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Some writers here want to claim some kind of "Imperialism" of the United States of America in the Western Hemisphere, the Americas, based on its name and the use of the adjective "American" to describe its people. I want to point out the existence of and the true meaning of the Monroe Doctrine as put forward by the fifth President of the United States in the 1820s. The Monroe Doctrine declared that the time for European colonization and colonialism (two different things) in the Western Hemisphere was over with. It declared that no more of this would be tolerated by the United States, and that the United States would use its power to uphold the independence of all countries in this hemisphere that wanted it, and that it would block any new colonies in the Americas. With the help of the Unted States (diplomatically and otherwise), no new overseas colonies have been established here. For example, there have been no new colonies established in the Americas by Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, the U.K., the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, and so forth. All of the former Spanish, Portuguese ( Brazil), British ( Canada, the Bahamas, etc.), and French (Haiti) colonies have achieved their independence, if they wanted it with the possibility of some very small exceptions. The U.S. admittedly little to do with the independence of Canada, except perhaps with diplomacy. Credit the Canadians themselves in "150 years worth of angry letters" leading to the British North America Act of 1867, and Canadian independence.
The United States has also eliminated overseas colonialism itself by purchasing Alaska from Russia, the U.S. Virgin Islands from Denmark. The United States fought a war with Spain to bring about the independence of Cuba, and to eliminate the Spanish from Puerto Rico, and incidentally, from the Philippines and {Guam]], though those are not in this hemisphere.
The Philippines were peacefully granted their independence in 1946. Puerto Rico retains a "Commonweath" status with the U.S. by free elections by its people where the choices were Commonwealth, independence, and statehood. Guam and the Northern Marianas Islands retain free association with the U.S.
The United States and Canada maintain the longest unfortified border in the world. A treaty between the two drastically limits the number and the armaments of naval ships on the Great Lakes along their border. Coast Guard vessels are maintained there on the basis of mutual consent, and their primary duty is in lifesaving and enforcement of customs laws. Numerous border vaguaries between the U.S. and Canada have been settled peacefully, either through mutual agreement, or through arbitration. (See references to the 49th parallel of latitude border agreements.) In one case involving islands in the Puget Sound, the interesting arbitrator who was selected (and whose decision was accepted permanently) was Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. Questions about the boundaries of Maine and Alaska have been settled peacefully between the two. As a matter of fact, armed conflict between the United States and Canada is unthinkable on both sides. Both are members of close alliances, including NATO and the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD). (There's that word "American" again, and we all understand what it means. It is a bilateral agreement between the United States and Canada.)
If all of this sounds like "Imperialism" by the United States - or by Canada, either - I don't see it at all. The United States has also had a peaceful border with Mexico since 1848, and the rather small Gadsden Purchase of land from Mexico was paid for, fair and square. It was also quite barren land, and the U.S. mostly wanted it for building long railroad lines across, between Texas and California.
Also, since the United States of America was the first independent nation that was established on the continents of the Americas, its citizens had and have first claim on the use of the words "American" and "America" to refer to themselves and their country in all adjectival and noun forms. Everyone can view this as a "copyright" on the names, just like "Canada", "Mexico", "Cuba", and "The Bahamas" are copyrighted names for those countries for all practical purposes. 74.163.40.105 ( talk) 08:07, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
I know "American" for everything from the USA is quite common in the USA. But for all others, American refers to somebody or something originating from a continent, not one country of this continent, even not the most populous one.
See also the passage under Demonym, "Cultural Problems": Quote - The demonym for citizens of the United States of America suffers a similar problem, because "American" may ambiguously refer to both the USA and North and South America. United Statian is awkward in English, but it exists in Spanish (estadounidense), French (étatsunien(ne)), Portuguese (estado-unidense or estadunidense), Italian (statunitense), and also in Interlingua (statounitese). US American (for the noun) and US-American (when used as a compound modifier preceding a noun) is another option, and is a common demonym in German (US-Amerikaner), though almost unheard of in English. Latin Americans (who are the most affected by this use of American) also have yanqui (Yankee) and the euphemism norteamericano/norte-americano (North American, which includes the USA, Mexico, Canada, and several other countries). Frank Lloyd Wright proposed Usonian (which was taken over into Esperanto: country Usono, demonym Usonano, adjective usona). In the spirit of Sydneysider, Statesider is also a possibility. See main article: Use of the word American.
The 2007 Miss Teen USA contestant Caitlin Upton, who gained international notoriety for her otherwise nonsensical response to a question posed during the pageant, referred to the people of the United States as "U.S. Americans." - End of Quote
The citizens of the USA are indeed using "American" for things or people coming from the USA and tend to believe that the whole world - except a few nuts - does the same. However, as Demonym correctly states, in many languages other than English reference is made to the USA in some way, and not just to America, which is used for the continent only. This sounds rather like the US-Americans usurping the expression "American" on their behalf and for their convenience and just purporting that everybody else does the same.
The US-Americans are free in how they call themselves at home. An international encyclopedia, however, should not be sloppy in such a matter or follow a national particularity, but try to find an internationally acceptable consensus. And this has certainly to take into consideration that for about 6 Billion people "American" refers to the continent and only 300 Million US-Americans use it exclusively for themselves. Especially all North, Central and South Americans, even if not from the USA, must feel concerned by everything "American". Internationally we should thus remain precise and explicitly specify the origin as being the USA. I am open for any suggestion, but US-Americans looks nice to me.
I am Austrian for the records. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.183.70.209 ( talk) 19:59, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
Yeah and it should be added that, in China at least, American refers to the United States, NOT Latin America. So that's another 1.3 billion for the US argument.
59.38.32.5 (
talk)
14:18, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
Yesterday Deepstrategem removed the line: "Of the 35 sovereign countries in North and South America, only the United States of America contains the word America within its long-form name." I reverted him, because the line seemed uncontroversial(also reverted some of his subsequent disruption). Deep, why do you think the line should be removed? -- Cúchullain t/ c 22:52, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
1. The use of America to describe a unified "dual continent" consisting of both North and South (and for pity's sake Central) America.
That is one point.
2. The use of America to describe and label the country of, someone from, the ideaology of, et al "The United States of America".
That is the second point.
3. The fact that language is nowhere near concrete, and calling this "this" or that "that" is purely conjecture and there is no way around it.
That is the third point.
And that is all there is to discuss.
1. If you want to be considered "American" if you live in either of the two continents - fantastic. You can. However, the majority of the world's population will assume you are from the States. Which leads me to
2. It has become ---- correct to assume the word "America" or the term "American" to be directly related to the States. As WilyD has stated several times, whether it should or should not be this way is irrelavent (to put my own spin on it). Language, and the words they are comprised of, is (as stated previously) purely conjecture - it is all relative to the individual. Which leads me to
3. The argument speaks for itself. You can say that so-and-so is linguistically correct, but to the next person so-with-so is linguistically correct under the same guise. There are guidelines and invisible fences, but no concrete barriers. Especially when it comes to English.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.231.39.116 ( talk • contribs).
What an interesting debate we have here. I see Deep still has an ax to grind, and is determined to use whatever resources in his intellectual arsenal to prove that the use of the word American is US-centric. But, according to Deep, I guess I just ramble. Because, of course, anyone that disagrees with Deep is only rambling. Jcchat66 23:10, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
We of the United States of America, citizens of only one of many nations in the Americas, North, Central, and South, have preempted the informal name of our country, America, and our title, Americans. It may be arrogant and inaccurate that we do so [...] [2]
Some fascinating discussions regarding the use of "American". In my travels, I've found that most English speakers hear the word "American" to refer to citizens of the United States only (or other U.S.-related items, but for the sake of simplicity, I'm going to focus on the citizens). That's generally because there isn't a wide-spread term to refer to U.S. citizens (unfortunately), and since the United States is indeed the only nation in the Americas (the more accepted term for referring to all of the countries of North and South America) to have "America" as part of its long-form name, the United States has, right or wrong, pretty much hijacked that term. Guess it would be a lot simpler if "United States of American" weren't such an unweildy term, unlike the much simpler "South African" when distinguishing the people of that nation from the residents of the greater continent. Personally, I prefer to refer to myself as a "U.S. citizen" as I do have respect for non-U.S. Americans and agree that they should be as much Americans as any Frenchman or German is a European (yes, I realize they *are* Americans, but I'm refering to being universally understood as such). But it doesn't change the fact that to say "America" or "American" without a qualifier of some sort will have the hearer infer that you mean a citizen or resident of the United States. And whether it is literally correct or not doesn't make much difference, as the ultimate point of speaking any language properly is to have the message understood by the hearer, and English speakers hear "American" to mean "U.S. resident". Of course, this really only applies when we're talking about English speakers; there might be widespread terms in other languages, as some have noted here, but do note that languages are never 100 percent parallel, that is, a phrase that means one thing in French can be literally translated to English or Spanish and quite accurately so (again, speaking of a purely literal translation), but it's meaning can still be distorted because of differentations in idiom, etc. Plus the fact that in some cases, there are words that have no literal translation when going from language to language. Thus how a Spanish-speaking person refers to a U.S. resident doesn't have as much bearing on what terminology an English-speaking person should use as one might hope. Nolefan32 19:55, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
American
American
AMERICAN. An occasional term for English as used in the US, often in contrast with English (sometimes British), and seriously or facetiously implying a distinct language: ‘The American I have heard up to the present, is a tongue as distinct from English as Patagonian’ (Kipling, From Sea to Sea, 1889); ‘Too often are spoken English and spoken American criticized as though it were impossible for them to have any laws of their own’ (Partridge, Usage and Abusage, 1947/57); ‘Brandon has a beaut: the transmission from American to English of cost-effective’ (Safire, New York Times, Oct. 1988).
These are some facts as reported by various OUP publications.
In four years of living in Europe, I encountered very many non-native English speakers who used the word "American" to refer to anything in or from the western hemisphere. That's also a fact, or very many - if you count each instance. There have been some statements in preceding posts concerning the majority of English speakers. One might assume that the majority of English speakers use the language similarly to native speakers of the U.K., Canada, and the U.S.; however in the early 1980's (according to the Oxford Companion to the English Language), "the total [number of English speakers worldwide] of circa 700 million was widely accepted", of which c.300m., or less than half, were native speakers. The same article, "ENL, ESL, and EFL territories", went on to say that the figure for the total numer of English speakers might well be doubled (as of 1985), which would further solidify native speakers' minority status. So I'd argue that it's speculative at best to state how the majority of English speakers use the word "American".
If there's a significant debate (outside of Wikipedia) about the use of the word "American" as a political tool to deny the sovereign existence of other states in the Americas, then this too is a fact that can be the subject of an article.
Let's document it all and try to represent it accurately. Robert Turner 02:02, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
First of all the original claim (that French, German and Italian use the term "American" to mean USAan only) is unsourced, so why let it stand?
Second, sources in these languages that use "Amerika/Amérique/Americhe" for the combined landmass of North/South/Central America/Carribean etc are numerous, I can cite printed encyclopedias for example.
Third, unclear? What precisely is unclear? I'm willing to clarify if it was pointed out.
Fourth, I get the impression that the original claim (that "American" refers to the USA in most languages) is heavily culturally biased.
Anorak2 14:47, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
What you say makes no sense, Willy, and as far as I can tell is heavily culturally biased. You try to sell your yankeefied worldview. I give up, yankeefy as much as you like. Anorak2 21:16, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
"It is true that I'm trying to make sure that the article reflects the English language usage of an English language word, rather than masquerade some non-English words as English words and extrapolate the usage in other languages to reflect some other use." (WilyD said this above). I agree with this sentiment. Languages are not 100 percent parallel. In Greek, there's several different words that translate to the English word "love", but each has it's own distinct meaning. In Japanese, there's only one word that means both "blue" and "green". French is well known for having phrases that literally translate to English one way but in actual usage infer completely other meanings. In other words, what words and terms may mean in other languages cannot be used as arguments for what they should or should not mean in English. For purposes of parsing, each language really needs to be looked at within a vacuum. I said it above and I'll repeat it here (as it seems to have been lost), it's unfortunate but there isn't a single term that can refer to U.S. residents or as an adjective for items from the States outside of "American". If there was, I'd happily use it, but there's not, and so the English speaking world considers "America" (when no modifier is used) to mean the United States; otherwise, it's "North America," "South America" or "the Americas". This isn't the only time that terms which grammatically mean one thing have come to infer something else in common usage - likewise, "African-Americans" don't have to have dual citizenship to use that term (even though "German-American" still infers an American citizen born in Germany), and caucasians can't use the term "Native American" regardless of where they were born. Personally, I prefer to refer to myself as a "U.S. citizen", as I do have respect for the fact that Canadians, Brazilians, etc., should technically be considered Americans (just as Germans, Italians, Spaniards, etc. are all Europeans); unfortunately, there's still not a word I can use when I want to complain about the build quality of cars designed and built in the United States, i.e., except to call them "American" cars. It might not be politically correct, but that's the way it is, and unfortunately, there isn't any other term that has effectively challenged it. Nolefan32 22:50, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Sorry Nolefan32, but you are misreading both my comment and the article. The article says that in reference to U.S. Americans there is no serious alternative besides American. It doesn't say that it is the most frequent usage of the word which has more than one meaning. I hope that makes sense to you. Or maybe I can draw a map
Here you have to make a distinction between references to Americans and references to the word.
-U.S. American -American
-American (resident of the continent) -American
-American (indigenous) -Native American -Indigenous American -American
The article says that the word American as defined at the top of the list only has one frequently used mapping. It doesn't deny the other mappings. If instead it was referring to the converse, then you would be correct. But it doesn't. Deepstratagem 23:27, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Your edit was not exactly minor, Wily, nor was it a matter of grammar. Those people are considered "United States or American" by their government. Regardless of what the sample respondents reported, all ancestries coded between 939 and 994 (American, United States, the names of the states (excluding Hawai'i, including the federal district (Georgia included, though not Georgia CIS)), Southerner, and North American) were aggregated as "United States or American" at American Fact Finder. As you can see at the Maps of American ancestries' Talk Page, AFF is the source of the data.
Feel free to confirm my interpretation by clicking on the AFF link above, click on "Fact Sheet - Fact Sheet for a Race, Ethnic, or Ancestry Group", enter "American" in the "Find" field, and click "Find"/"Find Next" until you find your "Americans". Note the "(939-994)". If you click on "Go", you can get more information on this ancestry group. The complete ancestry code list is here: [3].
If you want to order the raw data CD from the Bureau and run it through a
GIS to make a map more to your liking, knock yourself out, hoser.
.s
Ack
X ile 07:28, 15 May 2007 (UTC) - Talk
"Yo creí siempre que en la América nuestra no era posible hablar de muchas patrias, sino dé una patria gránde y única; yo creí siempre que si es alta la idea de la patria, expresión de todo lo que hay de más hondo en la sensibilidad del hombre: amor de la tierra, poesía del recuerdo, arrobamientos de gloria, esperanzas de inmortalidad, en América, más que en ninguna otra parte, cabe, sin desnaturalizar esa idea, magnificarla, dilatarla; depurarla de lo que tiene de estrecho y negativo, y sublimarla por la propia virtud de lo que encierra de afirmativo y fecundo: cabe levantar sobre la patria nacional, la Patria americana, y acelerar el día en que los niños de hoy, los hombres del futuro, preguntados cuál es el nombre de su patria, no contesten con el nombre del Brasil, ni con el nombre de Chile, ni con el nombre de Méjico, porque contesten con el nombre de América.
Toda política internacional americana que no se oriente en dirección a ese porvenir y no se ajuste a la preparación de esa armonía, será una política vana y descarriada."
JOSÉ ENRIQUE RODÓ (15 July 1872 – 1 May 1917) (uruguayo)
In "Manual de Español", Idel Becker. Companhia Editora Nacional, São Paulo, 1953.
"Conventional Wisdom of the Dominant Group" (from C.H. Waddington, Tools for Thought, page 16). I mention this while rereading this soapbox again after a few months, specifically the line "That's flat out wrong. Consensus of usage is the sole mechanism for validating english usage. No other exists." by WilyD, and which has been defended by others here as well.
And no, I am not Deepstrategem, although I sympathize with his patience and the fact that he has been the biggest contributors to this article. But I don't have his patience when dealing with the mediocrity of other so-called contributors, who only want to push their limited understanding based on COWDUNG, like Cúchullain, Coolcaesar and Daramane who chose to crucify Deepstrategem, accusing him (incorrectly) of pushing a minority view, while ignoring that WilyD is pushing a nichy anti-US agenda (full of generalizations bordering prejudice) that claims that the meaning of the word "American" as "being from the Americas" somehow implies that "Manifest Destiny" is still alive and ready to engulf Canada.
Every time I hear someone claiming consensus as reason for anything, I also hear its closely related parasites getting near: demagogy, and with it, ignorance. What a shame for so-called encyclopedists! Diderot and d'Alembert, who worked on bringing the selected minority educated view to the masses, are probably crying in their tombs. 70.122.45.124 07:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
"The most commonly expounded theory is that German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller derived it from the Latinized version of the name of Amerigo Vespucci (Americus Vespucius), an Italian merchant and cartographer whose exploratory journeys in the early 1500s brought him to the eastern coastline of South America and to the Caribbean. None of this work survives, and Vespucci himself does not give his name to the lands he describes." [emphasis added]
It is unclear what work does not survive. The publicly-accessible part of the 120 year old article that is supposedly the source says:
Vespucci "wrote observations on latitude and longitude and accounts of his voyages, and drew or corrected charts. None of these works exist. Some letters of his to two friends are extant, and in these he gives notes of his voyages and of the strange people he had seen. Two of these letters were published during his life . . ." [emphasis added]
Vespucci was a navigator, so it's safe to assume he drew or corrected charts and wrote observations of latitude and longitude and accounts of his voyages. It was his published letters (and the authenticity of some, but by no means, all of the letters is in dispute) that were the basis for the Cosmographiae Introductio and Universalis Cosmographia. These works survive. I have seen them. Follow the external links from those articles and see for yourself.
.s
Ack
X ile 18:07, 26 June 2007 (UTC) - Talk
I've heard and read people use U.S American to refer to U.S citizens, I hope its fine that I added this. Thanks!
and USA should be United Stetas Of Americas
Shouldn't it be included in the article that we apply the same principle in calling people from the United States of Mexico (Estados Unidos de Mexico) Mexicans (mexicanos), instead of "estadounidenses mexicanos", just as calling people from the United States of America (Estados Unidos de America) Americans (americanos) instead of "estadounidenses"? I am from Costa Rica, and I do get offended by stupid stuff, just as most Latin Americans do about using "American" as a demonym for the United States. I am not offended by this one, because of the logic I used in the title: Estados Unidos de Mexico : mexicano :: Estados Unidos de America : americano. What I am offended about, though, is seeing that the article says Central America is a part of North America, which to me is just ridiculous, but I'll do some research about it.
United States of Mexico : Mexican :: United States of America : American
WRONG. The official name of Mexico is 'Estados Unidos Mexicanos', which translates into 'United Mexican States'.
The analogy is corrupt, and the conclusion would not support historical fact, regardless.
It would not support the implied redundancy in the name of the United States of America, either; since it was named because of America the landmass and not in spite of it. Deepstratagem ( talk) 15:29, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
The problem with this argument is that "America" was the name of the continent first, and later for a confederation of states that was NOT America but IN America. This confederation of states became a country and in the process it did not accuire an original name. Mexico IS an original name for a country. So even in the name "United States of America", America refers to the continent, not the country. This could explain why the United States of America is sometimes refered to as simply the United States or U.S. and why, in spanish, it is allways written as EE.UU. (equivalent of U.S.) and never EE.UU.A. (equivalent of U.S.A.). Also, this means that "United States of Mexico" or "United Mexican States" is not equivalent to "United States of America" or "United American States". It also means that to call U.S. citizens "Americans" is linguistcally incorrect. 190.75.42.89 ( talk) 04:05, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
This argument seems a little silly. If everyone from both continents of the Americas is an American, then since the U.S. is in North America, then everyone from the U.S. is an American. It is the only demonym for a U.S. citizen and was used for the people in the colonies by the British before the U.S. existed. People from other countries in the Americas will say their country demonym (Columbian, Mexican, Belizean, Brazilean) if someone asks what their nationality is. Reliable sources are used here, and they say American refers to someone of the United States, some as the primary definition, but that it can also refer to someone from the Americas. One definition is used more often, but both are correct. Let's stop with the soap box rants on the talk pages about the Americas, America, or American. Kman543210 ( talk) 22:22, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
This section confuses me.
"…to refer to U.S. citizens. These languages generally have other terms for U.S. nationals…"
Is this about other languages having multiple terms for "U.S." and "American" in reference to people, or is this about other languages having different terms for U.S. citizens and U.S. non-citizen nationals? — RVJ 11:19, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
To say "America" just to say "U.S.A." is too despective for the rest of America. Well, I see it as "European" (I think it is just a region name). History called the continent with the name of America. Whitout any kind of negative meaning.
U.S.A. people decided to call its/his country using the name of the continent.
Don't you think you have enough hatred in your people to set up more walls between cultures?
What the heck is a "Latin American"? What is an "American"? We are all just humans. One of your presidents said: "We are all Americans" and that's right because America is a continent.
And now, ironicaly, if Bush goverment is still taking the freedom of invading other places... I think we all have to get the freedom and right of taking part in elections of the U.S.A. (not America) president. If you have humour sense you'll get this is a joke.
"Dont you change lifes for medals, soldier."
My apologies for my poor English and thanks for reading. Every interlocutor worths
Let's see if I can clear up one or two things... And, by the way, since nationalities seem to have such bearing on the subject, I am a Latin American.
In the 1700's Latin America was a series of Spanish colonies (the U.S., a series of English ones). New Spain was an administrative division, a Viceroyalty which covered most of what today is called North America (Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean and a good deal of the present day U.S.). If I am not wrong, there is also a New England, a region that retains its name to this day. New Spain was merely an administrative label, and was not kept after independence. If used, it is, at most, a reference to colonial Mexico, and not even all of Mexico, merely the center and south, and perhaps a part of Guatemala (what the Aztecs and Mayans once ruled, which was were the Spanish centered their colonial empire along with Peru).
I wonder when was it that, according to Jcchat, the countries of North and South America had those good relationships. The war with Mexico? The invasion of Nicaragua? Operation Condor? I don't want to turn this into a blaming marathon (the subject is too politically charged as it is, and I think DRoBeR's attitude doesn't help at all), but the "we all got along well until you had a problem with how we call ourselves" is ridiculous. And it really doesn't matter what the 1700's colonial English thought. When the country was named United States of America, the name from the continent (or continents, that is another matter) was taken away and given to a country. That really is the problem. At the time of the independece of Latin America, several countries had no name; they were American, and eventually took on a name. None used "America" as part of its official name because it was understood to stand for the whole thing.
As for "pride in our countries", we have plenty. That's part of the reason we get upset about this whole business; it is seen as something imposed by the most powerful country in the hemisphere, and the world for that matter. We don't want to give away the name that stands for all of us (Latin Americans and the rest of Americans). Think about it, if America meant only the USA, why would there even be a South America? I'm not dumb, I know that present day U.S. Americans don't use the term to offend; they've been hearing about it since they were kids. But that is as puzzling for us to understand as it is for you to get why it is that we protest. When I was a child, the first time I heard the use of "American" as U.S. only, I was confused about it. Now that I have a greater understanding of the matter, I still feel the use of America for the continent/supercontinent, with American as anything relating to it, makes more sense and is better supported by history.
The matter, as I said, is politically charged enough; that's why I tried to be cold-headed and answer what was written in this section without spite. But it is something that we feel deeply, I can assure you.
Rocabatus (
talk)
19:43, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
Hi. In sentences "Latin Americans also may employ the term norteamericano (North American), which itself conflates the United States and Canada. However, this term may also refer to anyone from the North American continent, which also includes Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean." must be added Mexico after Canada, because that is the original meaning of norteamericano, which now means "from/related to United States". Moreover, the sentences "However, this term..." only can be applied to term North American but no to norteamericano, because in Spanish language (and Iberoamerican culture) there are six continents and Norteamérica is a subcontinent from isthmus of Tehuantepec to North. Bye. -- Lin linao ( talk) 14:39, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
As anyone who speaks Spanish fluently and has lived in Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, and/or South America knows, the word "norteamericano" is most often used and understood as referring specifically and exclusively to the United States, not the US and Canada; this is its primary connotation in actual speech. The word "estadounidense" is rarely used in speech, presumably since it hardly flows off the tongue and sounds very formal. I suggest that the current reference to "norteamericano" in Spanish referring to the US and Canada be removed. Also, these kinds of definitions should be avoided unless a source can be cited. Is there any Spanish dictionary that disucsses the varied connotations of this word? The RAE is not a good source since it is aimed more at style issues than linguistic accuracy.
In addition, the word "americano" is very frequently used in many Spanish-speaking countries (Mexico and Central America in particular) to refer specifically to the United States, with the meaning (continental or US-specific) obvious from context. It is less often used this way in print, however this usage is quite common in speech. Again, citations to sources is necessary.
Hi, I would like to comment that in other Spanish-spearking countries (such as Chile and Argentina) the word "americano" is not that frequently used to refer to someone from the U.S. While the word "norteamericano" can be used to refere both people from the U.S. and Canada. At least in my country (Chile) the most common way to refer specifically to the United States is just saying "de Estados Unidos" (from the United States). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.112.25.55 ( talk) 04:17, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea is a part of the Australian continent, and in fact, they could call themselves rightly "Australians". So if we're going to pick on Americans, we should rightly pick on Australians too, because they don't have a monopoly on the word "Australian".
Or, we could just let the U.S. have the term "American" because we were the first country in the American supercontinent (Much like Australia was the first country in the Australian continent) and let people with anti-American sentiment find some other route for their views other than silly nomenclature. ColdRedRain ( talk) 17:21, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
Wrong. The country is called the "United States of America" and not "America". I don't know what is the first European country but let say it's Italy. Can Italians claim they are the only true Europeans? Anyways, as said in the article about Australia, the name Australia for the continent is a bad name many people doesn't agree with. In many languages the continent is named something which sounds like or translate to Oceania. 132.203.168.38 ( talk) —Preceding comment was added at 16:32, 8 July 2008 (UTC)
Since according to Latins, we're not "American", can we have the name to our sport back? I mean, "estadounidos football" doesn't roll off the tongue that well. ColdRedRain ( talk) 21:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
ColdRedRain, I am afraid that your comments are plagued with national sentimentalism and have little credibility. What exactly is "your sport"? Who are these Latins?(mabye you are referring to latin-americans) What do you mean have the name back?(surely you know that football exists from long before american football and is internationally known as football, the U.S. being the only country that uses the term "soccer"). My suggestion would be to stop taking linguistic corrections as an insult to your nation and to be a bit more serious in your interventions. 190.75.42.89 ( talk) 04:11, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
hmm.... Japan uses the word soccer ChesterTheWorm ( talk) 19:18, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
why is there an article titled American(word)? There are many words with multiple definitions. For example: Football, when I say football I mean the tackle, gridiron American Football. I know outside of the US this means what I mean by soccer. If I search football, do I get an article on Football(word)? We should handle American the same way. Have an article for each definition as it is now, I can't find an article on Americans. I can find one about the French, but not the Americans? Do we have to exist for a few more hundreds of years to be significant enough for a stub? Frankly, I don't know where this controversy came from, and it has been on wikipedia for years. I am still trying to find it in the real world. (I asked some Spanish speakers about it) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.156.208.3 ( talk) 05:04, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
Reading a story about statements made by Canadian officials concerning their discussions with an Obama staffer I couldn't help noticing this quote from the Canadian PM Stephen Harper:
He doesn't say "US Election" as might be fashionable in some quarters but there isn't any doubt which country he's talking about. I'm sure someone will say that because the US is in the Americas that that's the "American" he was talking about but any fluent English speaker would know that isn't true.
My regards to all of you still fighting cultural imperialism in this little corner of the world. (Cultural imperialism, as in the attempt by Spanish speakers to linguistically colonize the English word "American".)
Sumergocognito ( talk) 02:10, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
I made this change to keep the article neutral. The introduction should not be argumentative (and the rest of the article shouldn't either). I think we can all agree that the current introduction is more encyclopedic, in that it states what is, instead of sneakily trying to impose a narrow point of view. Deepstratagem ( talk) 14:10, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
This is about tag cleanup. As all of the tags are more than a year old, there is no current discussion relating to them, and there is a great deal of editing done since the tags were placed, they will be removed. This is not a judgement of content. If there is cause to re-tag, then that of course may be done, with the necessary posting of a discussion as to why, and what improvements could be made. This is only an effort to clean out old tags, and permit them to be updated with current issues if warranted. In this case, I see you have some issues at hand. I'm still removing the tag - if you wish to put an updated tag outlining current issues, then by all means do so. Jjdon ( talk) 17:46, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
I object to this change on the grounds that it is an incorrect translation. Normally, when translating from one language to another, the grammar, structure, and context and audience are to be taken into account. This is how professional and legal translations are done. The original paragraph is specifically discussing the English use of the word, and it is explicit:
(in English, without an accent)
Furthermore, the only place where italics are necessary are in the first and last words. And the accent marks, obviously, are not necessary either, since this article is in English. Deepstratagem ( talk) 09:51, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
The article states that the Declaration of Independence proclaimed a country named the United States of America and that this was the "first, official usage" of the name. I'm not certain this is true. As a technical matter, I don't think there was any legal entity know as the "United States of America" until either 1777 (final draft of the Articles of Confederation) or possibly 1781 (the de jure adoption of the Articles). Also, it isn't clear to me that the people signing the Declaration or even the Articles necessarily considered the union of thirteen states to be a single country. CAVincent ( talk) 00:15, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
Very little space in this article is given over to the history of how the term "America" and "American" came, in certain connotations, to refer to the United States specifically, both in that country and in perhaps most countries around the world. Are there any reliable published academic sources that have researched this mystery, that I'm sure many people have wondered at? 72.70.118.105 ( talk) 08:41, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
I removed the term "Dominion of Canada", since, according to the Btitish North American Act (1867), the country's official name is just "Canada". Quoting from Article 2:
"the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick shall form and be One Dominion under the Name of Canada [...] those Three Provinces shall form and be One Dominion under that Name accordingly."
"Unless it is otherwise expressed or implied, the Name Canada shall be taken to mean Canada as constituted under this Act."
Compare this to the wording of the Royal Proclamation of 1907 (regarding New Zealand):
"Whereas We have [..] determined that the title of Dominion of New Zealand shall be substituted for that of the Colony of New Zealand as the designation of the said Colony, We have therefore by and with the advice of Our Privy Council thought fit to issue this Our Royal Proclamation [...], the said Colony of New Zealand and the territory belonging thereto shall be called and known by the title of the Dominion of New Zealand."
I hope this clarifies the facts! Prof.rick ( talk) 04:45, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
There are an assumed 36 countries in America (the Western Hemisphere). It seems rather presumptuous of ONE of those countries to call itself "America", and its citizens, "Americans". The name "United States of America" might imply that all American (Western Hemisphere) countries are members of these "united states".
No it doesn't and no it won't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.37.222.239 ( talk) 19:26, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
Others of the Western World have no problem with the name of your country...Gee thanks...we can simply call it the "United States". But when you call it "America" we feel you have stolen the name of a hemisphere,,,We didn't steal it. It was given to us. All we did was accept it,,, and made it your own. The other 35 countries are clearly not members of the United States.
We also have great difficulty with the term "American". You use it to identify your nationality, but ALL who live in the Western Hemisphere are Americans. (Couldn't you call yourselves United Statians, or something like that? Much of the the world identifies you thusly, but it is difficult in English!)
This is why so many non-USA Americans feel threatened when you call your country America, and yourselves Americans. Can you not think of another name to call yourselves, even United Staters?
Perhaps your founding fathers had no idea of the future implications of the naming of your country, "The United States of America". (Or perhaps they suffered from a dilusion that evenentually you would would rule the entire Western Hemisphere?) Prof.rick ( talk) 06:32, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
I assume (perhaps naively) that most U.S. citizens would prefer to be known as U.S. citizens, rather than Americans. They know the implications of the latter name to the rest of the world...for better or for worse! (Of course, there are a few who would like to maintain your identity as "America" and "Americans"...for better or for worse.
Since this article is about "American (word)", I feel all these comments are completely relevant to the article. In fact, the article is as much about the abuse of the term "American" as about the legitimate use of the term.
Views from other countries of the Americas and the rest of the world would be most welcome!
Your comments can greatly contribute to the "tone" of the article! PLEASE, let your voice be heard!
I am a Canadian, and have mixed feelings! I object to one country stealing the name of our hemisphere as its own; likewise, I do not want to be identified as an "American" because of the sore reputation of the U.S., which is widely known as "America".
I hope my comments wil bring forth some light, and stimulate further discussion of this very "touchy" article. PLEASE, CONTRIBUTE YOUR VIEWS! Prof.rick ( talk) 06:32, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
Your just another American hater. Nobody hates Americans like Canadians. This guy wants to stamp out the use of the word American. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.18.61 ( talk) 20:24, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
Hi there! Thanks to everyone who has contributed to my request for more opinions. (Can we hear from more Canadians, eh?) Your contributions are sincerely appreciated. This is inevitably a controversial article, since the term "American" is itself controversial, and the very reason for the existence of this Article. For the most part, I like the rewrite of the lead, although I might edit a word or two!
I understand that the people of the United States have few choices in identifying themselves, and almost always fall back on the word, "American". History can prove helpful in how this all came about, and (one chance in a million) resolve the issue. I'll write more later, but meanwhile await further comments! Best to all, Prof.rick ( talk) 04:36, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
Revisions to an otherwise exceptionally well-written lead: removed the word "originally", since reference is made to "The Americas" (modern usage), and the evolution of the term American is discussed. ("Originally" suggests this is no longer true.)
Changed "Latin Americans" to "other members of the Americas", since Canadians generally share this view, and are not predominantly Latin-American.
I also question Reference 1, since it refers to a book published in the U.S., and therefore may be biased. Similarly, I question the removal of my references from a Canadian English Dictionary!!!
This Article will inevitably continue to be contoversial...so, fellow editors, let us all approach it with as much open-mindedness and mutual understanding as possible. Sincerely, Prof.rick ( talk) 06:27, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
I've done a rewrite in the "Canada" section. I hope, if you disagree, you will not simply revert without discussion on this page. I also intend to add a new section on the obvious dilemma "What can US citizens call themselves?" US citizens are in the most unfortunate position of being able to refer to themselves only through the use a word which refers to continents! Of course, it seems egocentric to much of the world, but you're in a tough position!
Your Canadian Friend, Prof.rick ( talk) 09:55, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
Special Message to Wily: The weakest definition of Canadian I have ever hear is not American. (Sure, I've heard it as a joke.) But we have much which makes us a unique nation, I wouldn't try to list it all...it would take forever. Also, most of us do NOT want to become an annex of the United States. We treasure our Canadian identity. Prof.rick ( talk) 10:08, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
On another note, I think I've gotten a start on eliminating a lot of the repeated confusion over terminolgy with the new article on Names of the Americans (forged from what was a fairly shitty article on Alternative adjectives for U.S. citizens). From now on discussion of what to call United Staters should go there, while this article will be on how the word is used.-- Cúchullain t/ c 17:07, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
This Section was becoming rather lengthy and confusing; thus, the new Section.
Hello, Cuchallain! You're move to recreate a new Article on "Names of the Americans" was BRILLIANT! (I agree, the last attempt to propose names for residents/citizens of the U.S. was shitty!) This should at very least relieve the present Article from some of its elements of controversy. THANK YOU! Prof.rick ( talk) 04:57, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
I question your reversion of the "Canada" section, suggesting that the term "American" applies only to residents/citizens of the U.S., and to Latin America. (You have excluded Canada, the largest country, by area, of the Americas, and Greenland, the world's largest island! If this is true, we may as well exclude Canada from the Article. No doubt other Canadians will eventually insist that "American" is a term belonging also to Canadians, and not just residents/citizens of the U.S. and to Latin Americans.
Sorry for my lack of references! It was the middle of the night when I rewrote the section on Canada, and I was simply too tired to add references, but KNOWING they were present in the Articles to which I provided links.
Furthermore, the term "American" referring to inhabitants of United States, obviously excludes Hawaii, which is NOT part of the Americas. Although your source may be valid, it is very easy to find other sources which refer to Americans as ALL residents/citizens of the Americas.
For now, I will simply remove the section on "Canada", since you do not regard Canadians as Americans. (This does NOT exclude the possibily of the future inclusion of Canada, with a rewrite which may involve many editors, eventually arriving at logical decisions.
It might also be worth noting that NAFTA refers to the U.S. (not U.S.A.)
Let's stick with it!!! Prof.rick ( talk) 05:27, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
Thank for for your interest and continuing efforts in this, a most difficult article for all sincere editors! Prof.rick ( talk) 05:27, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
I've edited Par. 1 of the lead to include not only Latin Americans but Canadians, citing a reliable source. (Further references in the Article further justify this edit, despite the claim that "American" refers only to residents of U.S., and Latin America! If anyone wishes to challenge this logical and documented edit, (let alone reverting it without explanation), I will probably abandon the article entirely. I am a Professor of Music, not politics! Still, I have strong political views, and would like to continue to strive towards the ever-challenging neutralization of this Article! I am convinced, if we KEEP WORKING AT IT, we can achieve an unbiased and factual article, of which we will all eventually be proud to have contributed. (I've attempted, in my edits, to convey the fact that not all Canadians regard the term "American" (in reference to the United States) to be pejorative! Prof.rick ( talk) 06:59, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
During the first half of the eighteenth century the term "American" generally meant Native American.
During the second half of the eighteenth century, especially during the French and Indian War (the North American theater of the Seven Years War) of 1754–1763, the term "American" acquired the meaning of a British subject from one of the British North American colonies. This may have been associated with a war-related distinction between "Americans" serving part-time in militia units and professional soldiers from the British Isles in the regular army.
The English-speaking colonists of British North America who came to refer to themselves as "Americans" during the French and Indian War (Seven Years War) probably did not view themselves as engaging in an exercise of global hegemony and certainly were not a world power by anyone's standards. Indeed, when the British generals used the term about the members of the militias under their command, it was unlikely to have been spoken as a compliment. The terminology, like much else about the United States, is accidental. People should not read too much into it. -- Bob —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bob99 ( talk • contribs) 23:25, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
The result of the move request was no consensus -- Aervanath ( talk) 07:11, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
American (word) → American — make the article about the word the primary topic for "American", hatnote linking to American (disambiguation) for other topics known as "American" — JHunterJ ( talk) 22:15, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
*'''Support'''
or *'''Oppose'''
, then sign your comment with ~~~~
. Since
polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account
Wikipedia's naming conventions.Topic was brought up at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation#American. As a neutral, previously-uninvolved editor in the disambiguation project, I propose a solution in which the article about the word is moved to the primary topic (base name). This will enable pages that link directly to American to be "right" (links to dab pages are usually in need of fixing) if they don't intend one of the other definitions specifically. If will also enable the dab page to either (a) cover just those terms that aren't on the word article (such as America (band)) or (b) list both word-article terms and other terms, hopefully without further drama. -- JHunterJ ( talk) 22:23, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
Yes, we are diffrent countries in America but we all share the same Nationality and that is American.
American (word) is the shared nationality of the 35 countries of America, and should be treated that way.
Kind Regards, American(Can) ( talk) 00:31, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
If the original spelling hadn't been changed there would no "room for confusion". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.76.246 ( talk) 20:22, 17 August 2009 (UTC) There was a District of Columbia long before there was a Republic of Colombia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.76.246 ( talk) 20:29, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
Can we have a section about using common sense? Stating something along the lines of. Other countries dispute the use of the word american to refer to citizens of the USA because this term is said, by them, to refer to everyone from the americas. However, since the residents of the US are residing on the continent of north america, it seams reasonable, nay commonsensical to refer to them as Americans. International affairs are rarely common sense affairs however" What do you think, could do with some ironing out but it seems to make its point quite well, yay or nay? Signed: a European, British, English man. :) Kungfukats2 ( talk) 20:39, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
No. -- Deepstratagem ( talk) 13:01, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
Why not, smartass? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.16.78 ( talk) 13:53, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
Because it doesn´t "make its point quite well". Deepstratagem ( talk) 15:48, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I would like to know if any of those Spanish-speaking countries have made diplomatic protests over the name of American Samoa. The UN recognizes the name, as do all countries in the Americas. It is not a territory of any of those other countries in the W. Hemisphere, it is a U.S. territory. There is no confusion in Polynesia, New Zealand, or Australia about the term American Samoa. Everybody knows what American means. This is just one more example why people opposed to the American usage of the term American are fighting a losing, uphill battle.-- MoebiusFlip ( talk) 05:45, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
The article doesn't benefit from a long list of examples where the word "American" is used in U.S. laws to refer to the United States, as has been recently added. And the fact that Hillary Clinton, like virtually all other people in the country, refers to US citizens as Americans is not necessary. Primary sources being compiled in such a way as to make interpretive claims (such as "The State Department has no record of a diplomatic protest over the use of the term American to refer to U.S. citizens or U.S. institutions in any of these countries" or "These travel guides, however, do not urge caution to people from American Samoa not to use the name of their U.S. territory, however") is against the no original research policy.-- Cúchullain t/ c 12:24, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
As this talk page and the article itself make clear, there is a concerted effort to show that there is more controversy about this term than there really is. There are also efforts to show that there is diversity in the United States about the term, and this is an incredible stretch that takes a lot of wp:original research to even assert. There have been edit wars to keep out sourced information from wp:verifiable references that do not fit some editors' preferences for the "argument of the article." The article is neither balanced nor neutral. It needs new and neutral help, and it needs some careful eyes to prevent wp:own problems, which seem to be rife here. Stating that a large verifiable source does not include certain notable information (like the fact that there are no diplomatic protests evidenced on the State Department website) is not wp:original research, any more than pointing out that a dictionary had a definition one year, but later did not. Certain editors are attempting to co-opt the article and prevent introduction of information to balance out information in the article. This is not neutral, and it needs to stop.-- MoebiusFlip ( talk) 02:37, 7 August 2009 (UTC)
Among those wearing camouflage fatigues and waving American flags in the audience today was Army Maj. Michael Beard of Miami, who is helping organize two task forces in Guatemala and one each in El Salvador and Nicaragua under the New Horizons mission. Immediately after Mitch hit, he said, relief groups from Japan, Spain, the Netherlands, Mexico and Cuba joined U.S. forces in rushing to the region's aid. "But now they're all gone," Beard said. "We're the only ones left. . . . The American people can really pat themselves on the back for what they've done here."
Clinton, who speaks little Spanish, won loud cheers when he said the response to Mitch's damage "reminds us that, in good times and bad, todos somos Americanos" – we are all Americans.
Is it not a fact that people from Colombia are called Colombians? Do you really think this is dubious? Yes, I would like to hear some discussion on that point. This article makes the point that people from the United States call themselves Americans. I would think this to be an indisputable sentence.
Merriam's reference at the bottom of the article shows past usage of Columbian for American.-- MoebiusFlip ( talk) 06:01, 9 August 2009 (UTC)
This page is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Some writers here want to claim some kind of "Imperialism" of the United States of America in the Western Hemisphere, the Americas, based on its name and the use of the adjective "American" to describe its people. I want to point out the existence of and the true meaning of the Monroe Doctrine as put forward by the fifth President of the United States in the 1820s. The Monroe Doctrine declared that the time for European colonization and colonialism (two different things) in the Western Hemisphere was over with. It declared that no more of this would be tolerated by the United States, and that the United States would use its power to uphold the independence of all countries in this hemisphere that wanted it, and that it would block any new colonies in the Americas. With the help of the Unted States (diplomatically and otherwise), no new overseas colonies have been established here. For example, there have been no new colonies established in the Americas by Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, the U.K., the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, and so forth. All of the former Spanish, Portuguese ( Brazil), British ( Canada, the Bahamas, etc.), and French (Haiti) colonies have achieved their independence, if they wanted it with the possibility of some very small exceptions. The U.S. admittedly little to do with the independence of Canada, except perhaps with diplomacy. Credit the Canadians themselves in "150 years worth of angry letters" leading to the British North America Act of 1867, and Canadian independence.
The United States has also eliminated overseas colonialism itself by purchasing Alaska from Russia, the U.S. Virgin Islands from Denmark. The United States fought a war with Spain to bring about the independence of Cuba, and to eliminate the Spanish from Puerto Rico, and incidentally, from the Philippines and {Guam]], though those are not in this hemisphere.
The Philippines were peacefully granted their independence in 1946. Puerto Rico retains a "Commonweath" status with the U.S. by free elections by its people where the choices were Commonwealth, independence, and statehood. Guam and the Northern Marianas Islands retain free association with the U.S.
The United States and Canada maintain the longest unfortified border in the world. A treaty between the two drastically limits the number and the armaments of naval ships on the Great Lakes along their border. Coast Guard vessels are maintained there on the basis of mutual consent, and their primary duty is in lifesaving and enforcement of customs laws. Numerous border vaguaries between the U.S. and Canada have been settled peacefully, either through mutual agreement, or through arbitration. (See references to the 49th parallel of latitude border agreements.) In one case involving islands in the Puget Sound, the interesting arbitrator who was selected (and whose decision was accepted permanently) was Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. Questions about the boundaries of Maine and Alaska have been settled peacefully between the two. As a matter of fact, armed conflict between the United States and Canada is unthinkable on both sides. Both are members of close alliances, including NATO and the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD). (There's that word "American" again, and we all understand what it means. It is a bilateral agreement between the United States and Canada.)
If all of this sounds like "Imperialism" by the United States - or by Canada, either - I don't see it at all. The United States has also had a peaceful border with Mexico since 1848, and the rather small Gadsden Purchase of land from Mexico was paid for, fair and square. It was also quite barren land, and the U.S. mostly wanted it for building long railroad lines across, between Texas and California.
Also, since the United States of America was the first independent nation that was established on the continents of the Americas, its citizens had and have first claim on the use of the words "American" and "America" to refer to themselves and their country in all adjectival and noun forms. Everyone can view this as a "copyright" on the names, just like "Canada", "Mexico", "Cuba", and "The Bahamas" are copyrighted names for those countries for all practical purposes. 74.163.40.105 ( talk) 08:07, 12 September 2008 (UTC)
I know "American" for everything from the USA is quite common in the USA. But for all others, American refers to somebody or something originating from a continent, not one country of this continent, even not the most populous one.
See also the passage under Demonym, "Cultural Problems": Quote - The demonym for citizens of the United States of America suffers a similar problem, because "American" may ambiguously refer to both the USA and North and South America. United Statian is awkward in English, but it exists in Spanish (estadounidense), French (étatsunien(ne)), Portuguese (estado-unidense or estadunidense), Italian (statunitense), and also in Interlingua (statounitese). US American (for the noun) and US-American (when used as a compound modifier preceding a noun) is another option, and is a common demonym in German (US-Amerikaner), though almost unheard of in English. Latin Americans (who are the most affected by this use of American) also have yanqui (Yankee) and the euphemism norteamericano/norte-americano (North American, which includes the USA, Mexico, Canada, and several other countries). Frank Lloyd Wright proposed Usonian (which was taken over into Esperanto: country Usono, demonym Usonano, adjective usona). In the spirit of Sydneysider, Statesider is also a possibility. See main article: Use of the word American.
The 2007 Miss Teen USA contestant Caitlin Upton, who gained international notoriety for her otherwise nonsensical response to a question posed during the pageant, referred to the people of the United States as "U.S. Americans." - End of Quote
The citizens of the USA are indeed using "American" for things or people coming from the USA and tend to believe that the whole world - except a few nuts - does the same. However, as Demonym correctly states, in many languages other than English reference is made to the USA in some way, and not just to America, which is used for the continent only. This sounds rather like the US-Americans usurping the expression "American" on their behalf and for their convenience and just purporting that everybody else does the same.
The US-Americans are free in how they call themselves at home. An international encyclopedia, however, should not be sloppy in such a matter or follow a national particularity, but try to find an internationally acceptable consensus. And this has certainly to take into consideration that for about 6 Billion people "American" refers to the continent and only 300 Million US-Americans use it exclusively for themselves. Especially all North, Central and South Americans, even if not from the USA, must feel concerned by everything "American". Internationally we should thus remain precise and explicitly specify the origin as being the USA. I am open for any suggestion, but US-Americans looks nice to me.
I am Austrian for the records. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.183.70.209 ( talk) 19:59, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
Yeah and it should be added that, in China at least, American refers to the United States, NOT Latin America. So that's another 1.3 billion for the US argument.
59.38.32.5 (
talk)
14:18, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
Yesterday Deepstrategem removed the line: "Of the 35 sovereign countries in North and South America, only the United States of America contains the word America within its long-form name." I reverted him, because the line seemed uncontroversial(also reverted some of his subsequent disruption). Deep, why do you think the line should be removed? -- Cúchullain t/ c 22:52, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
1. The use of America to describe a unified "dual continent" consisting of both North and South (and for pity's sake Central) America.
That is one point.
2. The use of America to describe and label the country of, someone from, the ideaology of, et al "The United States of America".
That is the second point.
3. The fact that language is nowhere near concrete, and calling this "this" or that "that" is purely conjecture and there is no way around it.
That is the third point.
And that is all there is to discuss.
1. If you want to be considered "American" if you live in either of the two continents - fantastic. You can. However, the majority of the world's population will assume you are from the States. Which leads me to
2. It has become ---- correct to assume the word "America" or the term "American" to be directly related to the States. As WilyD has stated several times, whether it should or should not be this way is irrelavent (to put my own spin on it). Language, and the words they are comprised of, is (as stated previously) purely conjecture - it is all relative to the individual. Which leads me to
3. The argument speaks for itself. You can say that so-and-so is linguistically correct, but to the next person so-with-so is linguistically correct under the same guise. There are guidelines and invisible fences, but no concrete barriers. Especially when it comes to English.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.231.39.116 ( talk • contribs).
What an interesting debate we have here. I see Deep still has an ax to grind, and is determined to use whatever resources in his intellectual arsenal to prove that the use of the word American is US-centric. But, according to Deep, I guess I just ramble. Because, of course, anyone that disagrees with Deep is only rambling. Jcchat66 23:10, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
We of the United States of America, citizens of only one of many nations in the Americas, North, Central, and South, have preempted the informal name of our country, America, and our title, Americans. It may be arrogant and inaccurate that we do so [...] [2]
Some fascinating discussions regarding the use of "American". In my travels, I've found that most English speakers hear the word "American" to refer to citizens of the United States only (or other U.S.-related items, but for the sake of simplicity, I'm going to focus on the citizens). That's generally because there isn't a wide-spread term to refer to U.S. citizens (unfortunately), and since the United States is indeed the only nation in the Americas (the more accepted term for referring to all of the countries of North and South America) to have "America" as part of its long-form name, the United States has, right or wrong, pretty much hijacked that term. Guess it would be a lot simpler if "United States of American" weren't such an unweildy term, unlike the much simpler "South African" when distinguishing the people of that nation from the residents of the greater continent. Personally, I prefer to refer to myself as a "U.S. citizen" as I do have respect for non-U.S. Americans and agree that they should be as much Americans as any Frenchman or German is a European (yes, I realize they *are* Americans, but I'm refering to being universally understood as such). But it doesn't change the fact that to say "America" or "American" without a qualifier of some sort will have the hearer infer that you mean a citizen or resident of the United States. And whether it is literally correct or not doesn't make much difference, as the ultimate point of speaking any language properly is to have the message understood by the hearer, and English speakers hear "American" to mean "U.S. resident". Of course, this really only applies when we're talking about English speakers; there might be widespread terms in other languages, as some have noted here, but do note that languages are never 100 percent parallel, that is, a phrase that means one thing in French can be literally translated to English or Spanish and quite accurately so (again, speaking of a purely literal translation), but it's meaning can still be distorted because of differentations in idiom, etc. Plus the fact that in some cases, there are words that have no literal translation when going from language to language. Thus how a Spanish-speaking person refers to a U.S. resident doesn't have as much bearing on what terminology an English-speaking person should use as one might hope. Nolefan32 19:55, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
American
American
AMERICAN. An occasional term for English as used in the US, often in contrast with English (sometimes British), and seriously or facetiously implying a distinct language: ‘The American I have heard up to the present, is a tongue as distinct from English as Patagonian’ (Kipling, From Sea to Sea, 1889); ‘Too often are spoken English and spoken American criticized as though it were impossible for them to have any laws of their own’ (Partridge, Usage and Abusage, 1947/57); ‘Brandon has a beaut: the transmission from American to English of cost-effective’ (Safire, New York Times, Oct. 1988).
These are some facts as reported by various OUP publications.
In four years of living in Europe, I encountered very many non-native English speakers who used the word "American" to refer to anything in or from the western hemisphere. That's also a fact, or very many - if you count each instance. There have been some statements in preceding posts concerning the majority of English speakers. One might assume that the majority of English speakers use the language similarly to native speakers of the U.K., Canada, and the U.S.; however in the early 1980's (according to the Oxford Companion to the English Language), "the total [number of English speakers worldwide] of circa 700 million was widely accepted", of which c.300m., or less than half, were native speakers. The same article, "ENL, ESL, and EFL territories", went on to say that the figure for the total numer of English speakers might well be doubled (as of 1985), which would further solidify native speakers' minority status. So I'd argue that it's speculative at best to state how the majority of English speakers use the word "American".
If there's a significant debate (outside of Wikipedia) about the use of the word "American" as a political tool to deny the sovereign existence of other states in the Americas, then this too is a fact that can be the subject of an article.
Let's document it all and try to represent it accurately. Robert Turner 02:02, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
First of all the original claim (that French, German and Italian use the term "American" to mean USAan only) is unsourced, so why let it stand?
Second, sources in these languages that use "Amerika/Amérique/Americhe" for the combined landmass of North/South/Central America/Carribean etc are numerous, I can cite printed encyclopedias for example.
Third, unclear? What precisely is unclear? I'm willing to clarify if it was pointed out.
Fourth, I get the impression that the original claim (that "American" refers to the USA in most languages) is heavily culturally biased.
Anorak2 14:47, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
What you say makes no sense, Willy, and as far as I can tell is heavily culturally biased. You try to sell your yankeefied worldview. I give up, yankeefy as much as you like. Anorak2 21:16, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
"It is true that I'm trying to make sure that the article reflects the English language usage of an English language word, rather than masquerade some non-English words as English words and extrapolate the usage in other languages to reflect some other use." (WilyD said this above). I agree with this sentiment. Languages are not 100 percent parallel. In Greek, there's several different words that translate to the English word "love", but each has it's own distinct meaning. In Japanese, there's only one word that means both "blue" and "green". French is well known for having phrases that literally translate to English one way but in actual usage infer completely other meanings. In other words, what words and terms may mean in other languages cannot be used as arguments for what they should or should not mean in English. For purposes of parsing, each language really needs to be looked at within a vacuum. I said it above and I'll repeat it here (as it seems to have been lost), it's unfortunate but there isn't a single term that can refer to U.S. residents or as an adjective for items from the States outside of "American". If there was, I'd happily use it, but there's not, and so the English speaking world considers "America" (when no modifier is used) to mean the United States; otherwise, it's "North America," "South America" or "the Americas". This isn't the only time that terms which grammatically mean one thing have come to infer something else in common usage - likewise, "African-Americans" don't have to have dual citizenship to use that term (even though "German-American" still infers an American citizen born in Germany), and caucasians can't use the term "Native American" regardless of where they were born. Personally, I prefer to refer to myself as a "U.S. citizen", as I do have respect for the fact that Canadians, Brazilians, etc., should technically be considered Americans (just as Germans, Italians, Spaniards, etc. are all Europeans); unfortunately, there's still not a word I can use when I want to complain about the build quality of cars designed and built in the United States, i.e., except to call them "American" cars. It might not be politically correct, but that's the way it is, and unfortunately, there isn't any other term that has effectively challenged it. Nolefan32 22:50, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Sorry Nolefan32, but you are misreading both my comment and the article. The article says that in reference to U.S. Americans there is no serious alternative besides American. It doesn't say that it is the most frequent usage of the word which has more than one meaning. I hope that makes sense to you. Or maybe I can draw a map
Here you have to make a distinction between references to Americans and references to the word.
-U.S. American -American
-American (resident of the continent) -American
-American (indigenous) -Native American -Indigenous American -American
The article says that the word American as defined at the top of the list only has one frequently used mapping. It doesn't deny the other mappings. If instead it was referring to the converse, then you would be correct. But it doesn't. Deepstratagem 23:27, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
Your edit was not exactly minor, Wily, nor was it a matter of grammar. Those people are considered "United States or American" by their government. Regardless of what the sample respondents reported, all ancestries coded between 939 and 994 (American, United States, the names of the states (excluding Hawai'i, including the federal district (Georgia included, though not Georgia CIS)), Southerner, and North American) were aggregated as "United States or American" at American Fact Finder. As you can see at the Maps of American ancestries' Talk Page, AFF is the source of the data.
Feel free to confirm my interpretation by clicking on the AFF link above, click on "Fact Sheet - Fact Sheet for a Race, Ethnic, or Ancestry Group", enter "American" in the "Find" field, and click "Find"/"Find Next" until you find your "Americans". Note the "(939-994)". If you click on "Go", you can get more information on this ancestry group. The complete ancestry code list is here: [3].
If you want to order the raw data CD from the Bureau and run it through a
GIS to make a map more to your liking, knock yourself out, hoser.
.s
Ack
X ile 07:28, 15 May 2007 (UTC) - Talk
"Yo creí siempre que en la América nuestra no era posible hablar de muchas patrias, sino dé una patria gránde y única; yo creí siempre que si es alta la idea de la patria, expresión de todo lo que hay de más hondo en la sensibilidad del hombre: amor de la tierra, poesía del recuerdo, arrobamientos de gloria, esperanzas de inmortalidad, en América, más que en ninguna otra parte, cabe, sin desnaturalizar esa idea, magnificarla, dilatarla; depurarla de lo que tiene de estrecho y negativo, y sublimarla por la propia virtud de lo que encierra de afirmativo y fecundo: cabe levantar sobre la patria nacional, la Patria americana, y acelerar el día en que los niños de hoy, los hombres del futuro, preguntados cuál es el nombre de su patria, no contesten con el nombre del Brasil, ni con el nombre de Chile, ni con el nombre de Méjico, porque contesten con el nombre de América.
Toda política internacional americana que no se oriente en dirección a ese porvenir y no se ajuste a la preparación de esa armonía, será una política vana y descarriada."
JOSÉ ENRIQUE RODÓ (15 July 1872 – 1 May 1917) (uruguayo)
In "Manual de Español", Idel Becker. Companhia Editora Nacional, São Paulo, 1953.
"Conventional Wisdom of the Dominant Group" (from C.H. Waddington, Tools for Thought, page 16). I mention this while rereading this soapbox again after a few months, specifically the line "That's flat out wrong. Consensus of usage is the sole mechanism for validating english usage. No other exists." by WilyD, and which has been defended by others here as well.
And no, I am not Deepstrategem, although I sympathize with his patience and the fact that he has been the biggest contributors to this article. But I don't have his patience when dealing with the mediocrity of other so-called contributors, who only want to push their limited understanding based on COWDUNG, like Cúchullain, Coolcaesar and Daramane who chose to crucify Deepstrategem, accusing him (incorrectly) of pushing a minority view, while ignoring that WilyD is pushing a nichy anti-US agenda (full of generalizations bordering prejudice) that claims that the meaning of the word "American" as "being from the Americas" somehow implies that "Manifest Destiny" is still alive and ready to engulf Canada.
Every time I hear someone claiming consensus as reason for anything, I also hear its closely related parasites getting near: demagogy, and with it, ignorance. What a shame for so-called encyclopedists! Diderot and d'Alembert, who worked on bringing the selected minority educated view to the masses, are probably crying in their tombs. 70.122.45.124 07:36, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
"The most commonly expounded theory is that German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller derived it from the Latinized version of the name of Amerigo Vespucci (Americus Vespucius), an Italian merchant and cartographer whose exploratory journeys in the early 1500s brought him to the eastern coastline of South America and to the Caribbean. None of this work survives, and Vespucci himself does not give his name to the lands he describes." [emphasis added]
It is unclear what work does not survive. The publicly-accessible part of the 120 year old article that is supposedly the source says:
Vespucci "wrote observations on latitude and longitude and accounts of his voyages, and drew or corrected charts. None of these works exist. Some letters of his to two friends are extant, and in these he gives notes of his voyages and of the strange people he had seen. Two of these letters were published during his life . . ." [emphasis added]
Vespucci was a navigator, so it's safe to assume he drew or corrected charts and wrote observations of latitude and longitude and accounts of his voyages. It was his published letters (and the authenticity of some, but by no means, all of the letters is in dispute) that were the basis for the Cosmographiae Introductio and Universalis Cosmographia. These works survive. I have seen them. Follow the external links from those articles and see for yourself.
.s
Ack
X ile 18:07, 26 June 2007 (UTC) - Talk
I've heard and read people use U.S American to refer to U.S citizens, I hope its fine that I added this. Thanks!
and USA should be United Stetas Of Americas
Shouldn't it be included in the article that we apply the same principle in calling people from the United States of Mexico (Estados Unidos de Mexico) Mexicans (mexicanos), instead of "estadounidenses mexicanos", just as calling people from the United States of America (Estados Unidos de America) Americans (americanos) instead of "estadounidenses"? I am from Costa Rica, and I do get offended by stupid stuff, just as most Latin Americans do about using "American" as a demonym for the United States. I am not offended by this one, because of the logic I used in the title: Estados Unidos de Mexico : mexicano :: Estados Unidos de America : americano. What I am offended about, though, is seeing that the article says Central America is a part of North America, which to me is just ridiculous, but I'll do some research about it.
United States of Mexico : Mexican :: United States of America : American
WRONG. The official name of Mexico is 'Estados Unidos Mexicanos', which translates into 'United Mexican States'.
The analogy is corrupt, and the conclusion would not support historical fact, regardless.
It would not support the implied redundancy in the name of the United States of America, either; since it was named because of America the landmass and not in spite of it. Deepstratagem ( talk) 15:29, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
The problem with this argument is that "America" was the name of the continent first, and later for a confederation of states that was NOT America but IN America. This confederation of states became a country and in the process it did not accuire an original name. Mexico IS an original name for a country. So even in the name "United States of America", America refers to the continent, not the country. This could explain why the United States of America is sometimes refered to as simply the United States or U.S. and why, in spanish, it is allways written as EE.UU. (equivalent of U.S.) and never EE.UU.A. (equivalent of U.S.A.). Also, this means that "United States of Mexico" or "United Mexican States" is not equivalent to "United States of America" or "United American States". It also means that to call U.S. citizens "Americans" is linguistcally incorrect. 190.75.42.89 ( talk) 04:05, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
This argument seems a little silly. If everyone from both continents of the Americas is an American, then since the U.S. is in North America, then everyone from the U.S. is an American. It is the only demonym for a U.S. citizen and was used for the people in the colonies by the British before the U.S. existed. People from other countries in the Americas will say their country demonym (Columbian, Mexican, Belizean, Brazilean) if someone asks what their nationality is. Reliable sources are used here, and they say American refers to someone of the United States, some as the primary definition, but that it can also refer to someone from the Americas. One definition is used more often, but both are correct. Let's stop with the soap box rants on the talk pages about the Americas, America, or American. Kman543210 ( talk) 22:22, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
This section confuses me.
"…to refer to U.S. citizens. These languages generally have other terms for U.S. nationals…"
Is this about other languages having multiple terms for "U.S." and "American" in reference to people, or is this about other languages having different terms for U.S. citizens and U.S. non-citizen nationals? — RVJ 11:19, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
To say "America" just to say "U.S.A." is too despective for the rest of America. Well, I see it as "European" (I think it is just a region name). History called the continent with the name of America. Whitout any kind of negative meaning.
U.S.A. people decided to call its/his country using the name of the continent.
Don't you think you have enough hatred in your people to set up more walls between cultures?
What the heck is a "Latin American"? What is an "American"? We are all just humans. One of your presidents said: "We are all Americans" and that's right because America is a continent.
And now, ironicaly, if Bush goverment is still taking the freedom of invading other places... I think we all have to get the freedom and right of taking part in elections of the U.S.A. (not America) president. If you have humour sense you'll get this is a joke.
"Dont you change lifes for medals, soldier."
My apologies for my poor English and thanks for reading. Every interlocutor worths
Let's see if I can clear up one or two things... And, by the way, since nationalities seem to have such bearing on the subject, I am a Latin American.
In the 1700's Latin America was a series of Spanish colonies (the U.S., a series of English ones). New Spain was an administrative division, a Viceroyalty which covered most of what today is called North America (Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean and a good deal of the present day U.S.). If I am not wrong, there is also a New England, a region that retains its name to this day. New Spain was merely an administrative label, and was not kept after independence. If used, it is, at most, a reference to colonial Mexico, and not even all of Mexico, merely the center and south, and perhaps a part of Guatemala (what the Aztecs and Mayans once ruled, which was were the Spanish centered their colonial empire along with Peru).
I wonder when was it that, according to Jcchat, the countries of North and South America had those good relationships. The war with Mexico? The invasion of Nicaragua? Operation Condor? I don't want to turn this into a blaming marathon (the subject is too politically charged as it is, and I think DRoBeR's attitude doesn't help at all), but the "we all got along well until you had a problem with how we call ourselves" is ridiculous. And it really doesn't matter what the 1700's colonial English thought. When the country was named United States of America, the name from the continent (or continents, that is another matter) was taken away and given to a country. That really is the problem. At the time of the independece of Latin America, several countries had no name; they were American, and eventually took on a name. None used "America" as part of its official name because it was understood to stand for the whole thing.
As for "pride in our countries", we have plenty. That's part of the reason we get upset about this whole business; it is seen as something imposed by the most powerful country in the hemisphere, and the world for that matter. We don't want to give away the name that stands for all of us (Latin Americans and the rest of Americans). Think about it, if America meant only the USA, why would there even be a South America? I'm not dumb, I know that present day U.S. Americans don't use the term to offend; they've been hearing about it since they were kids. But that is as puzzling for us to understand as it is for you to get why it is that we protest. When I was a child, the first time I heard the use of "American" as U.S. only, I was confused about it. Now that I have a greater understanding of the matter, I still feel the use of America for the continent/supercontinent, with American as anything relating to it, makes more sense and is better supported by history.
The matter, as I said, is politically charged enough; that's why I tried to be cold-headed and answer what was written in this section without spite. But it is something that we feel deeply, I can assure you.
Rocabatus (
talk)
19:43, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
Hi. In sentences "Latin Americans also may employ the term norteamericano (North American), which itself conflates the United States and Canada. However, this term may also refer to anyone from the North American continent, which also includes Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean." must be added Mexico after Canada, because that is the original meaning of norteamericano, which now means "from/related to United States". Moreover, the sentences "However, this term..." only can be applied to term North American but no to norteamericano, because in Spanish language (and Iberoamerican culture) there are six continents and Norteamérica is a subcontinent from isthmus of Tehuantepec to North. Bye. -- Lin linao ( talk) 14:39, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
As anyone who speaks Spanish fluently and has lived in Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, and/or South America knows, the word "norteamericano" is most often used and understood as referring specifically and exclusively to the United States, not the US and Canada; this is its primary connotation in actual speech. The word "estadounidense" is rarely used in speech, presumably since it hardly flows off the tongue and sounds very formal. I suggest that the current reference to "norteamericano" in Spanish referring to the US and Canada be removed. Also, these kinds of definitions should be avoided unless a source can be cited. Is there any Spanish dictionary that disucsses the varied connotations of this word? The RAE is not a good source since it is aimed more at style issues than linguistic accuracy.
In addition, the word "americano" is very frequently used in many Spanish-speaking countries (Mexico and Central America in particular) to refer specifically to the United States, with the meaning (continental or US-specific) obvious from context. It is less often used this way in print, however this usage is quite common in speech. Again, citations to sources is necessary.
Hi, I would like to comment that in other Spanish-spearking countries (such as Chile and Argentina) the word "americano" is not that frequently used to refer to someone from the U.S. While the word "norteamericano" can be used to refere both people from the U.S. and Canada. At least in my country (Chile) the most common way to refer specifically to the United States is just saying "de Estados Unidos" (from the United States). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.112.25.55 ( talk) 04:17, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea is a part of the Australian continent, and in fact, they could call themselves rightly "Australians". So if we're going to pick on Americans, we should rightly pick on Australians too, because they don't have a monopoly on the word "Australian".
Or, we could just let the U.S. have the term "American" because we were the first country in the American supercontinent (Much like Australia was the first country in the Australian continent) and let people with anti-American sentiment find some other route for their views other than silly nomenclature. ColdRedRain ( talk) 17:21, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
Wrong. The country is called the "United States of America" and not "America". I don't know what is the first European country but let say it's Italy. Can Italians claim they are the only true Europeans? Anyways, as said in the article about Australia, the name Australia for the continent is a bad name many people doesn't agree with. In many languages the continent is named something which sounds like or translate to Oceania. 132.203.168.38 ( talk) —Preceding comment was added at 16:32, 8 July 2008 (UTC)
Since according to Latins, we're not "American", can we have the name to our sport back? I mean, "estadounidos football" doesn't roll off the tongue that well. ColdRedRain ( talk) 21:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
ColdRedRain, I am afraid that your comments are plagued with national sentimentalism and have little credibility. What exactly is "your sport"? Who are these Latins?(mabye you are referring to latin-americans) What do you mean have the name back?(surely you know that football exists from long before american football and is internationally known as football, the U.S. being the only country that uses the term "soccer"). My suggestion would be to stop taking linguistic corrections as an insult to your nation and to be a bit more serious in your interventions. 190.75.42.89 ( talk) 04:11, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
hmm.... Japan uses the word soccer ChesterTheWorm ( talk) 19:18, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
why is there an article titled American(word)? There are many words with multiple definitions. For example: Football, when I say football I mean the tackle, gridiron American Football. I know outside of the US this means what I mean by soccer. If I search football, do I get an article on Football(word)? We should handle American the same way. Have an article for each definition as it is now, I can't find an article on Americans. I can find one about the French, but not the Americans? Do we have to exist for a few more hundreds of years to be significant enough for a stub? Frankly, I don't know where this controversy came from, and it has been on wikipedia for years. I am still trying to find it in the real world. (I asked some Spanish speakers about it) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.156.208.3 ( talk) 05:04, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
Reading a story about statements made by Canadian officials concerning their discussions with an Obama staffer I couldn't help noticing this quote from the Canadian PM Stephen Harper:
He doesn't say "US Election" as might be fashionable in some quarters but there isn't any doubt which country he's talking about. I'm sure someone will say that because the US is in the Americas that that's the "American" he was talking about but any fluent English speaker would know that isn't true.
My regards to all of you still fighting cultural imperialism in this little corner of the world. (Cultural imperialism, as in the attempt by Spanish speakers to linguistically colonize the English word "American".)
Sumergocognito ( talk) 02:10, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
I made this change to keep the article neutral. The introduction should not be argumentative (and the rest of the article shouldn't either). I think we can all agree that the current introduction is more encyclopedic, in that it states what is, instead of sneakily trying to impose a narrow point of view. Deepstratagem ( talk) 14:10, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
This is about tag cleanup. As all of the tags are more than a year old, there is no current discussion relating to them, and there is a great deal of editing done since the tags were placed, they will be removed. This is not a judgement of content. If there is cause to re-tag, then that of course may be done, with the necessary posting of a discussion as to why, and what improvements could be made. This is only an effort to clean out old tags, and permit them to be updated with current issues if warranted. In this case, I see you have some issues at hand. I'm still removing the tag - if you wish to put an updated tag outlining current issues, then by all means do so. Jjdon ( talk) 17:46, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
I object to this change on the grounds that it is an incorrect translation. Normally, when translating from one language to another, the grammar, structure, and context and audience are to be taken into account. This is how professional and legal translations are done. The original paragraph is specifically discussing the English use of the word, and it is explicit:
(in English, without an accent)
Furthermore, the only place where italics are necessary are in the first and last words. And the accent marks, obviously, are not necessary either, since this article is in English. Deepstratagem ( talk) 09:51, 26 September 2008 (UTC)
The article states that the Declaration of Independence proclaimed a country named the United States of America and that this was the "first, official usage" of the name. I'm not certain this is true. As a technical matter, I don't think there was any legal entity know as the "United States of America" until either 1777 (final draft of the Articles of Confederation) or possibly 1781 (the de jure adoption of the Articles). Also, it isn't clear to me that the people signing the Declaration or even the Articles necessarily considered the union of thirteen states to be a single country. CAVincent ( talk) 00:15, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
Very little space in this article is given over to the history of how the term "America" and "American" came, in certain connotations, to refer to the United States specifically, both in that country and in perhaps most countries around the world. Are there any reliable published academic sources that have researched this mystery, that I'm sure many people have wondered at? 72.70.118.105 ( talk) 08:41, 12 October 2008 (UTC)
I removed the term "Dominion of Canada", since, according to the Btitish North American Act (1867), the country's official name is just "Canada". Quoting from Article 2:
"the Provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick shall form and be One Dominion under the Name of Canada [...] those Three Provinces shall form and be One Dominion under that Name accordingly."
"Unless it is otherwise expressed or implied, the Name Canada shall be taken to mean Canada as constituted under this Act."
Compare this to the wording of the Royal Proclamation of 1907 (regarding New Zealand):
"Whereas We have [..] determined that the title of Dominion of New Zealand shall be substituted for that of the Colony of New Zealand as the designation of the said Colony, We have therefore by and with the advice of Our Privy Council thought fit to issue this Our Royal Proclamation [...], the said Colony of New Zealand and the territory belonging thereto shall be called and known by the title of the Dominion of New Zealand."
I hope this clarifies the facts! Prof.rick ( talk) 04:45, 8 November 2008 (UTC)
There are an assumed 36 countries in America (the Western Hemisphere). It seems rather presumptuous of ONE of those countries to call itself "America", and its citizens, "Americans". The name "United States of America" might imply that all American (Western Hemisphere) countries are members of these "united states".
No it doesn't and no it won't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.37.222.239 ( talk) 19:26, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
Others of the Western World have no problem with the name of your country...Gee thanks...we can simply call it the "United States". But when you call it "America" we feel you have stolen the name of a hemisphere,,,We didn't steal it. It was given to us. All we did was accept it,,, and made it your own. The other 35 countries are clearly not members of the United States.
We also have great difficulty with the term "American". You use it to identify your nationality, but ALL who live in the Western Hemisphere are Americans. (Couldn't you call yourselves United Statians, or something like that? Much of the the world identifies you thusly, but it is difficult in English!)
This is why so many non-USA Americans feel threatened when you call your country America, and yourselves Americans. Can you not think of another name to call yourselves, even United Staters?
Perhaps your founding fathers had no idea of the future implications of the naming of your country, "The United States of America". (Or perhaps they suffered from a dilusion that evenentually you would would rule the entire Western Hemisphere?) Prof.rick ( talk) 06:32, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
I assume (perhaps naively) that most U.S. citizens would prefer to be known as U.S. citizens, rather than Americans. They know the implications of the latter name to the rest of the world...for better or for worse! (Of course, there are a few who would like to maintain your identity as "America" and "Americans"...for better or for worse.
Since this article is about "American (word)", I feel all these comments are completely relevant to the article. In fact, the article is as much about the abuse of the term "American" as about the legitimate use of the term.
Views from other countries of the Americas and the rest of the world would be most welcome!
Your comments can greatly contribute to the "tone" of the article! PLEASE, let your voice be heard!
I am a Canadian, and have mixed feelings! I object to one country stealing the name of our hemisphere as its own; likewise, I do not want to be identified as an "American" because of the sore reputation of the U.S., which is widely known as "America".
I hope my comments wil bring forth some light, and stimulate further discussion of this very "touchy" article. PLEASE, CONTRIBUTE YOUR VIEWS! Prof.rick ( talk) 06:32, 12 November 2008 (UTC)
Your just another American hater. Nobody hates Americans like Canadians. This guy wants to stamp out the use of the word American. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.18.61 ( talk) 20:24, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
Hi there! Thanks to everyone who has contributed to my request for more opinions. (Can we hear from more Canadians, eh?) Your contributions are sincerely appreciated. This is inevitably a controversial article, since the term "American" is itself controversial, and the very reason for the existence of this Article. For the most part, I like the rewrite of the lead, although I might edit a word or two!
I understand that the people of the United States have few choices in identifying themselves, and almost always fall back on the word, "American". History can prove helpful in how this all came about, and (one chance in a million) resolve the issue. I'll write more later, but meanwhile await further comments! Best to all, Prof.rick ( talk) 04:36, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
Revisions to an otherwise exceptionally well-written lead: removed the word "originally", since reference is made to "The Americas" (modern usage), and the evolution of the term American is discussed. ("Originally" suggests this is no longer true.)
Changed "Latin Americans" to "other members of the Americas", since Canadians generally share this view, and are not predominantly Latin-American.
I also question Reference 1, since it refers to a book published in the U.S., and therefore may be biased. Similarly, I question the removal of my references from a Canadian English Dictionary!!!
This Article will inevitably continue to be contoversial...so, fellow editors, let us all approach it with as much open-mindedness and mutual understanding as possible. Sincerely, Prof.rick ( talk) 06:27, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
I've done a rewrite in the "Canada" section. I hope, if you disagree, you will not simply revert without discussion on this page. I also intend to add a new section on the obvious dilemma "What can US citizens call themselves?" US citizens are in the most unfortunate position of being able to refer to themselves only through the use a word which refers to continents! Of course, it seems egocentric to much of the world, but you're in a tough position!
Your Canadian Friend, Prof.rick ( talk) 09:55, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
Special Message to Wily: The weakest definition of Canadian I have ever hear is not American. (Sure, I've heard it as a joke.) But we have much which makes us a unique nation, I wouldn't try to list it all...it would take forever. Also, most of us do NOT want to become an annex of the United States. We treasure our Canadian identity. Prof.rick ( talk) 10:08, 13 November 2008 (UTC)
On another note, I think I've gotten a start on eliminating a lot of the repeated confusion over terminolgy with the new article on Names of the Americans (forged from what was a fairly shitty article on Alternative adjectives for U.S. citizens). From now on discussion of what to call United Staters should go there, while this article will be on how the word is used.-- Cúchullain t/ c 17:07, 14 November 2008 (UTC)
This Section was becoming rather lengthy and confusing; thus, the new Section.
Hello, Cuchallain! You're move to recreate a new Article on "Names of the Americans" was BRILLIANT! (I agree, the last attempt to propose names for residents/citizens of the U.S. was shitty!) This should at very least relieve the present Article from some of its elements of controversy. THANK YOU! Prof.rick ( talk) 04:57, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
I question your reversion of the "Canada" section, suggesting that the term "American" applies only to residents/citizens of the U.S., and to Latin America. (You have excluded Canada, the largest country, by area, of the Americas, and Greenland, the world's largest island! If this is true, we may as well exclude Canada from the Article. No doubt other Canadians will eventually insist that "American" is a term belonging also to Canadians, and not just residents/citizens of the U.S. and to Latin Americans.
Sorry for my lack of references! It was the middle of the night when I rewrote the section on Canada, and I was simply too tired to add references, but KNOWING they were present in the Articles to which I provided links.
Furthermore, the term "American" referring to inhabitants of United States, obviously excludes Hawaii, which is NOT part of the Americas. Although your source may be valid, it is very easy to find other sources which refer to Americans as ALL residents/citizens of the Americas.
For now, I will simply remove the section on "Canada", since you do not regard Canadians as Americans. (This does NOT exclude the possibily of the future inclusion of Canada, with a rewrite which may involve many editors, eventually arriving at logical decisions.
It might also be worth noting that NAFTA refers to the U.S. (not U.S.A.)
Let's stick with it!!! Prof.rick ( talk) 05:27, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
Thank for for your interest and continuing efforts in this, a most difficult article for all sincere editors! Prof.rick ( talk) 05:27, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
I've edited Par. 1 of the lead to include not only Latin Americans but Canadians, citing a reliable source. (Further references in the Article further justify this edit, despite the claim that "American" refers only to residents of U.S., and Latin America! If anyone wishes to challenge this logical and documented edit, (let alone reverting it without explanation), I will probably abandon the article entirely. I am a Professor of Music, not politics! Still, I have strong political views, and would like to continue to strive towards the ever-challenging neutralization of this Article! I am convinced, if we KEEP WORKING AT IT, we can achieve an unbiased and factual article, of which we will all eventually be proud to have contributed. (I've attempted, in my edits, to convey the fact that not all Canadians regard the term "American" (in reference to the United States) to be pejorative! Prof.rick ( talk) 06:59, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
During the first half of the eighteenth century the term "American" generally meant Native American.
During the second half of the eighteenth century, especially during the French and Indian War (the North American theater of the Seven Years War) of 1754–1763, the term "American" acquired the meaning of a British subject from one of the British North American colonies. This may have been associated with a war-related distinction between "Americans" serving part-time in militia units and professional soldiers from the British Isles in the regular army.
The English-speaking colonists of British North America who came to refer to themselves as "Americans" during the French and Indian War (Seven Years War) probably did not view themselves as engaging in an exercise of global hegemony and certainly were not a world power by anyone's standards. Indeed, when the British generals used the term about the members of the militias under their command, it was unlikely to have been spoken as a compliment. The terminology, like much else about the United States, is accidental. People should not read too much into it. -- Bob —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bob99 ( talk • contribs) 23:25, 24 February 2009 (UTC)
The result of the move request was no consensus -- Aervanath ( talk) 07:11, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
American (word) → American — make the article about the word the primary topic for "American", hatnote linking to American (disambiguation) for other topics known as "American" — JHunterJ ( talk) 22:15, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
*'''Support'''
or *'''Oppose'''
, then sign your comment with ~~~~
. Since
polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account
Wikipedia's naming conventions.Topic was brought up at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Disambiguation#American. As a neutral, previously-uninvolved editor in the disambiguation project, I propose a solution in which the article about the word is moved to the primary topic (base name). This will enable pages that link directly to American to be "right" (links to dab pages are usually in need of fixing) if they don't intend one of the other definitions specifically. If will also enable the dab page to either (a) cover just those terms that aren't on the word article (such as America (band)) or (b) list both word-article terms and other terms, hopefully without further drama. -- JHunterJ ( talk) 22:23, 4 April 2009 (UTC)
Yes, we are diffrent countries in America but we all share the same Nationality and that is American.
American (word) is the shared nationality of the 35 countries of America, and should be treated that way.
Kind Regards, American(Can) ( talk) 00:31, 8 June 2009 (UTC)
If the original spelling hadn't been changed there would no "room for confusion". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.76.246 ( talk) 20:22, 17 August 2009 (UTC) There was a District of Columbia long before there was a Republic of Colombia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.76.246 ( talk) 20:29, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
Can we have a section about using common sense? Stating something along the lines of. Other countries dispute the use of the word american to refer to citizens of the USA because this term is said, by them, to refer to everyone from the americas. However, since the residents of the US are residing on the continent of north america, it seams reasonable, nay commonsensical to refer to them as Americans. International affairs are rarely common sense affairs however" What do you think, could do with some ironing out but it seems to make its point quite well, yay or nay? Signed: a European, British, English man. :) Kungfukats2 ( talk) 20:39, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
No. -- Deepstratagem ( talk) 13:01, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
Why not, smartass? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.46.16.78 ( talk) 13:53, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
Because it doesn´t "make its point quite well". Deepstratagem ( talk) 15:48, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I would like to know if any of those Spanish-speaking countries have made diplomatic protests over the name of American Samoa. The UN recognizes the name, as do all countries in the Americas. It is not a territory of any of those other countries in the W. Hemisphere, it is a U.S. territory. There is no confusion in Polynesia, New Zealand, or Australia about the term American Samoa. Everybody knows what American means. This is just one more example why people opposed to the American usage of the term American are fighting a losing, uphill battle.-- MoebiusFlip ( talk) 05:45, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
The article doesn't benefit from a long list of examples where the word "American" is used in U.S. laws to refer to the United States, as has been recently added. And the fact that Hillary Clinton, like virtually all other people in the country, refers to US citizens as Americans is not necessary. Primary sources being compiled in such a way as to make interpretive claims (such as "The State Department has no record of a diplomatic protest over the use of the term American to refer to U.S. citizens or U.S. institutions in any of these countries" or "These travel guides, however, do not urge caution to people from American Samoa not to use the name of their U.S. territory, however") is against the no original research policy.-- Cúchullain t/ c 12:24, 6 August 2009 (UTC)
As this talk page and the article itself make clear, there is a concerted effort to show that there is more controversy about this term than there really is. There are also efforts to show that there is diversity in the United States about the term, and this is an incredible stretch that takes a lot of wp:original research to even assert. There have been edit wars to keep out sourced information from wp:verifiable references that do not fit some editors' preferences for the "argument of the article." The article is neither balanced nor neutral. It needs new and neutral help, and it needs some careful eyes to prevent wp:own problems, which seem to be rife here. Stating that a large verifiable source does not include certain notable information (like the fact that there are no diplomatic protests evidenced on the State Department website) is not wp:original research, any more than pointing out that a dictionary had a definition one year, but later did not. Certain editors are attempting to co-opt the article and prevent introduction of information to balance out information in the article. This is not neutral, and it needs to stop.-- MoebiusFlip ( talk) 02:37, 7 August 2009 (UTC)
Among those wearing camouflage fatigues and waving American flags in the audience today was Army Maj. Michael Beard of Miami, who is helping organize two task forces in Guatemala and one each in El Salvador and Nicaragua under the New Horizons mission. Immediately after Mitch hit, he said, relief groups from Japan, Spain, the Netherlands, Mexico and Cuba joined U.S. forces in rushing to the region's aid. "But now they're all gone," Beard said. "We're the only ones left. . . . The American people can really pat themselves on the back for what they've done here."
Clinton, who speaks little Spanish, won loud cheers when he said the response to Mitch's damage "reminds us that, in good times and bad, todos somos Americanos" – we are all Americans.
Is it not a fact that people from Colombia are called Colombians? Do you really think this is dubious? Yes, I would like to hear some discussion on that point. This article makes the point that people from the United States call themselves Americans. I would think this to be an indisputable sentence.
Merriam's reference at the bottom of the article shows past usage of Columbian for American.-- MoebiusFlip ( talk) 06:01, 9 August 2009 (UTC)