Well, everybody born in the american continent is technically “american” too, including Central and South America. Is there a specific term in english for these people?
Edit: Thanks for all your answers, especially the wholesome ones and those patient enough to explain it thoroughly. Since we (South Americans) and you (North Americans) use different models/conventions of continent boundaries, it makes sense for you to go by “Americans”, while it doesn’t for us.
In Australia we call them cunts.
You call everyone Cunts though.
That’s if we like you, if we don’t then mate, if we want to physically hurt you with a word, we call you champ.
I’m from the US. I’m familiar with the idea of “Southern Hospitality”.
Look at this cunt out here with all the knowledge, bloody legend!
In Australia, you call your mates cunt and cunts mate
Not just down under, if I call you “friend” then I’m pissed
Or Seppos.
For septics?
Or skip the rhyming slang and just say yanks. But usually not to their face, we’re toi friendly for that. :P
Calling an American a yank isn’t an insult to US. I know it’s meant as an insult from some cultures but it’s absolutely not insulting to an American lol
Rude, but fair…
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The proper term is American.
everybody born in the american continent is technically “american” too
The implied context of your question is in English.. In the English-speaking world, there is no American continent. People from North America are North Americans; people from South America are South Americans. People from the United States of America are American. There is no ambiguity. There is also no good term to collectively describe everyone from the Americas but there’s also rarely any need to discuss that.
I consider terms such as “USonian” and whatnot to be highly offensive. Nobody should tell a people what they are allowed to call themselves in their own language just because the same word means something else in another language. It would be like telling French people they’re not allowed to call their arm a bras because it refers to an article of clothing in English. Other languages where America means something else already have their own terms for people from the US. English, however, has no real ambiguity except that caused by those trying to shame Americans for calling themselves Americans.
“highly offensive” lol wow chill out bud. It’s weird but doesn’t bother me at all. Let em call me whatever they want in whatever language they have.
Telling people what they’re allowed to be offended by is usually a bad choice.
Let em call me whatever they want in whatever language they have.
That’s not what this is about though, which is precisely the point. In other languages, “America” means something else, and they all have other terms to refer to people from the US. The whole discussion is about what Americans should be called in English.
It’s ridiculous to give such weight and care to silly things like labels.
I don’t care what they want to call me in English. My comment was intended to read as dismissive of the entire conversation.
In the English-speaking world, there is no American continent.
I didn’t know that, thanks.
Nobody should tell a people what they are allowed to call themselves in their own language
Look man, I’m not american and I didn’t ask the question to create some debate about the ethics or whatsoever. I just wanted to know if there was a specific word for that.
In the English-speaking world, there is no American continent.
I didn’t know that, thanks.
Eh, I agree common and mostly unambiguous usage is that ‘America’ refers to USA, but even in English it feels incongruous sometimes.
Just to be clear, I didn’t think that you were being offensive. It came across entirely as a good faith question from a foreigner, but it ties into (ironically arrogant) advocacy from some foreigners who call Americans arrogant for using the term American.
People from North America are North Americans; people from South America are South Americans. People from the United States of America are American. There is no ambiguity.
Thank you for eloquently responding to the pedantry underlying OP’s question.
It would be like telling French people they’re not allowed to call their arm a bras because it refers to an article of clothing in English.
And yet I’ve seen so many Americans chastising Spanish speaking people for saying the color black in their own language.
In the English-speaking world, there is no American continent.
You mean, in USA world.
No, it’s the entire English-speaking world, which actually makes sense since the practice originated with the British Empire long before American independence.
In the English-speaking world, there is no American continent.
Not true. North and South America were made up by the government to brainwash people. It’s a conspiracy. There are only 4 continents.
This is about language, not geology. Doesn’t really matter how it came to be that way, North and South America are effectively treated as separate continents and very rarely referred to as a whole, and you saying “but actually” doesn’t change that.
Words can be coined. America is a continent. There, if the word didn’t exist before, it does now.
You’re right that words can be coined and their usage changed, but you seem to be misinformed about how that happens. You just deciding we’re gonna do it this way now in a random thread on lemmy is not gonna cut it, sorry
Sure, 4 out continents, but what about incontinence.
Yankee, or Yank.
How to be murdered by someone from Boston or a southerner who’s still not over the civil war
Yankees are only people from the North East US, like New York. Calling someone from California a Yankee would be laughable.
In the US, sure.
Outside, a Yankee is a Yankee, even if they’re cosplaying a ghost while standing in front of a burning cross and waving a confederate flag. We don’t care enough to ask in which state they had the misfortune of being born. 🤷♂️
It’s like calling someone in the UK English even though they live in Scotland. You sound stupid but yeah only those people care
That’s a good analogy because that also happens all the time.
Yeah, but British is a thing, and everyone knows about it (the British made damn well sure, back when they were the main global bully)… American, on the other hand, doesn’t work, because it refers to the whole damn continent, not just the USA… so if we want to refer to the citizens of the US Yankee / Yank is about the only option we have; not the best, maybe, but probably the least worst.
In my experience living in Ireland and traveling to other English-speaking countries you’re at least as likely to be called an “American” as you are “yank.”
The reason why is that it dates back to the British Empire and the fact that British subjects lived in the “American” colonies for at least 200 years before they gained independence. By that time the usage in the British Empire, of referring to people from the “American” colonies as “Americans,” was pretty well baked into informal English usage and it never really died out.
Linguistics doesn’t tell us how language should work in a prescriptive sense, it just tells us why it works and how it’s used and why every language we know of is full of logical inconsistencies, especially English.
As a Californian I will embrace any non-american who calls me Yankee assuming it’s followed by some Sherman posting.
Only in the US. In the rest of the English-speaking world many people don’t know or don’t care about these differences and it’s just a blanket term for all Americans.
Only one country on those countries has the word “America” in its name.
It’s commonly understood by all but the most pedantic that “americans” refers exclusively to inhabitants of the USA.
So they should call them American Americans, or Americericans for short; like I talk about English English because calling it British English implies Scots talk the same way.
;-)
Lowkey solid answer
I’ve never had to differentiate before like I have in this conversation. I think I would say “US Americans” since it seems to adopt other languages calling us something like United Statesans without creating an odd word like Statesans.
I think I would say “US Americans”
And I will reply YOU Americans
Why not England’s English?
They could call themselves “States of America”
Are you suggesting that “united states” implies something like the triple point of water?
North and South America are so big and diverse that there’s really no usage for the term “American” being used to refer to everyone on both continents. US just took the term for themselves and no one really cared enough to complain
Spanish speaking nations complain. They don’t mean USA when they say Americano
Okay, but most people in the US wouldn’t call themselves Americano.
Well, no. That’s a kind of coffee.
Holup being from Spanish America I promise you Americano does in fact mean American, despite all complaints.
Not using EEUU?
What are you talking about? all my life it’s been “estadounidense”. Americano was always politically charged and used by those promoting globalization.
Now this is the most interesting comment chain so far for me. TIL
Que chucha, acá siempre usamos estadounidense, norte americano, o derechamente gringo. Jamás he escuchado a nadie decir americano para referirse específicamente a los de EEUU.
Excepto la ropa americana, pero ese es otro contexto cultural que no tiene anda que ver con la discusión.
Jamás he escuchado a nadie decir americano para referirse específicamente a los de EEUU.
I have in Mexico. Strangely “estadounidense” is not something a Mexican would call themselves.
Language rules (in English at least) are descriptive not prescriptive. They try to explain why Americans are called Americans, not determine what they’re called. They’re called Americans, whether or not it’s logical, or the ideal descriptor, or fits with other names, that’s what they’re called.
Also most English speaking countries don’t have an “American” continent, they have North and South America as separate continents, so you would say someone is North or South American to refer to the continent, not just American. Similar to how some people consider Eurasia a single continent but very few people would identify as Eurasian.
When referring to the entire continent, I’ve heard “The Americas” in English.
Just a reminder: Central America is another division of the American continent.
Um
AKSHUALLY
It’s debatable that North and South America are separate continents. I prefer the continental plate system but some countries literally teach that there is an “American” continent that includes both landmasses.
They also typically merge Europe and Asia, which is absolutely the right thing to do regardless.
The reason you have this disagreement is that there simply isn’t a good, concise definition of “continent,” and because at the end of the day it only matters for semantics and racism.
So the number of continents in the world is between 5 to 7, all debatably correct, depending on who you ask.
Possibly even 4 if you want to get particularly spicy and say any large, connected landmass is a single continent, merging Africa, Europe, and Asia into a single entity.
Which is also a more valid take than “Europe is its own continent because white people live there.”
Edit: I forgot to mention the Indian homies are more deserving of a continent than Europe, thanks to having their own tectonic plate.
Tl;DR the world has 4-8 continents, but it is typically taught as anywhere from 5-7, it just depends on how actually consistent you want to be with your rules for what defines a continent, and 7 is just straight up the scientifically worst option unless India is recognized as a separate continent from Eurasia.
Yeah that’s kinda my point haha. Continents are made up and don’t mean anything. If you’re going by plates then there’s dozens of continents.
A US Citizen.
Not everyone who identifies as American has citizenship, and not everyone with citizenship identifies as American. It’s not synonymous.
Did you even read the OP?
Yes.
“How do you call someone born in the US besides American”?
Yes, not everyone born in the US identifies as American. I’ve had friends who were born there while their parents were traveling and while they are technically US citizens they wouldn’t consider themselves American as they’ve never lived there and aren’t culturally American at all. I’ve also known people who were born outside the US and brought there at an early age who definitely consider themselves American even though their legal status is a mess. It’s the only country they’ve ever known.
I understand what you are saying, but it doesn’t relate to the question.
The question is asking what do you call someone born in the US besides “American”, no matter what way you spin it, they are a US Citizen until they decide to get citizenship in another country. This is also obviously different from being born on US soil, which implies your parents were not citizens themselves.
I’m not really getting how born in the US and born on US soil have different meanings in the context of this conversation.
A completely different tangent: lots of Americans aren’t born in the US. Which kinda messes up OPs question also. Like, yes, technically you can call most people born in the US a US citizen, but you can also call lots of people not born in the US that.
US residents are not Americans. They can identify all they want but it doesn’t make it true.
I might relate to Americans on many things but unless I move there and become a citizen I’ll never be American.
I don’t disagree with your second sentence though. Considering that some US citizens inherited their citizenship from their parents but never lived there for prolonged periods of time. For them, being a US citizen is just a technicality.
To add a bit of context, it isn’t arrogance or something that drives us to use “American” as a demonym, it’s just the linguistic norm. I don’t find any of the other names offensive (except seppo, but that one is meant to offend me), but most of us would probably do a double take at the term “USican” or “USian.” Virtually all of us would accept Yankee.
Further reading: the full name of Mexico is the United Mexican States. If we wanted to be pedantic, we could say that using the reference to the US would be ambiguous, as they too are technically a US.
Wasn’t Yankee historical origin as a derogatory term?
I like to call them Muricans. Sure, it may sound super similar to “Americans”, but it’s different enough to sorta make things clearer.
I’m joking. This idea is horrible.
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You mean the land of Abe Lincoln? No, not Abraham, I said Abe. Completely different.
Who is this Abe? It sounds like an honest name
It’s a guy from an alternate reality
The simple answer is really, no. Colloquially if you say “American” you’re talking about someone from the USA. We’ll further segregate ourselves into the States we’re from, which isn’t that different a distinction between “European” and “German”.
obese.
Yank
“American” is the official name, though throughout history attempts have been made to find alternatives. You can read more on the Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonyms_for_the_United_States
The only officially and commonly used alternative for referring to the people of the United States in English is to refer to them as citizens of that country.[18] Another alternative is US-American,[19] also spelled US American.
Several single-word English alternatives for American have been suggested over time, especially Usonian, popularized by architect Frank Lloyd Wright,[20] and the nonce term United-Statesian.[21]
Writer H. L. Mencken collected a number of proposals from between 1789 and 1939, finding terms including Columbian, Columbard, Fredonian, Frede, Unisian, United Statesian, Colonican, Appalacian, Usian, Washingtonian, Usonian, Uessian, U-S-ian, Uesican, and United Stater.[22] Names for broader categories include terms such as Western Hemispherian, New Worlder, and North Atlantican.[23][24][25]
Nevertheless, no alternative to “American” is common in English.[18]
Nonce term?? Does that mean something different where you are?
That sentence stumped me too, really weird wording. Apparently it means “rare, seldom used” in US English.
Edit: just checked Urban Dictionary and welp, I didn’t foresee the British slang meaning o_O
I’m british, so you can see my confusion!
I’m American, but I understand the slang meaning of nonce, and yeah… it’s a nonce term.
Usonian
Yankee (or Yank) is a colloquial term for Americans in English; cognates can be found in other languages. Within the United States, Yankee usually refers to people specifically from New England or the Northern United States, though it has been applied to Americans in general since the 18th century, especially by the British.[26] The earliest recorded use in this context is in a 1784 letter by Horatio Nelson.[26]
I might start calling Americans Yankees
I prefer yankers thank you very much
Do it, it’s probably the best option really. Feel free to call us Yanks too. Unlike the others proposed it’s one where any of us will know what you mean
And Aussies take that another step further and say “Seppo” which is short for “Septic Tank”, which is rhyming slang for “Yank”.
If you call people in the Southern US a Yankee it won’t end well for you.
Anyone that takes offense to being called a Yank is someone that would’ve been happily fighting for the Confederates during the Civil War. So fuck 'em.
Not necessarily - there’s also a MLB team with this name, so folks from different regions of the US may get pissed off/confused.
It just sounds weird to me personally, but I know it’s not an uncommon term in places like the UK/EU & I don’t take offense.
Depends on where the person using the term is from I guess?
Some British guy said something like,“I bet the yanks won’t like that” (Whatever it was, I can’t remember). I replied,“Hell, the confederates won’t like it much either” He was very confused.
i invite them to travel to europe and try
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Honestly, Yankee is probably the best. Some southerners won’t like it, and westerners will probably be confused, but we all know it means American and it’s the only real term for one of us that doesn’t lend the question “and why do we call you this and not people from the United States of Mexico this”. Our country’s name is unfortunately extremely generic.
This is definitely not the universal term all americans would go by. Many even find it offensive.
Southerners use this term pejoratively sometimes. I wouldn’t assume every person is actually cool with it.
It always annoys me to be called a yank because my family is northern but I lived in the South for a while as a kid and they weren’t calling me a Yankee to be nice or fun. A lot of southerners are still butthurt about losing the US civil war and get tribalistic about it.
