Americans, why do you say you and your family is Irish/English/German/Swedish etc

<p>In a way, I agree with the original poster. I am first generation here in the US. My family is Polish, and I have an EU passport. It always irritates me when an American will come up to me and claim they are Polish when in fact they can not name a city in Poland other than Warsaw. </p>

<p>I think that there is a distinct difference beween “of Polish orign” and actually Polish.</p>