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There seems to be a contradiction in the article - in that the lead says = " As a result, Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship.(unreferenced) " However according to this article and the United States Census Bureau American ethnicity is a valid response. Perhaps the Canadians article could be an example. Moxy ( talk) 23:41, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
I dont see that as a compromise the article lead is still wrong and misleading our readers. We simply have a different interpretation of what the article is saying is the only thing I can guess. I believe the lead should be broad in its term covering all aspects the article covers - don't have to mentioned ethnicity at all sometimes in leads. I believe the article lead should be progressive and not go out if its way to contradict the articles content, data and subsequently linked articles. The style of leads below are the way to go in my opinion - they dont contradict the articles information. Moxy ( talk) 07:34, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
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The scope of the article is defined by the reliable sources of what the definition of what American is. As American is based on one who is a native of, or is a citizen of, the United States it is not limited to a specific race or ethnicity. Perhaps the lead section can be rewritten better to summarize the article (per WP:LEAD), but that doesn't mean that it should change the scope of what the article is about. If anything the scope is very close to that of the British people article that Moxy listed. Therefore, I do not see a need to change it (the scope).-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 08:17, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
Come to think about it, I think there is something else to be added. Per the references, externally, the United States (since the end of the Civil Rights movement)likes to project an image of one population that is colorblind, and if not colorblind is multiethnic and multiracial and united. Yet internally, as shown by the self-used definitions of the population and the government, the population (at least demographically) divides itself based on race, ethnic, religious, and sometimes sexual preference lines. While it is true that anyone can become an American, whether it by a former Somali refugee, or a Scottish Comedian, or a former member of the Chinese Communist Party, how Americans sees itself internally ( Salad bowl (cultural idea) or Melting pot) maybe very different from how it projects its external image.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 15:26, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
Ok this is really odd - your not understanding what I am saying in the lest bit - never had such a hard time conveying a problem. I am saying (again) we DO NOT NEED to mention ethnicity in the lead at all. Your the one that is insisting a statement about ethnicity should be there - with refs that are disputed (by me) and that contradict the articles content. Lets go over what I have suggested thus far.
(emphesis mine).implies American do see ethnicity as a determining factor in their identity
I think the cause of this dispute is almost entirely which language you are speaking. If you are speaking American English, then "nationality = citizenship", with perhaps a small exception for people who were born in the US and have given up their citizenship for another country's citizenship. Perhaps in British English (and I know in translation in other European languages) "nationality = ethic identity". That's fine for those languages, but it just doesn't apply in American English.
Look under "German" in the Oxford English Dictionary:
"1a native or inhabitant of Germany.
Clearly "German" is (in part) an ethnic identity
But for "American"
"1a native or citizen of the United States."
without the ethnic component. The definition of "American" is not related to ethnicity.
Similarly, in Europe "nationality" is almost identical in meaning to "ethnicity." Not so in America, in fact Americans usually can't believe that anybody could define "nationality" as anything other than "citizenship."
So what's this thing about "American ethnicity"? For the most part, I think it's an artifact of the Census, when they first started asking people about their ethnicity (prob. 1970 or 1980). A lot of people would want to respond "I don't have an ethnic identity, I'm just an American." So "ethic American" grew out of the box that you could check on the census question "Ethnicity: American". Other people would just see this as a convenience answer. Rather than answer "I'm 1/32 Spanish, 1/16 Cherokee, 1/4 German, and the rest a mixture of English, Scots, and Irish with some French," they could just answer "Ethnicity: American".
In short many, many Americans do not self-identify with an ethnic group, and the answer for them on the census is "Ethnicity: American."
I know many Europeans who just can't grasp this concept. For them it is just defined that Nationality= ethnicity. I was in the reverse position living in Europe for almost a decade, and it took me a long time to understand that there were people who did not define nationality = citizenship. But in America nationality = citizenship.
So "Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship" is absolutely correct. It's part of our language - just look it up in the dictionary.
Hope this helps. Smallbones( smalltalk) 20:03, 8 February 2013 (UTC)
In the United States, there is the nationality element of an individuals identity (I am an American, I am a Mexican, I am a (insert country adjuctive here)), and there is an ethnicity element (I am Irish, I am Canadian, I am Vietnamese, etc.). One need not be one or the other, one can be both. This is why there are those who have issue with " hyphenated Americans".Thus, American is also a "political" identity
The purpose of this response is not to offend the authors or make baseless accusations to debase their character. I simply am giving my take on the "Americans" article. I was deeply offended by the article, but I am sure no offense was intended.
The proliferation of race theory on the page describing "Americans" is quite inaccurate and offensive.
Quote: "Americans, or American people, are the citizens of the United States of America. The country is home to people of different national origins. As a result, Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship." This seems to accurately describe what defines an "American", as someone is considered a citizen of America through birth or through the immigration process. However a description of a citizen and these processes in which someone becomes an American should be included with a citation.
Note "describes" should be grammatically corrected to "describe".
The sections on Race I find quite repulsive, and I am certain I am not the only one. The author/s give a great definition of what an American is, as quoted above. Americans are not defined by ethnicity or national origin. However strangely the article degenerates after this point and wastes no time in classifying American Peoples into so-called "Races". It is neither moral, nor effective, nor informative, nor accurate to classify Americans in this way. If it is moral, effective, informative, and accurate, than the author/s should cite the source/s for the classifications of what defines "White", "Black", etc. There are those of very light complexion that have lived on the continent of Africa, in Jamaica, and in India, for several hundred years, and there are those of very dark complexion that have lived in Europe and North America for several hundred years. It is quite offensive for human beings to be broken up like dogs into "breeds". The authors should be required to cite work in a Biological/Anthropological authority which validates race theory.
There are many who find it repulsive to classify people by skin color. American Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." Most Americans find segregation repulsive. I find it offensive that information on Hispanic Americans is segregated into one section, and Asian Americans segregated into another "separate but equal" section, so on and so forth. I also find the section on "Two or More Races" offensive, as if these human beings are some sort of unclassifiable newly discovered mixed breed.
As another observant poster commented, the American culture is very homogenous. Those of various skin tones regularly participate in the culture originated by those Americans and others of diverse backgrounds and nations.
Besides being rejected by science, race theory is also rejected by most American belief systems, humanist and religious. For example, Christian and Islamic theology do not classify human beings into races, but rather consider all humanity equal in the eyes of God.
It is highly recommended that you reevaluate this page. It is highly recommended that you do not break up and classify Americans into races and groups and breeds, in segregated sections. America is a Melting Pot, all theories of Race and policies of Segregation should be rejected. I recommend you get much more specific when referencing culture and nationality. General classifications such as "White" and "African" and "Asian" and "European" again are not very effective, accurate, or informative, particularly when you are classifying someone as "European" or "African" or "Asian", NOT based on the continent they were born in or the culture they subscribe to, but trivial characteristics like skin color or eye shape. RealTalk1000 ( talk) 17:33, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
In response to the above Census bureau citation: So why, out of all the data which the US Census Bureau collects, did the author/s decide it was appropriate to divide the American people by race? Why not gender? Why not by State? Why not by annual income?
How about not breaking up Americans into baseless categories at all?
Does the US Census Bureau cite biological or anthropological studies which scientifically define the race classifications? Or maybe they are basing these classifications on quack race theories of the 19th and early 20th century?
Maybe the mighty Aryan Race has its origins in the ruins of South America, as the Nazi archeologists proclaimed in the 1930's? In that regard, we should most definitely amend any articles pertaining to the origins of the South American or German peoples to reflect this government-sanctioned fact. (sarcasm)
If race shall be defined by government decree and not by some sort of consensus in the scientific community or academia... and if this herein shall be acceptable standards for publishing articles on wikipedia... than I challenge writers here on wikipedia to participate. We should base our articles on all types of government-sanctioned quackery and junk science, whether it has its stamp of approval from the U.S. Census Bureau or some 1930's German archeological program in South America. If the almighty State proclaims it true, than who are we to question it?
RealTalk1000 ( talk) 16:41, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
I will be reverting a good faith edit done here, which had the edit summary:
MOS:commonname
The reason for the reversion is there is no such thing as MOS:COMMONNAME. There is a WP:COMMONNAME, however that applies to article titles and not article content. Additionally, the content changed does not fall under MOS:LIFE, where there is a "MOS:COMMONNAME", which is a red link. The closest MOS that would apply is MOS:PN; however, it does not require that the most common name for a country be used. It does mention not using historical names where there is a modern name available for the subject, but as the country names that were previously used are also those countries (Republic of Korea, People's Republic of China, and Republic of China) modern names either name can be used.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 17:47, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
May I ask the editor, what was the reasoning behind these series of edits? I did not understand the reasoning behind the edits using the edit summaries used.
I am assuming good faith, that this is not meant to be disruptive or to be make a point regarding past reversion of edits done by this editor, and that there is a reason why some listed countries have their official name used, and others do not.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 04:41, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
Going to all official names, is perfectly fine with me.
As for the January edit which was reverted per WP:BRD, it was that using China for one and Taiwan for the other country name is to advance a POV that favor's one nation's political position over another nation's. Using the official name for both China's does not favor either nation's political POV, and is thus keeping with WP:NEU.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 15:51, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
The culture section of this article needs more citations per verification, or it needs to be a summary of the main article Culture of the United States, which itself needs more work.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 01:27, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
Americans are anyone from North , South, And Central. This article is insulting to the Americans in Central and South America. You have millions of people in Central and South American that can confirm this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DrMenoRPS ( talk • contribs) 13:32, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
There is no evidence backing up that Einstein was ethnically Jewish, but religiously. He was a German. ( N0n3up ( talk) 04:52, 30 September 2013 (UTC))
Instead of a picture of Americans, there is the Flag of USA. On the other ethnic group/people pages there are pictures of the people (for example on the British people page, Han Chinese page and Russians page) Shouldn't this page be similar with the others? -- Ransewiki ( talk) 09:05, 4 July 2013 (UTC)
Well, we found out why we have no images of Americans in the Lead - too much pettiness. I honestly didn't expect this much crap, or a lack of support. As has been pointed out,this is a regular feature of most other nationality/ethnicity articles. Thus I've removed the section as being against consensus. - BilCat ( talk) 19:44, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
I gave Americans an accurate meaning consistent with the 2 sources below but BilCat reverted my edit. [ [3]]
Americans do not only include US citizens and its native people but also permanent residents, those who renounced US citizenship, those who live outside the US, and so on. That's what the two sources are explaining and this is common sense.-- Fareed30 ( talk) 01:06, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
The point I want to raise here is that the introduction of this article is only giving readers the strict definition of an American but lacks other definitions. For example, an anti-American terrorist becomes a US citizen and then kills Americans vs. a person who grew up in America for many years but moved to another country for job, marriage or other purposes. I think a line should be added in the intro to include certain people who have strong connection to America although they may not be physically living inside the US, and not US citizens or legal permanent residents. See this
As defined by the INA, all U.S. citizens are U.S. nationals but only a relatively small number of persons acquire U.S. nationality without becoming U.S. citizens. Section 101(a)(21) of the INA defines the term “national” as “a person owing permanent allegiance to a state.” Section 101(a)(22) of the INA provides that the term “national of the United States” includes all U.S. citizens as well as persons who, though not citizens of the United States, owe permanent allegiance to the United States (non-citizen nationals).
-- Fareed30 ( talk) 13:20, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
User:Fareed30 has been blocked as a sockpuppet of banned user User:Lagoo sab. Banned users are not allowed to participate in WP, and their contributions can be removed on sight. Does anyone else support the changes he's made to the Lead? If not, I'm going to revert his changes in a few days. Thanks. - BilCat ( talk) 11:22, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
Recently, I have returned to editing wikipedia an an other editor
reverted my recent efforts to improve the article. In reverting my edit the editor removed the German, Irish, and English individuals in the table for
White Americans, as well as recreated the table inconstancy for
Asian Americans. As I am not going to get into an
edit war following a return from a multimonth wiki break that early, I would like the editor to explain why recreating problems is a net positive to this article.
When this article received less attention, I updated the demographics and added tables to each section. The reason why there wasn't a collage at the top of the article in the infobox as the consensus at the time was there wasn't an image which properly showed the diversity of the nation, that any of the active editors could provide at that time. In the tables in each section, which is categorized by race as is done by the U.S. Census, there was a representative individuals for each of the ethnicities/ancestries listed in the infobox.
By removing Einstein, Kennedy, and Washington the editor removed the German, Irish, and English representatives from that table, and by removing Chawla the editor removed the Indian representative from that table. I will wait 24 hours for a response. Otherwise, I will return the images in the infobox. --
RightCowLeftCoast (
talk) 19:11, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
The top image selects nine particular Americans from all the rest (giving them undue weight), and I think we can easily do better. The infobox details the distribution of Americans in other countries but not within the US. So, I suggest the following image and caption, which seems rather unobjectionable.
Anythingyouwant ( talk) 20:24, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
Seriously - an article about American people should have as its first image a collage of American people. I think that's about all I have to say on the matter. Red Slash 00:00, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
That's my list. Hate on it if you want p b p 05:29, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
18.51.3.209 ( talk) 20:18, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
There are a total of 3 people on that image who would be considered Asian-American. THREE, despite Asian-Americans making up 5% of the population. If you were attempting to be diverse or reflective of the American population then there should be at least 6 whites, a black, a brown Hispanic and then a minority of your choosing. If you wanted significant figures then there are also better ways of distributing the image slots. As it stands I can only guess this image was made by a skinny white liberal hopelessly trying to be politically correct while making even more of a mess of the image. Changing it is the only option, it is not representative of the American people. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.189.66.95 ( talk) 14:02, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
The article states "Americans, or American people, are citizens, permanent lawful residents.." Neither source supports the lawful part. They refer to inhabitants and citizens. Toddst1 ( talk) 21:54, 12 December 2013 (UTC)
The article begins with: "Americans, or American people, are citizens, or natives, of the United States of America." Even though the disambiguation refers to other uses in the first line, this definition is only based on wide-spread use of the word "Americans". But semantically it is not correct.
I'd like to suggest: "Americans, or American people, are citizens, or natives, of a country in America, even though in daily speech it is often only meant to refer to citizens of the United States".
McPoel ( talk) 19:55, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
First let me say that I've read all the points made above.
Second, I wish to make it clear I'm (a) a native English-speaker, (b) Canadian by nationality and (c) American by continental identity.
Anyone who claims that there are no English-speakers who user American only as a continental identity is a liar, because I am an English-speaker who uses American in that sense only. I stand with my fellow Americans who live south of the Rio Grande in saying that we are all Americans, just as Germans, Italians and Poles are all Europeans. I find the arrogance of Usonians in claiming that American means them alone truly disgusting. How such people can possibly wonder why the rest of us don't like them is truly mind-boggling!!!! Epikuro57 ( talk) 05:37, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
In the interest of clarity (for those readers who may not want to follow links to clarify what they are reading), the following might be better:
In modern English usage the terms "Americans", or "American people" generally refer to the citizens, permanent lawful residents and natives of the United States. In this sense it also includes certain individuals who are considered as nationals of the United States. This common usage has been the source of controversy, particularly among Latin Americans, who feel that using the term solely for the United States misappropriates it. The United States of America is home to people of different national origins; as a result, the citizens of the United States do not equate their nationality with ethnicity. With the exception of the Native American population (whose ancestors migrated from Asia in pre-historic times), generally all Americans or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries
This incorporates a couple of sentences from the American (word) article, which is IMHO more even-handed in its approach.-- TraceyR ( talk) 16:23, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
As someone new and previously uninvolved to this discussion, I really think that the editors who suggested just a slight clarification to the article name back in August had a good and workable idea. This article, with its current scope, is obviously about the use of the term in the US. Therefore, "American (United States)" is appropriate, and "American (Americas)" would be a potential choice for an article name that describes the other but also verifiable and notable common use. It avoids the ambiguity, and avoids any POV problems where the US "Americans" try to "have it their way." Cheers. N2e ( talk) 01:03, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
Well, I tried. I acknowledge that it appears no consensus is possible here, even with the suggestion of the other editors who back in August suggested a very neutral but descriptive article name that would allow Wikipedia to work well for both groups.
But I will close with saying that I think this continues to disrespect the non-US folks of the Americas, many of whom do, in fact, refer to themselves by the name American. I realize of course that the particular use of the term "Americans," in this article, is about the US-based flavor of Americans. But the space should be left open for the others as well, and not taken/assumed by any one country or set of folks, whether or not they have the largest population, or whether or not they are the regional hegemon. Cheers. N2e ( talk) 00:50, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
The opening sentence of this article indicates that the complete definition of "Americans" is by citizenship. This implies that no one who is not a citizen isn't American. Here's several examples of non-citizens stilling being Americans.
I think we should keep citizenship in the lead for the immigrants who become American citizens but still have to assimilate but also include the word people to also include anybody who is not a citizen since being American is also more than just a piece a paper that says you are. I would like it to follow the opening in the Canadians article but with citizenship also included. Thoughts? AbelM7 ( talk) 06:23, 14 April 2014 (UTC)
![]() | This 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. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 |
There seems to be a contradiction in the article - in that the lead says = " As a result, Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship.(unreferenced) " However according to this article and the United States Census Bureau American ethnicity is a valid response. Perhaps the Canadians article could be an example. Moxy ( talk) 23:41, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
I dont see that as a compromise the article lead is still wrong and misleading our readers. We simply have a different interpretation of what the article is saying is the only thing I can guess. I believe the lead should be broad in its term covering all aspects the article covers - don't have to mentioned ethnicity at all sometimes in leads. I believe the article lead should be progressive and not go out if its way to contradict the articles content, data and subsequently linked articles. The style of leads below are the way to go in my opinion - they dont contradict the articles information. Moxy ( talk) 07:34, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
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The scope of the article is defined by the reliable sources of what the definition of what American is. As American is based on one who is a native of, or is a citizen of, the United States it is not limited to a specific race or ethnicity. Perhaps the lead section can be rewritten better to summarize the article (per WP:LEAD), but that doesn't mean that it should change the scope of what the article is about. If anything the scope is very close to that of the British people article that Moxy listed. Therefore, I do not see a need to change it (the scope).-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 08:17, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
Come to think about it, I think there is something else to be added. Per the references, externally, the United States (since the end of the Civil Rights movement)likes to project an image of one population that is colorblind, and if not colorblind is multiethnic and multiracial and united. Yet internally, as shown by the self-used definitions of the population and the government, the population (at least demographically) divides itself based on race, ethnic, religious, and sometimes sexual preference lines. While it is true that anyone can become an American, whether it by a former Somali refugee, or a Scottish Comedian, or a former member of the Chinese Communist Party, how Americans sees itself internally ( Salad bowl (cultural idea) or Melting pot) maybe very different from how it projects its external image.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 15:26, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
Ok this is really odd - your not understanding what I am saying in the lest bit - never had such a hard time conveying a problem. I am saying (again) we DO NOT NEED to mention ethnicity in the lead at all. Your the one that is insisting a statement about ethnicity should be there - with refs that are disputed (by me) and that contradict the articles content. Lets go over what I have suggested thus far.
(emphesis mine).implies American do see ethnicity as a determining factor in their identity
I think the cause of this dispute is almost entirely which language you are speaking. If you are speaking American English, then "nationality = citizenship", with perhaps a small exception for people who were born in the US and have given up their citizenship for another country's citizenship. Perhaps in British English (and I know in translation in other European languages) "nationality = ethic identity". That's fine for those languages, but it just doesn't apply in American English.
Look under "German" in the Oxford English Dictionary:
"1a native or inhabitant of Germany.
Clearly "German" is (in part) an ethnic identity
But for "American"
"1a native or citizen of the United States."
without the ethnic component. The definition of "American" is not related to ethnicity.
Similarly, in Europe "nationality" is almost identical in meaning to "ethnicity." Not so in America, in fact Americans usually can't believe that anybody could define "nationality" as anything other than "citizenship."
So what's this thing about "American ethnicity"? For the most part, I think it's an artifact of the Census, when they first started asking people about their ethnicity (prob. 1970 or 1980). A lot of people would want to respond "I don't have an ethnic identity, I'm just an American." So "ethic American" grew out of the box that you could check on the census question "Ethnicity: American". Other people would just see this as a convenience answer. Rather than answer "I'm 1/32 Spanish, 1/16 Cherokee, 1/4 German, and the rest a mixture of English, Scots, and Irish with some French," they could just answer "Ethnicity: American".
In short many, many Americans do not self-identify with an ethnic group, and the answer for them on the census is "Ethnicity: American."
I know many Europeans who just can't grasp this concept. For them it is just defined that Nationality= ethnicity. I was in the reverse position living in Europe for almost a decade, and it took me a long time to understand that there were people who did not define nationality = citizenship. But in America nationality = citizenship.
So "Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship" is absolutely correct. It's part of our language - just look it up in the dictionary.
Hope this helps. Smallbones( smalltalk) 20:03, 8 February 2013 (UTC)
In the United States, there is the nationality element of an individuals identity (I am an American, I am a Mexican, I am a (insert country adjuctive here)), and there is an ethnicity element (I am Irish, I am Canadian, I am Vietnamese, etc.). One need not be one or the other, one can be both. This is why there are those who have issue with " hyphenated Americans".Thus, American is also a "political" identity
The purpose of this response is not to offend the authors or make baseless accusations to debase their character. I simply am giving my take on the "Americans" article. I was deeply offended by the article, but I am sure no offense was intended.
The proliferation of race theory on the page describing "Americans" is quite inaccurate and offensive.
Quote: "Americans, or American people, are the citizens of the United States of America. The country is home to people of different national origins. As a result, Americans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizenship." This seems to accurately describe what defines an "American", as someone is considered a citizen of America through birth or through the immigration process. However a description of a citizen and these processes in which someone becomes an American should be included with a citation.
Note "describes" should be grammatically corrected to "describe".
The sections on Race I find quite repulsive, and I am certain I am not the only one. The author/s give a great definition of what an American is, as quoted above. Americans are not defined by ethnicity or national origin. However strangely the article degenerates after this point and wastes no time in classifying American Peoples into so-called "Races". It is neither moral, nor effective, nor informative, nor accurate to classify Americans in this way. If it is moral, effective, informative, and accurate, than the author/s should cite the source/s for the classifications of what defines "White", "Black", etc. There are those of very light complexion that have lived on the continent of Africa, in Jamaica, and in India, for several hundred years, and there are those of very dark complexion that have lived in Europe and North America for several hundred years. It is quite offensive for human beings to be broken up like dogs into "breeds". The authors should be required to cite work in a Biological/Anthropological authority which validates race theory.
There are many who find it repulsive to classify people by skin color. American Dr. Martin Luther King Jr: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." Most Americans find segregation repulsive. I find it offensive that information on Hispanic Americans is segregated into one section, and Asian Americans segregated into another "separate but equal" section, so on and so forth. I also find the section on "Two or More Races" offensive, as if these human beings are some sort of unclassifiable newly discovered mixed breed.
As another observant poster commented, the American culture is very homogenous. Those of various skin tones regularly participate in the culture originated by those Americans and others of diverse backgrounds and nations.
Besides being rejected by science, race theory is also rejected by most American belief systems, humanist and religious. For example, Christian and Islamic theology do not classify human beings into races, but rather consider all humanity equal in the eyes of God.
It is highly recommended that you reevaluate this page. It is highly recommended that you do not break up and classify Americans into races and groups and breeds, in segregated sections. America is a Melting Pot, all theories of Race and policies of Segregation should be rejected. I recommend you get much more specific when referencing culture and nationality. General classifications such as "White" and "African" and "Asian" and "European" again are not very effective, accurate, or informative, particularly when you are classifying someone as "European" or "African" or "Asian", NOT based on the continent they were born in or the culture they subscribe to, but trivial characteristics like skin color or eye shape. RealTalk1000 ( talk) 17:33, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
In response to the above Census bureau citation: So why, out of all the data which the US Census Bureau collects, did the author/s decide it was appropriate to divide the American people by race? Why not gender? Why not by State? Why not by annual income?
How about not breaking up Americans into baseless categories at all?
Does the US Census Bureau cite biological or anthropological studies which scientifically define the race classifications? Or maybe they are basing these classifications on quack race theories of the 19th and early 20th century?
Maybe the mighty Aryan Race has its origins in the ruins of South America, as the Nazi archeologists proclaimed in the 1930's? In that regard, we should most definitely amend any articles pertaining to the origins of the South American or German peoples to reflect this government-sanctioned fact. (sarcasm)
If race shall be defined by government decree and not by some sort of consensus in the scientific community or academia... and if this herein shall be acceptable standards for publishing articles on wikipedia... than I challenge writers here on wikipedia to participate. We should base our articles on all types of government-sanctioned quackery and junk science, whether it has its stamp of approval from the U.S. Census Bureau or some 1930's German archeological program in South America. If the almighty State proclaims it true, than who are we to question it?
RealTalk1000 ( talk) 16:41, 3 December 2012 (UTC)
I will be reverting a good faith edit done here, which had the edit summary:
MOS:commonname
The reason for the reversion is there is no such thing as MOS:COMMONNAME. There is a WP:COMMONNAME, however that applies to article titles and not article content. Additionally, the content changed does not fall under MOS:LIFE, where there is a "MOS:COMMONNAME", which is a red link. The closest MOS that would apply is MOS:PN; however, it does not require that the most common name for a country be used. It does mention not using historical names where there is a modern name available for the subject, but as the country names that were previously used are also those countries (Republic of Korea, People's Republic of China, and Republic of China) modern names either name can be used.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 17:47, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
May I ask the editor, what was the reasoning behind these series of edits? I did not understand the reasoning behind the edits using the edit summaries used.
I am assuming good faith, that this is not meant to be disruptive or to be make a point regarding past reversion of edits done by this editor, and that there is a reason why some listed countries have their official name used, and others do not.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 04:41, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
Going to all official names, is perfectly fine with me.
As for the January edit which was reverted per WP:BRD, it was that using China for one and Taiwan for the other country name is to advance a POV that favor's one nation's political position over another nation's. Using the official name for both China's does not favor either nation's political POV, and is thus keeping with WP:NEU.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 15:51, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
The culture section of this article needs more citations per verification, or it needs to be a summary of the main article Culture of the United States, which itself needs more work.-- RightCowLeftCoast ( talk) 01:27, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
Americans are anyone from North , South, And Central. This article is insulting to the Americans in Central and South America. You have millions of people in Central and South American that can confirm this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DrMenoRPS ( talk • contribs) 13:32, 23 July 2013 (UTC)
There is no evidence backing up that Einstein was ethnically Jewish, but religiously. He was a German. ( N0n3up ( talk) 04:52, 30 September 2013 (UTC))
Instead of a picture of Americans, there is the Flag of USA. On the other ethnic group/people pages there are pictures of the people (for example on the British people page, Han Chinese page and Russians page) Shouldn't this page be similar with the others? -- Ransewiki ( talk) 09:05, 4 July 2013 (UTC)
Well, we found out why we have no images of Americans in the Lead - too much pettiness. I honestly didn't expect this much crap, or a lack of support. As has been pointed out,this is a regular feature of most other nationality/ethnicity articles. Thus I've removed the section as being against consensus. - BilCat ( talk) 19:44, 6 November 2013 (UTC)
I gave Americans an accurate meaning consistent with the 2 sources below but BilCat reverted my edit. [ [3]]
Americans do not only include US citizens and its native people but also permanent residents, those who renounced US citizenship, those who live outside the US, and so on. That's what the two sources are explaining and this is common sense.-- Fareed30 ( talk) 01:06, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
The point I want to raise here is that the introduction of this article is only giving readers the strict definition of an American but lacks other definitions. For example, an anti-American terrorist becomes a US citizen and then kills Americans vs. a person who grew up in America for many years but moved to another country for job, marriage or other purposes. I think a line should be added in the intro to include certain people who have strong connection to America although they may not be physically living inside the US, and not US citizens or legal permanent residents. See this
As defined by the INA, all U.S. citizens are U.S. nationals but only a relatively small number of persons acquire U.S. nationality without becoming U.S. citizens. Section 101(a)(21) of the INA defines the term “national” as “a person owing permanent allegiance to a state.” Section 101(a)(22) of the INA provides that the term “national of the United States” includes all U.S. citizens as well as persons who, though not citizens of the United States, owe permanent allegiance to the United States (non-citizen nationals).
-- Fareed30 ( talk) 13:20, 23 October 2013 (UTC)
User:Fareed30 has been blocked as a sockpuppet of banned user User:Lagoo sab. Banned users are not allowed to participate in WP, and their contributions can be removed on sight. Does anyone else support the changes he's made to the Lead? If not, I'm going to revert his changes in a few days. Thanks. - BilCat ( talk) 11:22, 12 November 2013 (UTC)
Recently, I have returned to editing wikipedia an an other editor
reverted my recent efforts to improve the article. In reverting my edit the editor removed the German, Irish, and English individuals in the table for
White Americans, as well as recreated the table inconstancy for
Asian Americans. As I am not going to get into an
edit war following a return from a multimonth wiki break that early, I would like the editor to explain why recreating problems is a net positive to this article.
When this article received less attention, I updated the demographics and added tables to each section. The reason why there wasn't a collage at the top of the article in the infobox as the consensus at the time was there wasn't an image which properly showed the diversity of the nation, that any of the active editors could provide at that time. In the tables in each section, which is categorized by race as is done by the U.S. Census, there was a representative individuals for each of the ethnicities/ancestries listed in the infobox.
By removing Einstein, Kennedy, and Washington the editor removed the German, Irish, and English representatives from that table, and by removing Chawla the editor removed the Indian representative from that table. I will wait 24 hours for a response. Otherwise, I will return the images in the infobox. --
RightCowLeftCoast (
talk) 19:11, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
The top image selects nine particular Americans from all the rest (giving them undue weight), and I think we can easily do better. The infobox details the distribution of Americans in other countries but not within the US. So, I suggest the following image and caption, which seems rather unobjectionable.
Anythingyouwant ( talk) 20:24, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
Seriously - an article about American people should have as its first image a collage of American people. I think that's about all I have to say on the matter. Red Slash 00:00, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
That's my list. Hate on it if you want p b p 05:29, 8 November 2013 (UTC)
18.51.3.209 ( talk) 20:18, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
There are a total of 3 people on that image who would be considered Asian-American. THREE, despite Asian-Americans making up 5% of the population. If you were attempting to be diverse or reflective of the American population then there should be at least 6 whites, a black, a brown Hispanic and then a minority of your choosing. If you wanted significant figures then there are also better ways of distributing the image slots. As it stands I can only guess this image was made by a skinny white liberal hopelessly trying to be politically correct while making even more of a mess of the image. Changing it is the only option, it is not representative of the American people. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.189.66.95 ( talk) 14:02, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
The article states "Americans, or American people, are citizens, permanent lawful residents.." Neither source supports the lawful part. They refer to inhabitants and citizens. Toddst1 ( talk) 21:54, 12 December 2013 (UTC)
The article begins with: "Americans, or American people, are citizens, or natives, of the United States of America." Even though the disambiguation refers to other uses in the first line, this definition is only based on wide-spread use of the word "Americans". But semantically it is not correct.
I'd like to suggest: "Americans, or American people, are citizens, or natives, of a country in America, even though in daily speech it is often only meant to refer to citizens of the United States".
McPoel ( talk) 19:55, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
First let me say that I've read all the points made above.
Second, I wish to make it clear I'm (a) a native English-speaker, (b) Canadian by nationality and (c) American by continental identity.
Anyone who claims that there are no English-speakers who user American only as a continental identity is a liar, because I am an English-speaker who uses American in that sense only. I stand with my fellow Americans who live south of the Rio Grande in saying that we are all Americans, just as Germans, Italians and Poles are all Europeans. I find the arrogance of Usonians in claiming that American means them alone truly disgusting. How such people can possibly wonder why the rest of us don't like them is truly mind-boggling!!!! Epikuro57 ( talk) 05:37, 17 November 2013 (UTC)
In the interest of clarity (for those readers who may not want to follow links to clarify what they are reading), the following might be better:
In modern English usage the terms "Americans", or "American people" generally refer to the citizens, permanent lawful residents and natives of the United States. In this sense it also includes certain individuals who are considered as nationals of the United States. This common usage has been the source of controversy, particularly among Latin Americans, who feel that using the term solely for the United States misappropriates it. The United States of America is home to people of different national origins; as a result, the citizens of the United States do not equate their nationality with ethnicity. With the exception of the Native American population (whose ancestors migrated from Asia in pre-historic times), generally all Americans or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries
This incorporates a couple of sentences from the American (word) article, which is IMHO more even-handed in its approach.-- TraceyR ( talk) 16:23, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
As someone new and previously uninvolved to this discussion, I really think that the editors who suggested just a slight clarification to the article name back in August had a good and workable idea. This article, with its current scope, is obviously about the use of the term in the US. Therefore, "American (United States)" is appropriate, and "American (Americas)" would be a potential choice for an article name that describes the other but also verifiable and notable common use. It avoids the ambiguity, and avoids any POV problems where the US "Americans" try to "have it their way." Cheers. N2e ( talk) 01:03, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
Well, I tried. I acknowledge that it appears no consensus is possible here, even with the suggestion of the other editors who back in August suggested a very neutral but descriptive article name that would allow Wikipedia to work well for both groups.
But I will close with saying that I think this continues to disrespect the non-US folks of the Americas, many of whom do, in fact, refer to themselves by the name American. I realize of course that the particular use of the term "Americans," in this article, is about the US-based flavor of Americans. But the space should be left open for the others as well, and not taken/assumed by any one country or set of folks, whether or not they have the largest population, or whether or not they are the regional hegemon. Cheers. N2e ( talk) 00:50, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
The opening sentence of this article indicates that the complete definition of "Americans" is by citizenship. This implies that no one who is not a citizen isn't American. Here's several examples of non-citizens stilling being Americans.
I think we should keep citizenship in the lead for the immigrants who become American citizens but still have to assimilate but also include the word people to also include anybody who is not a citizen since being American is also more than just a piece a paper that says you are. I would like it to follow the opening in the Canadians article but with citizenship also included. Thoughts? AbelM7 ( talk) 06:23, 14 April 2014 (UTC)