Germans (German: Deutsche) are the citizens or native-born people of Germany and those descended from the ethnic and ethnolinguistic group associated with the German language. This connection may be ethnic, historical, ancestral, cultural, legal or residential.The English term Germans has historically referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages.Legally, most Germans are citizens of the Federal Republic of Germany. Of approximately 100 million native speakers of German in the world, roughly 70 million consider themselves Germans. There are an additional 80 million people of German ancestry mainly in the United States, Brazil (almost all in South Region of the country), Argentina, Canada, South Africa, post-Soviet states (mainly in Russia and Kazakhstan), France, Australia, Chile and Italy (mainly in South Tyrol).Thus, the total number of Germans worldwide lies between 66 and 160 million, depending on the criteria applied (native speakers, single-ancestry ethnic Germans, partial German ancestry, etc.). Today, people from countries with a German-speaking majority such as Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Luxembourg, have developed their own national identity, and since the end of World War II, have not referred to themselves as "Germans" in a modern context.
Posted on: Fri, 19 Jul 2013 22:51:08 +0000
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