ANGLO-CELTIC AUSTRALIAN

'Anglo-Celtic Australian' is an ethnic or cultural category, used to describe the majority of Australians of European descent. It is considered to refer to the ethnic majority in Australia, where it applies to at least 80% of the population.^[1]
By the time of the 2001 Census of Australia, 38% of Australians identified their ancestry as simply "Australian".^[3] Because of the history of British settlement of Australia and modern Australian culture — which have been dominated by people from the United Kingdom and Ireland — this is also generally assumed to mean European-descended people of predominantly British and/or Irish ancestry, and is included in the Anglo-Celtic grouping.

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Usage

References

See also

Usage

The term Anglo-Celtic is primarily associated with Australians of British and/or Irish ancestry. It is often used interchangeably with the terms "Australian" or "Aussie", particularly by young people, when such words are used in an ethnic context. However, some Australians claiming strictly Anglo-Saxon or Celtic ancestry reject the term Anglo-Celtic.
The broad term reflects the composition of post-colonial Australian society, in which English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, and Cornish components fused into a singular national culture, and the resultant large demographic role of people with ancestry from two or more British or Irish ethnic backgrounds.
Anglo-Celtic Australian is often an inaccurate synonym for "Anglo Australian" or "Anglo-Saxon Australian" — that is, an Australian of English heritage. Some believe this is permissible because those regarded as Celtic peoples are perceived to be, by and large, English-speaking. "Anglo Australian" was used extensively in Australian media reports of the Cronulla riots in December 2005, despite the fact that many of the participants had non-English names.
It is also not uncommon for Australians of other northern European backgrounds, especially Dutch, German and Scandinavian people, to be labelled "Anglo-Celtic", based on cultural backgrounds and physical appearances that are similar to Anglo-Celtic people ''per se''.
Anglo-Celtic Australian does not carry any religious connotations. A relatively large proportion of Anglo-Celts have connections to Protestant or Catholic Christian denominations. However, many Anglo-Celtic Australians are agnostic or atheist. According to sociologist Adam Jamrozik, this is because the term "is of recent coinage and only started to have meaning after the sectarian conflicts between Irish Catholics and British Protestants lost salience — perhaps partly in the face of large scale non-British immigration, which produced another outgroup of “New Australians."^[4][5]

References

1. Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2003, "Population characteristics: Ancestry of Australia's population" (from 'Australian Social Trends, 2003'). Retrieved 01 September 2006.
2. Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2003, "Population characteristics: Ancestry of Australia's population" (from 'Australian Social Trends, 2003'). Retrieved 01 September 2006.
3. ''Ibid .''
4. http://larvatusprodeo.net/2005/04/26/anglo-celts/
5. Adam Jamrozik, "The Chains of Colonial Inheritance: Searching for Identity in a Subservient Nation", UNSW Press: Sydney, 2004

See also

★ Anglo-Celtic

★ Demographics of Australia

★ Europeans in Oceania