Started an argument with my much smarter wife because she said North and South America are not two separate continents. She was right, because continents are only defined by convention.
Started an argument with my much smarter wife because she said North and South America are not two separate continents. She was right, because continents are only defined by convention.
I try to explain this to people who don’t believe south americans call themselves americans.
This becomes even more confusing with the way people commonly talk in English versus Spanish. In English, residents of the United States of America typically refer to themselves as Americans, and in English “American” typically only refers to someone from the USA. In Spanish, it seems residents of the USA are typically called the equivalent of “United Stateser” and “American” refers more generally to someone from the continent, at least in some parts of the Spanish-speaking world. I once had an apparent native Spanish-speaker online argue that was the correct form in English as well and insisted that the official name of the country is United States (Estados Unidos), not United States of America (Estados Unidos de América), and that America never refers to the country in English. They didn’t appreciate when I asked why in international sporting events the Americans’ shirts always say USA and why the supporters chant “U-S-A” all the time.
Languages are weird. If you’re learning a different language and try to insist that the new language behave the same as your native language, you’re going to have a hard time.
Mostly right but nobody in Latinamerica refers to themselves as American in any language. It would be weird.
That one’s a weird one. We don’t explicitly call ourselves Americans in Spanish because there’s no need to but whenever this comes up in conversation it’s generally agreed upon that we are technically Americans (and then people immediately take the opportunity to dunk on USians for appropriating the word 😅).
Yeah, that’s my point. Being part of the continent is something that almost never comes up. We call ourselves whatever we are and it’s never “Americanos”.
Yep. In Spain and Latin America, there is no separation between North and South. Its just one continent: América
Most romance languages follow that. The 5 rings in the Olympics logo are meant to be continents.
Antarctica is severely underrepresented in the Olympics. Not a single medal.
The USA isn’t the only America nor the only United States. Maybe when the government collapses we can come up with a better name.
North America isn’t even the first place to be called America
Well, they’re in South America
Right? Continent or not has nothing to do with it.
And yet when you tell people that you mean south americans when you say americans they always freak out.
Do those same people freak out when you refer to Mexicans or Canadians as Americans?
It might not be a North/South continent thing.
Yeah, that’s really because the USA doesn’t really have a name, just a description.
They may eventually admit they know it’s technically correct, but you take your life in your hands if you try telling a Canadian that they are “American.” Well, not your life, but they’ll probably stop talking to you for a little while.
I think it’s one of those “technically” things, that isn’t useful.
Someone from The Americas is American, technically. That’s how language works.
But I’d venture* that 97.3% of people mean United States when they say “Americans”, or better, it’s what people mean 97.3% of the time. The only time I’ve seen people bring it up is when they’re from a South American country.
So I’d say context and scale of detail/granularity influence the meaning in the moment.
*Totally Made Up Stats
You mean US citizens. I’ve had “Americans” chime in on that as well, when I explained that for people who are not from the US, that “America” is not just the US of A but all of the Americas, and that Americans are not just people from the US either.
Not just US citizens, but specifically the Anglophone world as a whole. I’ve been to other English-speaking country where citizens of the USA are commonly referred to as “Americans” (when they’re not called Yanks) while the continents are called “The Americas”.
I also colloquially know that the name of the country in Japanese is simply “America” as well with its citizens just called “America-jin”
The relevant Wikipedia article seems to have some interesting insights as to which major world languages opt for which options, but it doesn’t seem to be an overly long list of examples.
Well, smart Americans call themselves Americans too, and dumb Americans call themselves Americans, even Usamericans call themselves Americans ;-)