Assimilate for God: The Impact of Religious Divisions on Danish American Communities

Jeanet Bentzen, Nina Boberg-Fazlic, Paul Sharp, Christian Skovsgaard and Christian Vedel

No 18898, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: The cultural assimilation of immigrants into the host society is often equated with prospects for economic success, with religion seen as a potential barrier. We investigate the role of ethnic enclaves and churches for the assimilation of Danish Americans using a difference-in-differences setting. Following the ordination of a divisive religious figure in 1883, this otherwise small and homogeneous group split into rival Lutheran revivalist camps - so-called "Happy" and "Holy" Danes. The former sought the preservation of Danish culture and tradition, while the latter encouraged assimilation. We use data from the US census and Danish American church and newspaper archives, and find that Danish Americans living in a county with a "Happy" church chose more Danish names for their children. Newspapers read by "Holy Danes" saw a more rapid Anglicization of the language used. Religious beliefs thus facilitated assimilation. Divergence in behaviour only emerged following the religious division.

Keywords: Assimilation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F22 J61 N31 N32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024-03
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP18898 (application/pdf)
CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

Related works:
Working Paper: Assimilate for God: The Impact of Religious Divisions on Danish American Communities (2024)
Working Paper: Assimilate for God: The Impact of Religious Divisions on Danish American Communities (2024)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:18898

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP18898

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers Centre for Economic Policy Research, 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().