Thanksgiving

By Zoe Chiara Keesee MSS 13, 10.10.2022

In Germany Thanksgiving is a minor holiday that isn’t celebrated in a big way. In 2022 it took place on October 2nd. In the USA however, Thanksgiving is a national holiday celebrated on the 4th Thursday of November. Nowadays, it is a time for family, togetherness, gratefulness and specifically giving thanks for blessings.
The tradition is based on a harvest feast that took place in today’s Plymouth, Massachusetts in the year 1621. In the years before the feast the Pilgrims struggled to adapt to the living conditions in New England and their harvests were unsuccessful. However, the native Americans reached out to them and helped them learn how to plant corn and how to fish, among other skills. In November of 1621 the corn harvest was successful, and the pilgrims celebrated this for 3 days by having a feast and inviting the native Americans to join the festivities.
In 1863 Thanksgiving was declared a national holiday to promote unity during the Civil War and as we know, it is still an important holiday in the US today.
The first Thanksgiving was not only to celebrate gratitude for the harvest, but also to celebrate peace and cooperation between different peoples, so it seems only fitting that it was a symbol of unity when the country was divided in warring factions.

Vocabulary words:

1.  minor holiday – (hier) Feiertag, der nicht sehr groß gefeiert wird
2. nowadays – heutzutage
3. gratefulness – die Dankbarkeit
4. blessing, blessings (pl) – der Segen
5. harvest – die Ernte
6. feast – das Festmahl
7. unsuccessful – erfolgslos
8. native American – amerikanischer Ureinwohner, amerikanische Ureinwohnerin
9. skill – die Fähigkeit
10. (to) celebrate sth. – etw. feiern
11. unity – die Einigkeit
12. people, peoples (pl) – das Volk, die Völker
13. faction – eine Fraktion, eine Gruppierung