II, Nazi Germany classified ethnic Germans as Übermenschen, while Jews, Romani people, Slavic peoples, mainly Polish people and Serbs, along with black people and Multiracial were called . After the war, Central European nations such as Poland, the Czechoslovakia, Hungary, as well as the Soviet Union in Eastern Europe, and Yugoslavia in the Balkan region of Southern Europe, expelled most of the ethnic Germans living in their territories.
There were significant ethnic German populations in such areas as Romania, Moldova, and Ukraine at one time. As recently as 1990, there were one million standard German speakers and 100,000 Plautdietsch speakers in Kazakhstan alone, and 38,000, 40,000 and 101,057 standard German speakers in Ukraine, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan, respectively.
There were reportedly 500,000 ethnic Germans in Poland in 1998.
These Auslandsdeutsche, as they are now generally known, have been streaming out of the former Eastern Bloc since the early 1990s. For example, many ethnic Germans from the former Soviet Union have taken advantage of the German Aussiedler, a policy which grants citizenship to all those who can prove to be a refugee or expellee of German ethnic origin or the spouse or descendant of such a person. This exodus has occurred despite the fact that many of the ethnic Germans from the former Soviet Union were highly assimilated and spoke little or no German.
Historical countries
Former Soviet Union
Former Yugoslavia
According to the 1921 census, the German community was the largest minority group in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (505,790 inhabitants or 4.22%).
Groupings
Note that many of these groups have since migrated elsewhere. This list simply gives the region with which they are associated, and does not include people from countries with German as an official national language. In general, it also omits some collective terms in common use defined by political border changes where this is antithetical to the current structure. Such terms include:
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Ungarndeutsche / Germans of Hungary (of the Austria-Hungary empire, 1867–1918).
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Serbiendeutsche / Germans of Serbia (former Yugoslavia).
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Rumäniendeutsche / Germans of Romania (one of Many Eastern European German settlements extending from Belarus to Slovakia to Ukraine).
Roughly grouped:
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Sudeten Germans, often known as Sudetenland (now the Czech Republic).
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Silesians (now Poland).
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Germans of East Prussia (the largest group), including
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The German-Briton group of the United Kingdom (sometimes called British Germans), and German Poles living in the UK since the end of World War II.
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Schleswigsch Germans in South Jutland County, Denmark, see North Schleswig Germans.
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German-speaking citizens of the Netherlands (386,200 - 2.37% of the population), including Limburger Germans.
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German-speaking Belgians, mostly in the German-speaking Community of Belgium ( DGB - Deutschsprachige Gemeinschaft Belgiens), and about 1 to 3 percent of Belgians speak German.
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Cimbrians in Italy.
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Móchenos in Italy.
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Germans in Slovenia: in the Gottschee, in the towns of Maribor, Celje and Ptuj, and in the Apače area.
-
the original .
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Russian Mennonites in Ukraine, including the Mennonite Brethren.
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Transylvanian Saxons in Romania.
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Transylvanian Landler Protestants in Romania.
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Bukovina Germans from Bukovina, Romania.
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Carpathian Germans in Romania, as well as nearby Hungary, Slovakia and Ukraine.
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Zipser, from Spiš (Carpathian German heartland) to northern Romania.
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Regat Germans in southern and eastern Romania.
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Danube Swabians, including:
-
those in the Bačka.
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Banat Swabians in the Serbian and Romanian Banat, as well as a handful in Bulgaria.
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Satu Mare Swabians in Romania, a much smaller colony as a result of the two world wars and the Communist era.
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most Germans of Hungary (especially Swabian Turkey).
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in Croatia (where it is a recognized minority language).
-
and Bosnia and Herzegovina, though are now minuscule in number since World War II.
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Black Sea Germans in southern Ukraine, Moldova, Romania and Bulgaria including:
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Germans of the Crimea.
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Dobrujan Germans of Romania and Bulgaria.
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Bessarabia Germans roughly from what is now Moldova.
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Germans of Volhynia ().
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Galiziendeutsche in Galicia.
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Caucasus Germans, estimated at 5 million throughout Russia, and German Ukrainians, included in Ukraine.
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Caucasus Germans (also Swabians) in the northern Caucasus, Georgia, and Azerbaijan.
-
the rest of the Germans in the former USSR, including:
-
Bosporus Germans, originally craftsmen in and around Istanbul, Turkey.
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Cyprus has a German expatriate community.
In the Americas, one can divide the groups by current nation of residence:
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and , the largest ethno-ancestral group in the USA documented by the 2000 United States census.
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, including Mennonites in Mexico as well as many notable figures, see German-, Austrian-, Hungarian-, and Polish- subcategories of European Mexicans, esp. in the Northern states.
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Deutschbrasilianer in Brazil, whose various languages comprise Brazilian German.
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German Argentines with prominent personalities and a notable German impact on Argentine culture.
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Uruguay, known for a German community.
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Germans of Paraguay.
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Germans, mostly from outside the borders of Germany, in the rest of Latin America, especially:
-
German-Puerto Ricans (and a similar community in the Virgin Islands).
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Heavy concentration of German, Austrian and Swiss descendants in Southern Chile. (German Chileans).
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Peru, not many are German speakers, see German Peruvian.
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German Venezuelans, for example Colonia Tovar where settlers came from Baden, and Colonia Agrícola de Turén where settlers were Germans of the Bukovina Region and some Germans of Poland, in Colonia Tovar the dialect Alemán Coloniero is dramatically disappearing and losing popularity being replaced mainly by Spanish, meanwhile in Colonia Agrícola de Turén some German is still spoken.
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Colombia (German Colombians), Cuba and the Dominican Republic.
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Central America.
...or by ethnic or religious criteria:
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Pennsylvania Dutch - in the Northeastern US.
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Amish found in the US, notably Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana and New York.
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Volga Germans and Plautdietsch-speaking Russian Mennonites.
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in Canada, (e.g. Chortitzer Mennonite Conference).
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in the United States, for instance in Kansas, New York, and Chicago, Illinois where millions of residents self-claim to be German (American).
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throughout Latin America, most notably in Mexico.
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who speak Hutterite German.
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"Germania" - from the mid 19th century to after World Wars I or II, a large ethnic and cultural German presence in many towns in the Midwestern US.
In Africa, Oceania, and East/Southeast Asia
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Germans of Namibia, Togo, Cameroon, Tanzania and South Africa, which was never a pre-WWI German colony.
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German Angolans
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German Australians and German New Zealanders.
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Germans in the colony of Jiaozhou Bay, China, who founded (among others) the Tsingtao Brewery in today's Qingdao.
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Small numbers of German expatriates in East Asia and Southeast Asia (Burma, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam).
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German cultural traits remain in Papua New Guinea.
German-language media worldwide
A visible sign of the geographical extension of the
German language is the German-language media outside the German-speaking countries.
German is the second most commonly used scientific language
as well as the third most widely used language on websites after English and Russian.
Deutsche Welle (German pronunciation: ˈdɔʏtʃə; " German Wave" in German), or DW, is Germany's public international broadcaster. The service is available in 30 languages. DW's satellite television service consists of channels in German, English, Spanish, and Arabic.
German-speaking people living abroad (and people wanting to learn German) can visit the websites of German-language newspapers and TV- and radio stations. The free software MediathekView allows the downloading of videos from the websites of some public German, Austrian, and Swiss TV stations and of the public Franco-German TV network Arte. With the webpage " onlinetvrecorder.com," it is possible to record programs of many German and some international TV stations.
Note that some material is region-restricted for legal reasons and cannot be accessed from everywhere in the world. Some websites have a paywall or limit the access for free/unregistered users.
See also:
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List of newspapers in Germany and List of German-language newspapers published in the United States
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List of magazines in Germany
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List of television stations in Germany and List of German-language television channels
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List of radio stations in Germany and List of German-language radio stations
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Goethe-Institut ˈɡøːtə (a non-profit German cultural association operational worldwide with 159 institutes, promoting the study of the German language abroad and encouraging international cultural exchange and relations.)
Germany's policy on dual citizenship
Since June 27, 2024, unrestricted dual citizenship has been possible.
Prior to that date, German nationality law allowed dual citizenship only with other EU countries and Switzerland; with other countries, in some cases:
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With special permission (" Beibehaltungsgenehmigung"), for which German citizens must apply before taking the other citizenship (otherwise, German citizenship is automatically lost). Non-EU and non-Swiss citizens wanting to be naturalized in Germany must usually renounce their old citizenship, but may keep it if their country does not allow the renunciation of citizenship, or if the renunciation process is too difficult/humiliating/expensive, or, rarely, in individual cases if the renunciation of the old citizenship means enormous disadvantages for the concerned person.
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If dual citizenship was obtained at birth. Some countries do not accept the "dual-citizenship-by-birth principle," so the concerned person must later choose one citizenship and renounce the other.
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Under Article 116 par. 2 of the Basic Law (Grundgesetz), former German citizens who between 30 January 1933, and 8 May 1945, were deprived of their German citizenship on political, racial, or religious grounds may re-invoke their citizenship and the same applies to their descendants, and are permitted to hold dual (or multiple) citizenship.
A law adopted in June 2019 allows the revocation of the German citizenship of dual citizens who have joined or supported a terror militia such as the Islamic State and are at least 18 years old.
Naturalized Germans can lose their German citizenship if it is found out that they got it by willful deceit / bribery / menacing / giving intentionally false or incomplete information that had been important for the naturalization process. In June 2019, it was decided to prolong the deadline from 5 to 10 years after naturalization.
Visa requirements
:
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As of July 2024, German citizens can visit 194 countries without a visa or with visa on arrival. The Henley Passport Index ranks the German passport second in the world in terms of travel freedom.
Freedom of movement within other EU countries and the EFTA countries
As
European Union citizens, Germans can live and work indefinitely in other EU countries and the
EFTA countries; however, the right to vote and work in certain sensitive fields (such as government, police, military) might in some cases be restricted to the local citizens only. The EU/EFTA countries can exclude immigrants from getting welfare for a certain time period to avoid "welfare tourism," and they can refuse welfare completely if the immigrants do not have a job after a certain period of time and do not try to get one. Immigrants convicted of welfare fraud can be deported and be refused the re-entry of the country.
Right to consular protection in non-EU countries
When in a non-EU country where there is no German embassy, Germans as EU citizens have the right to get consular protection from the embassy of any other EU country present in that country. See List of diplomatic missions of Germany and List of diplomatic missions in Germany.
German citizens can be extradited only to other EU countries or to international courts of justice, and only if a law allows this (German Basic Law, Art. 16). Before the introduction of the European Arrest Warrant, the extradition of German citizens was generally prohibited by the German Basic Law.
Germany regularly publishes travel warnings on the website of the Auswärtiges Amt (Federal Foreign Office) to its citizens. The Office allows German citizens to register online in a special list, the Krisenvorsorgeliste ("Crisis-Prevention List") before they travel abroad ( Elektronische Erfassung von Deutschen im Ausland ELEFAND Electronic Registration of Germans Being Abroad). With a password, the registered persons can change or update their data. The registration is voluntary and free of charge. It can be used for longer stays (longer than 6 months), but also for a vacation of only two weeks. The earliest date of registration is 10 days before the planned trip.
See also
References and notes
Most numbers are from the www.ethnologue.com, apart from a few from German language and
Germans, as well as the following:
Notes
External links
