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The Norwegian diaspora consists of Norwegian emigrants and their descendants, especially those that maintain some of the customs of their Norwegian culture.

History

Norsemen left the area that is now the modern state of Norway in the Viking expansion, the settlement of Iceland and the conquest of Normandy.

In the 1500s and 1600s there was a small scattering out of Norwegian people and culture as Norwegian tradesmen moved along the routes of the timber trade.

The 19th century wave of Norwegian emigration began in 1825. The Midwestern United States, especially the states of Wisconsin and Minnesota, was the destination of most people who left Norway. Currently there are over 5 million Norwegian Americans and over 430,000 Norwegian Canadians. 30.1% of the people of the US state of North Dakota are of Norwegian descent.

Early emigrant communites in the US were an enthusiastic market for books written in Norwegian at least from the 1890s to 1930s. One popular writer for the Decorah-Posten, a major Norwegian-language newspaper in the US, was Torbjørg Lie, who imagined her readers "not so much adopting a new country as living in a diaspora." Meanwhile, newspapers in Norway were also eager to publish letters that recent emigrants had written home, telling of their experiences in foreign countries.

According to scholar Daniel Judah Elazar, "It was the Norwegian diaspora in the United States which initiated the separation of Norway from Sweden, which led to Norwegian independence in 1905." The Norwegian-American community overwhelmingly favored independence of Norway from Sweden, and collecting money for Norwegian rifle clubs in case the conflict should become violent. In 1884, the Minneapolis chapter of Den Norsk-Amerikanske Venstrefoening sent 4,000 kroners to Norway's Liberal Party (the party that favored independence.) Norwegian-Americans campaigned enthusiastically for the US to recognize Norway's independence from Sweden, with petitions and letters arriving in Washington, DC from most major cities. One petition from Chicago's Norwegian community bore 20,000 signatures. President Theodore Roosevelt did not change his stance, however, and remained neutral until after Sweden accepted the change.

Ties to the homeland

While modern Norway has a wary relationship with immigrants from non-European cultures, Norwegian emigration to the USA from the 19th century has fostered a flourishing Norwegian culture of the diaspora.

The Norwegian Emigrant Museum in Hamar, Norway is dedicated to "collecting, preserving and disseminating knowledge about Norwegian emigration, and to the preservation of cultural ties between Norway and those of Norwegian ancestry throughout the world," according to the museum's website, which states that a million Norwegians emigrated to other countries around the world between 1825 and 2000.

The Sons of Norway ("Sønner av Norge"), originally a small fraternal benefit organization, now has more than 60,000 members in the US and almost 3,000 in Canada. It is dedicated to promoting Norwegian culture and traditions.

The Vesterheim Norwegian-American Museum in Decorah, Iowa, is the oldest and most comprehensive museum in the United States devoted to a single immigrant ethnic group. It was founded in 1877 in association with nearby Luther College and re-dedicated in 1975 in a ceremony involving Norway's late King Olav. King Harald V of Norway will be present in October 2012 for the celebration of Luther College's sequicentennial.

Self-identified Norwegians, whether in Norway or elsewhere, celebrate "Syttende Mai" on May 17 as Norwegian Constitution Day. They may hold a children's parade, wear traditional clothing, or display ribbons of red, white, and blue. Norwegians in Sweden maintain their own Norwegian band "Det Norske Korp" for these celebrations.

Members of the Norwegian emigrant community in the United States "took a special pride" in Norway hosting the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer.

References

1. Margaret Clunies Ross (2010). The Cambridge Introduction to the Old Norse-Icelandic Saga. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521735203. So, in this context, Iceland was just one of many, the last settled colony of the Norwegian diaspora. Early reports appear to have suggested that people could make a good living in a place where land and resources were as yet unclaimed ... {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
2. Louis Sicking and Harry de Bles and Erlend des Bouvrie, ed. (2004). Dutch light in the "Norwegian night": maritime relations and migration. p. 46. ISBN 9065508147. By the time of the emigration from Norway to America in the nineteenth century, the memories of this earlier diaspora were already fading, according to professor Ludvig Daae, the first historian to have approached this theme seriously ... {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
3. Frederick Hale (author) (1986). Their own saga: letters from the Norwegian global migration. University of Minnesota Press. The Rim of the Norwegian Diaspora: From the inception of organized Norwegian emigration in 1825, remained the destination of most people who for one reason or another left Norway. Canada attracted tens of thousands, ... {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
4. Gulliksen, Øyvind Tveitereid (2004). Twofold identities: Norwegian-American contributions to Midwestern literature. Peter Lang. pp. 21–22. ISBN 0820462306. Writing for the Diaspora: The Case of Torbjorg and John Lie. ... What they read of poetry, fiction, and religious literature was often written and published by authors in Norway, ...
5. Elazar, Daniel Judah (1996). Kinship and Consent: The Jewish Political Tradition and Its Contemporary Uses. Transaction Publishers. pp. 172–173. ISBN 1560009330. It was the Norwegian diaspora in the United States which initiated the separation of Norway from Sweden, which led to Norwegian independence in 1905, and the Czech diaspora which initiated the establishment of Czechoslovakia after World War I.
6. Lovoli, Odd Sverre (1999). The promise of America: a history of the Norwegian-American people. University of Minnesota Press. p. 202. ISBN 0816633509.
7. Leiren, Terje I. "American Press Opinion and Norwegian Independence, 1905". Norwegian-American Historical Association. Retrieved 23 February 2011.
8. Anthony Ham and Miles Roddis (2005). Norway. Lonely Planet. p. 37. ISBN 1740595203. While modern Norway has a wary relationship with immigrants from non-European cultures, Norwegian emigration to the USA from the 19th century has fostered a flourishing Norwegian culture of the diaspora {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
9. "The Norwegian Emigrant Museum". Norway.com. Retrieved 23 February 2011.
10. "About us: Who we are". Sons of Norway. Retrieved 23 February 2011.
11. "Norway's royal couple to visit Luther". LaCrosse Tribune. 1 February 2011. Retrieved 23 February 2011.
12. "Det Norske Korps". Det Norske Korps. Retrieved 23 February 2011.
13. Roel Puijk (1997). Global spotlights on Lillehammer: how the world viewed Norway during the 1994 Winter Olympics. University of Luton Press. ISBN 1860205208. Sidesel and Kari in the American sample also show that the Norwegian disapora in the States took a special pride in the Games. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)

See also

• Sons of Norway
• Norwegian American
• Norwegian Canadian
• Norwegian Minnesotan
• List of US Communities where Norwegian is spoken
• Norse colonization of the Americas
• Scandinavian migration to the United Kingdom
• Scandinavian diaspora

v t e Norwegians abroad and their descendants
Europe	Denmark Finland Iceland Ireland Russia Sweden United Kingdom
Africa	South Africa
Americas	Brazil Canada Mexico United States Minnesota Dakota Venezuela
Asia & Oceania	Australia New Zealand
See also: Nordic diaspora and Norwegians

• Norwegian diaspora