Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive ("U.S." or "American")

See also: Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#Use_of_America/American, Talk:List of people from the United States/naming, Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style, talk:Alternate words for American, talk:American

If you check news outlets like The Washington Post, NY Times and such you'll read headlines like "US Senate...", "US outsourced...", "US Troops..." now I would think that major newspapers (in the US!) would do a good research on how to properly name their headlines for the past decades and how to use proper english. http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&q=US&btnG=Search+News vs

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&q=American&btnG=Search+News

The first one nearly triples the ammount of headlines with US including major newspapers, the second is used by mostly local/regional newspapersDamianFinol 14:01, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

US is used in headlines chiefly because it's shorter than American. You don't have a lot of room to write a headline. Anyway, this says nothing about the meaning of American. John FitzGerald 13:21, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

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Quit changing American to U.S. RickK 01:22, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Why? Is the John Birch Society active in South America too? --Wik 01:25, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

Possibly. I have no idea. But the nationality of people living in the United States, their institutions and organizations is "American", not "U.S.". RickK 01:29, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

An interesting idea. So there are no U.S. people or organizations? Don't be silly. U.S. is perfectly correct and unambiguous, while "American" can be misunderstood. --Wik 01:55, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

Don't be silly. I am an American, not a U.S. If you want to change it, I'll be perfectly happy to follow along behind you and make it correct. RickK 01:58, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I didn't claim you can say "a U.S." on its own. But you're a U.S. person or a U.S. citizen etc. And the JBS is a U.S. organization. If that sounds strange to you, do a Google search for "a U.S. organization" - 2,780 hits. More than "an American organization" (2,530). --Wik 02:03, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

Nonsense. What do the people of the United States of Mexico think about someone taking their name for the use of people and institutions of another country? RickK 02:06, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

No one ever uses "U.S." for the United States of Mexico. The short form of the United States of Mexico is Mexico, the short form of the United States of America is United States. --Wik 02:08, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

Sez you! I sez that the short form of United States of America is, take your pick: America, US, U.S., USA, U.S.A., U.S. of A., Murrica, etc. jengod 21:36, 2 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I'd say quit changing "US" to "American". I've asked this repeatedly and never gotten any reply: is "US" or USA" in any way considered somehow insulting? Is there some reason to object to it? Still wondering, -- Infrogmation 18:44, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)

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Please see User talk:Wik. What is the consensus of Wikipedia concerning the naming of the nationality of people of the United States? Is Wik correct in changing "American" to "U.S."? It's offensive, to me. My nationality is American, not U.S.. RickK 02:09, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Both are correct. There is no reason to change one to the other besides stylistic concerns. --Brion 02:14, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

There you have it, Rick. I don't think you'll find anyone who agrees with you that U.S. is in any way incorrect. And clearly U.S. is more precise and unambiguous; it means the United States of America and not the entire continent. --Wik 02:26, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

Both are not correct. I am an American, not a "U.S.". RickK 02:22, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Now you're just trolling. I already responded to that on the Talk page. --Wik 02:26, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

RickK, if you insist you are an American whose nationality is not US, I'd have to assume that you are from somewhere in America other than the USA. What is your objection to thinking of yourself from as being from the USA? BTW, I've always listed my citizenship as "USA" on doccuments both in the USA and abroad and have never recieved any objection. Infrogmation

See American. Its very first sentence says "American can mean "of the United States of America" (the more common usage in the English language)". IF both are correct, as Brion says above, then why do you feel the need to change John Birch Society? You must obviously feel that both are not correct. RickK 02:38, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

No. I agree both are correct, but U.S. is more precise. American can mean "of the United States of America." U.S. always means it. --Wik 02:42, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

Of course you are not a "U.S." While "U.S." can be used synonmously w/ American in the form of an adjetive, only American can be used as a noun to refer to the person(s). "U.S." in noun form just means the country. Both are correct if it is in the proper part of speech. Which one to use is up to the user who inserts the initial text and no one should be removing/changing. --Jiang 03:21, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I was originally American, at [change], until Wik went in and changed it. RickK 03:27, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I'm an American, but I believe the term can be used by anyone from the New World. I know most "US"ers would disagree, but I've always felt that it was presumptuous of us to call ourseleves Americans as if people from Canada and Mexico, etc. were not. And I've had peolple in Mexico tell me they consider themselves to be "Americans" -- 24.94.82.245 03:36, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Likewise, it would be unfair for the people of Mexico. Why should only people of the US receive the distinction of being "USers" while the people of Mexico shouldn't? There's no logic behind reserving "US" to the USA and not to the USM. We call the United States of Mexico Mexico. Similarly, we call the United States of America America. See a parallel? Both make the same sense. --Jiang 03:47, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

When speaking in English, only pedants insist that "American" is not specific enough, when the reality is that everyone knows what you mean by "American" since there is only one country in the two American continents that includes "America" in the name (and in English too). In other meanings, you just say "North American", "Central American", "South American", or "Latin American". Seriously, when speaking in English, what Canadian or Mexican would say "I am American" rather than "I am Canadian" or "I am Mexican"? Daniel Quinlan 04:21, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

You're exactly wrong there. The common short form of the United States of Mexico is Mexico, but the common short form of the United States of America is United States, not America. If it's clear from the context that you mean a nationality of a person then American is fine, since there's no continental nationality. But the issue was about an organization (the John Birch Society), which to someone who doesn't know anything about it yet might as well be a pan-American organization. So to be precise it should be called a "U.S. organization." --Wik 13:40, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

No, the United States of America has two short forms--US or America. Since when has it been limited to one? Both of these short forms have their flaws. --Jiang

The common short form (certainly in an encyclopaedic context) is United States. You won't find an encyclopaedia which has the article about the United States of America under "America," which is just a colloquialism. --Wik 18:04, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

That's when referring to the government. But the people are almost always "Americans". --Jiang

Some Canadians do say they are American, meaning "North American," but only if they are extremely sympathetic to the United States, much moreso than Canadians are normally. If that makes any sense. Adam Bishop 04:26, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

This category of change is definitely political correctness run amok. How about waiting until we have a significant number of Canadians and Mexicans complaining about the American==USian assumption before hacking up hundreds of articles. The Wikipedia way would be to have the disgruntled Mexicans start making the changes, not to have some patronizing gringo do it. Stan 05:47, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Talking about disgruntled mexicans (that'll be me among many others I know) I do consider myself to be definetely american, as I was born in America (Mexico City, if you want me to be more specific). The name "United States of Mexico" has been mostly droped in Mexico and at some points the Mexican Legislative Power has considered changing the Official name to Mexico ONLY. I do not know a single mexican that considers himslef a national of the US just because the official name is "Estados Unidos Mexicanos".

Not to be overly pedantic, but may I make A Modest Proposal? The controversy arises from the English conflation of "American"=resident of U.S. and "American"=two continents of Western Hemisphere. If we used the Spanish "estadounidense" (or French, Italian, etc.) equivalents of the former meaning, there would be no confusion! More seriously, "American" is the only usable word for "citizen of the U.S." (as in, "my nationality is American"), but "U.S." should probably be used whenever possible ("the U.S. government undertook this action" as opposed to "the American government") for precision's sake. Paul Musgrave

Is "U.S.-American" common? That could be a way to move around the dispute, being precise, political correct and including the American part (U.S.-)Americans seems to be proud of. -- till we *) 10:57, Aug 10, 2003 (UTC)

"U.S.-American" doesn't work, really, because there's already a hyphenated convention with "Irish-Americans," "Mexican-Americans," "African-Americans." "U.S.-American" sounds like you're claiming a dual "American"/"estadounidense" heritage, and I don't think anyone's ever done that. But you're right, we need to meet the criteria you lay out--if we add another one: instant recognizability, so that people who haven't been following this dispute know what we mean. --Paul Musgrave 16:31, 10 Aug 2003 (UTC)

How silly. Pages of debate on this and no link to USian.

Given Monroe Doctrine, interference in Latin America throughout the entire 20th century, etc., it's fair to say that an "American" is someone who believes they have a right to control everything in the Americas. Let them stand and fall by that definition, rather than inventing new terms now, when it's too late to save the silly thing.

I agree with RickK and i would have posted a thank you on his personal page for taking up this fight. We ARE Americans. I got into an argument with people on a messageboard because someone wanted to call us USAmericans. Everyone considers us to be Americans, evenyone knows who you are talking about when you say America or American. They do not get it confused with Brazil, Mexico, Cuba or Canada. I would also like to know why it's so acceptable for outsiders to determine what Americans are called and what we aren't. Don't WE as citizens of this country get to determine our own name - especially since it has been used since the founding of our country? No one got us confused with the Candians while we were storming the beaches of Normandy. --JerseyDevil 09:43, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Actually, many of the people arguing on this page (myself included) are US citizens. Within limits, we do get to determine our own name. And because we are writing an encyclopedia which values clarity and despises ambiguity, most of us strongly prefer US. Rossami (talk) 20:22, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

JerseyDevil - You surely are americans. No one doubts that. But keep in mind that Canadians, Mexicans, Brazilians, Argentinians, Equatorians, Jamaicans etc etc are also americans, because they are all born in the continent of America. US citizen, US resident, and other less catchy nouns/adjectives have been proposed to define a person who is born in the US in english language. This because that word (for someone born in the US) exists clearly in many other languages, Spanish and Portuguese (which are the two other most common laguanges in the American continent) included. "american" is ambiguos, and highly aggressive to others (those not born in the US), while US citizen (or other equivalent) is neither.LtDoc 03:24, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Canadians are not Americans. I most definitely am not an American. If you want to offend a Canadian, tell him he sounds like an American. The use of American to mean a citizen of the United States is the only idiomatic usage in English. I don't tell francophones to stop calling me an anglo-saxon, even though in English I'm not one. It's their language and they use the term the way they see fit. That Spanish and Portuguese define American differntly than anglophones is certainly important on the Spanish and Portuguese Wikipedias, but obviously Spanish or Portuguese usage is of no relevance to English style. Or will you be wanting us to add gender to our articles next? John FitzGerald 00:20, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Oh, but Canadians ARE Americans, as sure as the sun is hot. Canadians are born in the continent of America, thus, are Americans, just as every German, French, Italian and Spaniard are Europeans. If you are Canadian, you most surely are also a American. What you are not, (unless you have double citzenship) is a citzien of the US. I do not wish to offend you or anything, but its just that simple. And allow me to point that the use of american= citizen of the US is NOT the only use for american in the english language. How do US citzens refer to the indian people inhabiting the land before the immigrants? And how do US citzens refer to countries of Latin origin? Is then Latin America a part of the US, such as "little italy" or a "french quarter"?? Of course not. And no, I dont want you to use gender in articles or adjectives. I just want you to understand that this is an illogical and offensive term to use.LtDoc 23:24, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

There is no continent of America in English, ergo I wasn't born on it. As you say, it's just that simple. Canadians are North Americans for sure, but Americans they are not.

Here's a question for you – what do Canadians call aboriginal peoples? They don't call them Native Americans, so what's the point of your question about Native Americans? And if you want me to use Portuguese and Spanish definitions of adjectives, why not want me to use gendered articles? Why don't you cut to the chase and just demand we speak Portuguese?

I personally get more than enough cultural imperialism from Americans and Britons, thank you, so getting it from Brazilians as well is never going to appeal to me. To paraphrase a great Englishman (if that term is acceptable to you), I and several others here have found you arguments, we cannot find you an understanding, especially when you don't want one. John FitzGerald 23:41, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

[Answer to question about aboriginal peoples: First Nations, Inuit, and Métis – if you want to tell Canadians what they are, maybe it would help to know something about their society, eh? Eh?]

Oh, but there IS a continent named "America" in english. Thing is, most US citizens (and some canadians, I suppose) began to say there were two continents insteand of one, by mid-XVIII century, the reasons behind that to be discussed in due time. Thus, they set USA (and Canada) apart from the "less civilized" nations south of the border; Even the choice of naming a country "United States of America" is proof of that. If the founders of the country really did believe that North America was a separate continent, why the h*ll didnt they name the country "United States of North America"??? Because at the time the US didnt have the influence it has nowadays, and because they never did think that it would matter, after all, being one of the first countries in this continent (America, not N.America or S.America) to claim independence, they were literally the only "United States of America", for there were no other states in all of America that were united as one country.

My point in asking how US citizens (not americans) call their natives? It was to show you that even US citizens rely on the term "american" to describe others; "native americans" they call them. But, mind you, that name is not used just for Apaches ou Sioux (tribes that were predominatly in what is US territory today) - the term also describes Mayas, Aztecs, Toltecs, Tupi-Guaranis, Timbiras, Pataxós, etc... that is, people who lived in other part of the America. And actually, I asked how US citizens called their natives, not how canadians or any other inhabitants of America (thus, americans) called their natives, so your answer is pointless.

As for the Portuguese part, Im not damanding anything. (Have you not read what I wrote?) I dont want you to use gendered articles or adjectives, nor to conjugate verbs in more than 15 tenses. I just want that the "land of political corectness" uses an andjective to describe themselves that is not offensive to the rest of the entire continent. And just so you know, Im not trying to appeal to anybody, Im saying things as I perceive than. And taking the risk of believing you are a little bit prejudiced, I dont need to appeal to others because Im "a poor victim of cultural imperialism" brazilian.

Finally, I do want to reach an understanding on this. To me, however, its you that, in face of the arguments, dont want to.LtDoc 21:15, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

I want to reach an understanding. too, so let's try some more. Fleshing this out amicably couldn't hurt.

Ok.

First, Native American is an inclusive term – it's not intended as a name for other peoples nbut as a sign that the indigenous peoples are part of American society.

And what "other peoples" are these you mention? This is exactly my point; The term "Native Americans" is used by residents of North America (perhaps with the exception of Mexico) as a synonim to "people who inhabited the area that is now USA before the colonization". The term, however, should include, according to logic, all peoples who inhabited the American continent (NA+SA, as you call it) and not just the Apache or the Sioux, but also the Mayas, Aztecs, Timbiras, Xingu, etc..

One of the reasons Native Canadian failed to catch on in Canada is precisely because it is inclusive. Many Canadian First Nations bands consider themselves to be sovereign (some of them may even be right, and other native peoples definitely are sovereign). There's also the historical fact that until 1959 an Indian was only allowed to vote if he or she renounced his or her treaty rights.

Moving on, I'd say 18th-century usage is not a guide to 21st-century usage. India used to include the territory that is now Pakistan and Bangladesh, but did not include Goa. The country now called India does not occupy the same territory, but I don't think that means we should call it something else.

My reference to the naming in the 18th century was to show you that the original meaning has been deturped and is now different. I mentioned it to bring to light the fact that the reasoning about the "separation" of America in two parts, South and North, in the 18th century, was due to a political, unilateral position by the US.

As for English usage being offensive to people who speak other languages, that is a problem created entirely by people who speak other languages.

Not if the choosing of the words english-speakers use is posterior to the usage of an original word on other language. I couldnt disagree with you more on this. Either way, this attitude is what sets the fires of ill-will towards US citizens in general ablaze.

Should I lecture the French about how they use the term anglo-saxon? For example, they call people with names like mine anglo-saxon. Hell, in Canada the entire English Canadian population gets called anglosaxonne. That seems far less than accurate to me, but no doubt the French know what they're doing with their language.

Please illuminate me on where do you think the French are wrong in that. To me, every one who is a native speaker of english has at least anglo-saxon culture in them.

And I learned on Des Chiffres et des Lattres last night that the French spelling of McCarthyism is Maccarthysme. The man's name was McCarthy, not Maccarthy, but if that's the way they want to spell it it's their language.

And Magellans name is not actually Magellans, but Magalhães. Do you know the Bible? Do you think that the apostoles were 'actually' called John, Peter, Luke or Mark? Or that the name of the Christ was Jesus? Why do you think english speakers have Johns, russian speakers have Ivans, spanish ones have Juans and portuguese Joões? Names have always been translated or assimilated in different languages. Im not familiar with the specific rules in French, but if to a frenchman every "Mc" is written "Mac", so be it. Nevertheless, its beoynd the point if you think this is correct or no, for no "loss of meaning" occurs when one changes someone´s name from Mc to Mac; the ideas of McCarthysm are the same be it in english or french. It is a completely different ball game, however, if the word has already some meaning in the language; Thus the french "mac" is harmless because it doesnt mean anything special, but in an extreme example, if the french "mac" meant "stupid" in english, than the change of that prefix would be as insulting and offensive.

A few months ago on the same show they also described Shaw and Wilde as British playwrights (they may even have called them English playwrights, come to think of it) – the skin crawls, but it's their language.

Shaw and Wilde are Irish, right? (N.)Ireland is part of Great Britain, right? Thus, if they were born in N.Ireland they are british, as much as any scottsman or welsh.

And I was serious about cultural imperialism. I don't tell people who speak other languages how to speak them, and I don't see why they should insist that I change the way I speak mine because they think their language is superior to mine. As for political correctness, changing English usage because it doesn't conform to usage in other languages is the height of it.

Lets get something straight; First, I dont want you to "change the way you speak". And second, I dont feel my language is superior to yours, I never suggested such thing and dont want to convince you anything like that. What Im saying is: 1)Theres a term in english that is offensive to the other countries in the continent of the same name. 2)The use of this term is posterior to the definition of "America" as a single continent. 3)There are alternatives to that term that are not offensive or culturally imperialistic. 4)The use of the term the way US residents put it is illogical.

Also, I dont want to change the way you speak; feel free to build up your vocabulary in any way you see fit. Wouldnt it be better though, if the term in question would be replaced to something that has no negative impact on neighbouring countries, not being offensive to them, when there are plenty of available and adequate substitutes? It was not until recently that "americans" born with black skin were called "Afro-americans". Before that they were called...black people.

Of course, maybe we define political correctness differently, too, and cultural imperialism. Anyway, these remarks are made in the spirit you suggested. John FitzGerald 22:03, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Please do not take my bluntness or harshness as a sign of disrespect or trolling; while I do have a sufficient grasp on english to elaborate a conversation, sometimes the "weight" of the words is miscalculated (and some are mispelled, as well!). Thus, be sure Im writing this with the spirit of Wikipedia in mind.LtDoc 21:20, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

The "other peoples" are "no other peoples" – I clearly said it was intended as a name for no other peoples. And your introducton of morality ("the term...should include") and logic are irrelevant. We're talking about language.

I take it "posterior to the usage of an original word" means anglophones should never change the meanings of words. As for increasing ill will towards the United States, you'd think there are enough real grievances to get worked up about.

And what's your evidence for your contention that all native speakers of English are Anglo-Saxon? On what observations do you base this offensive, stereotyped, and ignorant generalization? And aren't you using a "posterior usage" of Anglo-Saxon?

No, it wouldn't be offensive if the first syllable of maccarthysme meant stupid. Maybe we "anglo-saxons" just have a different view of this issue. But you know, it's still ignorant to spell a modern person's name incorrectly, just as it's ignorant of native speakers of English to use all the misspelled and mispronounced French words they do.

As for the Irish being British, neither Shaw nor Wilde was from Northern Ireland, as you could verify very quickly on this very site. The Irish are distinguished in English from Britons.

As for American as now defined being offensive to neighbouring countries, I've already explained that the replacement you propose would be offensive to a neighbouring country (Canada) but apparently Canadians' feelings don't count, eh?

Another reason you may consider for what you write seeming disrespectful is that it's actually disrespectful. You're told Canadians are offended if they're called Americans – and you insist that they are Americans! You're told someone with a Norman name isn't Anglo-Saxon – and you say that not only is he an Anglo-Saxon but so are American black people and Trinidadian Buddhists and Guyanese etc. etc. etc. Well, this "discussion" has lost its charm for me. I've given you my reasons at length. If they are inadequate to get you to even consider the arguments for other positions that's the way the mop flops, I guess. On the other hand, I've had worse ifferences with other people here and ended up working productively with them, so who knows? John FitzGerald 00:04, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

To avoid further confusion, as pointed out to me by one of the readers, I wont answer in the middle of the comment above, but as a single block below.

Regarding "Native Americans": you believe this term should be used by the "indian" tribes (and by them only) that inhabited the land that is now known as the USA, by the time of the colonization. Ok. What Im saying is that, the term should include all inhabitants of the continent America. There IS relevance in that logic, Im sorry if you fail to see it. Otherwise let us call japanese europeans, spaniards africans and nigerians arabs. After all, its all words and no logic!

Regarding "...posterior use of words...": Anglophones (and francophones, and every -phone you can think of) are free to do what they will with their language, I never said otherwise and implying that I did is a cheap attempt to decredit my position. What I said, and repeat, is that, if some language borrows a word from another language and changes its meaning deliberately to something the "original user" consider to be offensive, the borrower is being "inapropiate" (for lack of a better word). Do as you please!

Regarding "Anglo-Saxon": You accuse me of being offensive and making an ingnorant generalization. So tell me, doesnt all countries that speak english as their mother language have at least some degree of anglo-saxon culture in them? Isnt the language one country speaks part of its culture? If, say, Australia's official language is english, them to some degree, theres anglo-saxon culture in them. The same goes for countries that speak french, or spanish, etc. Im not saying, mind you, that the culture in these countries is completely, or mainly, anglo-saxon (even if it might be true in some cases); Im saying a part of it is.

Please point out to me where I have spelled the name of someone in an incorrect manner. If you are reffering to Magellan and McCarthy, why do you use Magellan instead of Magalhães, and deny the french use of MacCarthy to McCarthy? Also, explain why you think that "no it wouldnt" (be offensive/insulting if the english for for "mac" meant "stupid" in MacCarthy). You might come off as immature answering things like that.("It isnt because it isnt!").

Also, while I do suggest that the term "americans" meaning "citizens of the USA" be replaced, I have not suggested any terms to do that. Thus, Im not proposing any term as you claim. Is that offensive to canadians? How come? If I say a german is also "european" is he to be offended? Or a japanese "asian"?? Canadians are canadians, mexicans are mexicans and brazilians are brazilians. But canadians, mexicans and brazilians are also american, for they were born in the continent of America. Where is the offense in that? And I never said or implied that "canadians feelings dont count, eh?", youre just trying to paint me in arrogant colors.

As for Shaw and Wilde, their pages list them as being Irish. Havent read the whole article, and believing that the show you mentioned wouldnt make such a blunder, I (wrongly) assumed they were from N.Ireland rather than Ireland. Thus, calling them british is surely equivocal. The idea behind my statement remains, though; if they WERE born in N.Ireland, Scotland, Wales or England, they COULD be called British.

"Canadians are offended if they are called americans". That might happen if canadians share the same meaning that the word "americans" has with the population of the USA. What Im trying to tell you from day one is that this use is inapropriate, equivocal and misleading, let alone offensive to everyone else in the continent of America. It is you that seem to not understand that. If you take the word "american" to mean a native of the continent of America, then theres no reason at all for canadians to be offended. As for the rest of your ranting in your last paragraph, you show yet another sign of lack of understanding what I meant from anglo-saxon culture. If you would be so kind as to re-read what I wrote...

On a last note, if I didnt even consider what youre writing, I wouldnt be answering it. You've given me your views, Ive given you mine. To me, however, it appears that you have failed to argue properly each of my points. Respectfully, LtDoc 14:00, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

We seem to have edited this page at the same time. Thus, some of my comments refer to your notes 'before' you edited them.LtDoc 14:46, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Okay, let's deal with these issues one at a time. You write:

Regarding "...posterior use of words...": Anglophones (and francophones, and every -phone you can think of) are free to do what they will with their language, I never said otherwise and implying that I did is a cheap attempt to decredit my position. What I said, and repeat, is that, if some language borrows a word from another language and changes its meaning deliberately to something the "original user" consider to be offensive, the borrower is being "inapropiate" (for lack of a better word). Do as you please!

Now, I can see this argument, but you must be consistent. You believe it's wrong for angophones to use an offensive posterior usage of American, but all right for non-anglophones to use a posterior usage of Anglo-Saxon which anglophones find offensive (even if your assertion about "anglo-saxon culture" were true, it still involves an offensive redefinition of the term Anglo-Saxon). How do you reconcile those two positions? John FitzGerald 13:20, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I also think we could better approach this one thing at a time. And I do share your view that a disagreement over something can render nice fruits in the long run.

There must be a lack of information on my part; there is no dichotomy in my position, at least in the way I see it. While I do believe its wrong ("innapropriate" is more like it) for anglophones to use a term which is offensive to others, even more so if there was a different, prior meaning for the term in other languages, I dont see where the use of the term "Anglo-Saxon" is offensive to anglophones (Please do tell me what the offense is).

The meaning of "Anglo-Saxon" that Im most familiar with is one that can be found on the article "Anglo-Saxon" here on Wikipedia;

For over a hundred years, "Anglo-Saxon" has been used as pertaining to the Anglophone cosmopolitan societies of predominantly Western character, (the United States, the British Isles, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa) describing their intellectual traditions and national characters, as opposed to "Gallic", "Lusitanic" or "Hispanic".

As for the cultural bit, perhaps a better phrasing on my part would be that in every country that English is spoken (as the primary language or not) there is a bit of Anglo-Saxon culture there. I also fail to see where is the "different" position you mention. My attitude towards both these issues is the same.200.244.240.40 17:41, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps it would help if you could clarify what you mean by posterior usage. I took that to mean a usage which is not the same as the original. If that is what posterior usage means, then your circular definition of Anglo-Saxon – you say English-speaking countries' cultures are Anglo-Saxon, but your definition of Anglo-Saxon is "pertaining to the culture of English-speaking countries" – would cause problems for me. If that's not what a posterior usage is, though, then I need to get on the right track. John FitzGerald 13:59, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

To better explain what I called posterior usage, think of this example: In 1492 someone finds an uncharted island. Circa 1507 people start calling it "America". During the next few hundred years people go to this new land, now known to be a continent, and start grouping themselves in colonies. England, the metropolis, refers to these colonies as the colonies of America. During the same period, however, there were also colonies other than the english ones in the american continent, mainly spanish and portuguese. While Portugal and Spain referred to their colonies using the terms they themsleves baptized coined for the land (Ilha de Vera Curz, Terra de Vera Cruz, Terra de Santa Cruz, depending on the time frame), they were also colonies in America. When the USA became an independent country, it adopted the official name of "United States of America" (they were states alright; they were united in many aspects; and they were located in America - the continent). Gradually, citizens of this new country began calling their own country America, since its a simpler, shorter alternative to United States of America. Thus the problem was set; people from the country of USA said that their countries name was "America", thus they were "americans". But all over the continent of America the other colonies were also saying that "America" is the name of the continent, not the name of one country. Thus, citizens of that new country were changing the use of a word that was already consagrated by use, therefore my choice of the term "posterior usage". Technically speaking, all countires that are divided in federal units known as states are "United States of America", since they have states, are united under one govt, and are in America.

As for Anglo-Saxon: I say english-speaking countries cultures are in some degree anglo-saxonic, not entirely anglo-saxonic. As for being circular, the definition in the article says: They (the Anglo-Saxons) eventually coalesced completely around the 9th century into a single people, the Anglo-Saxons, forming the basis for the modern day English country, people, language and culture. Therefore, its natural to assume that if some country speaks english, to some degree they have Anglo-saxonic culture. Nevertheless, while one can say that canadians have (some) anglo-saxonic culture, it is completely wrong to say that a canadian is anglo-saxonic.LtDoc 16:10, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Well. we may end up just disagreeing about this. First of all, the Anglo-Saxon article, as I recall, does acknowledge that assertions such as the one that English culture is founded on Anglo-Saxon culture are disputed. The Danes occupied huge tracts of England for considerable time, for example. And if the posterior usage is that Anglo-Saxon means English-speaking, I do find it offensive – not so much as a personal insult as a distortion of the facts.

Sure, English-Canadian is English-speaking, but that doesn't mean we need to use a term for it that implies that its advantages and its flaws are the work of the Angles and Saxons. Yes, we have and like English institutions; Ontario, where I live, came into being for the very reason that settlers there wanted English institutions. However, those institutions are English, not Anglo-Saxon. The Angles and the Saxons had no hand in their development. Furthermore, Canadian political institutions have evolved in a different culture from those in which they originated. John Ralston Saul has argued that both the English and French Canadian cultures are predominantly Celtic and Norman. The dominant ethnic groups in English Canada when the country was created were the Irish and Scots, and of course many Irish are of Norman descent and the great Norman families in Ireland had an influential role on Irish culture. The first French Canadians were from Normandy and they later intermarried with the Irish and Scots. Classifying Canadians as Anglo-Saxon just seems to me another example of leaping to conclusions about Canada.

As I've said I'm not grossly offended by this. However, I would object to the substitution thrroughout Wikipedia of Anglo-Saxon for English-speaking or anglophone (which in turn is a term Canadians have adopted a posterior usage for). Now – none of this means that I must reject outright your suggestion about the use of American. However, it's about time I got some work done so I'll have to return to that later. I think we have got to the nub of this aspect of the issue, though. John FitzGerald 17:08, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I ended up considering whether, given my offence at the French use of Anglo-Saxon, I should initiate a move at the French wikipedia to use a less offensive one (assuming, of course, that they use the term in the way I find offensive and haven't dealt with it already). I decided that such decisions are at best matters of temperament. Even if I find the term offensive it's not intended to be offensive. Furthermore, hurt feelings and insults are the least of grievances. I did raise a stink here at attempts to style our prime minister as Paul Martin Jr. (to distinguish him from his father, who was also a prominent politician), and part of my argument was that use of that style was an insulting imposition of foreign style on Canadians. However, if that were the entire argument I wouldn't think much of it. The more important argument was that the style simply rendered the article about him inaccurate. He is never called Paul Martin Jr.

Anyway, I'm happy to let the French use whatever term they want. That, however, is not to say that it's wrong to recommend changing such terms. Instead of everyone, especially me, going on at great length about American, though, it would have been easier just to vote on it once the main arguments had been laid out. I would have no trouble going along with whatever people decided, especially as some of the Americans here appear to sympathize with you.

That's an anti-climax, I guess, but I'm slow on the uptake. From now on I will be more laid back about these issues. I do think this discussion has been valuable to me, at least, and if any issues you have raised remain that it might be useful to discuss I will return to them. John FitzGerald 14:07, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[I'd started discussion of another issue here but have removed it until LtDoc has a chance to respond to this so that th discussion doesn't get too confusing.]John FitzGerald

(Thanks for waiting; in hard to have a couple of hours of free time this far in the year.)

Well, the article on Anglo-Saxons does explicity say, in its introduction, that the single people of the anglo-saxon tribe (a tribe with different genetic origins, yes, with danes, normans and celts, but one tribe nonetheless) formed the basis for modern day English (amongst other things). Thus, its not "posterior usage"; Anglo-Saxons formed modern day English, thus, to be english speaking is to have a part of anglo-saxonic culture.

Indeed, I disagree with you when you say: "However, those institutions are English, not Anglo-Saxon. The Angles and the Saxons had no hand in their development". The institutions, and most likely everything that relates to culture, is anglo-saxon in its origin. If an instutotion which promotes Great Britain's culture is founded by an britishman, this institution is inexorably connected to anglo-saxon culture, if not only for the fact that Great Britain became what it is in part due to what anglo-saxons were.

I agree with you that Canada is a specific case; the culture of Canada has evolved in such a way that it mixes cultures of both France and Great Britain, thus making a unique culture. Im not entering the grounds of saying that the Celts and Normans on Canada were those of the single Anglo-saxon tribe (as there are some the defend this); but that a fraction of this unique culture that Canada has is a heritage of anlgo-saxonic culture.

Thus, I agree with you that generalizing canadians with the term anglo-saxon is innapropriate, unless talking about specific segments or subpopulations where the anglo-saxon heritage is more proeminent.

What I dont agree, however, is that offense at such words is taken according to temperament.

By calling themselves "americans" citzens of USA exclude the right of every citizen the continent of America to that name. Argentinians, Brazilians, Colombians, Uruguayans, Mexicans and Canadians cannot call themselves "americans" because that term is connected to the people born in the USA. Thats the equivalent of saying that only people born in Germany are europeans. Some people might not care about it, and some might be raging mad about it, but the point is that the offense exists, wheter some people dont really care if that name changes or not.200.244.240.42 13:18, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I appreciate the difficulties in finding time at this time of year. I think we have laid out our differences fairly well. I have a few points to make. First, if Anglo-Saxon as you use it is not a posterior usage, then I am not clear about what a posterior usage is. Obviously, the Celts are not Germanic tribes (which Anglo-Saxon describes as the source of Anglo-Saxons) and therefore including them as Anglo-Saxon seems to me to be posterior to the original usage. That is a minor point, however, since I would feel the same way about any truly posterior usage. Second, the English-speaking people had other influences besides Anglo-Saxon tradition. We (like pretty well everyone) were affected by classical thought, by French thought, and generally by ideas from around the world, so calling our institutions Anglo-Saxon seems misleading to me. Finally, no one is stopping anyone from calling themselves Americans. If Brazilians want to call themselves Americans, more power to them, and I'm sure the overwhelming majority of Americans would agree. As I mentioned in the piece I deleted, English-speakers don't even agree among themselves about what English words mean – billion is an example. People can call themselves what they want, but as a standard for Wikipedia I recommend the one suggested by Infrogmation below – use American except where it would be ambiguous to native speakers of English.

Well, I don't think we've persuaded each other but our differences are now clearer. I've got projects to finish and you're busy so I'll postpone posting my second piece till after Christmas. I will check to see if you have any further comments about this. This has been helpful to me, if to no one else. John FitzGerald 14:07, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

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following text on the back: "The tiny republic of Salvador, the smallest in America, but the most densely peopled" This was published by Keystone View Company, a USA based company, in 1902. If anyone insists that "America" or "American" never means the Americas in American English, we'll have to start collecting such counter-examples. Hm, I wonder if "American" for the Americas has become less common over the last century? -- Infrogmation 18:44, 15 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Can you establish that your example was written by someone fluent in American English? Or that the linotypist didn't miss a word? I wouldn't be surprised if you could find the occasional example, but the point is that the usage is not typical. Incidentally, I agree wholeheartedly with your next point below. John FitzGerald 00:30, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Use of the word "American" elsewhere

Someone else - "is it the opinion of Wikipedians that the use of the word "American" to refer specifically to the United States is [1] forbidden and will be replaced (and if so, by what?) or [2] permissible and will be tolerated without systematic reversion".

I'd suggest [3] "American" can be used where the meaning is obvious to all from its contexts, but precice terms should be used instead of ambiguous terms whenever possible on Wikipedia. "America" or "American" without context can be ambiguous; such terms as "USA" "United States" etc are clear. --Infrogmation

John is a U.S. senator. Why not "John is a U.S. artist"? Koyaanis Qatsi

Because there is such a thing called the United States Senate. Thus "U.S. Senator" is a noun in its own right. Adding the nationality to a person's occupation requires the use of an adjective for the word indicating nationality. --mav

There is an analogy with the term European with regards to the EU.

Yes, please think about if Germans insisted that "Europe" and "European" referred specifically to Germany and Germans. -- Nico 15:28, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC)

The usage, often seen in US news papers, to write European instead of EU is of course a sad example of arrogance and stupidification. So NATO member Norway should no longer be in Europe? Or Switzerland. Pure stupidity! But I'm not sure how this is relevant for the US vs American dispute.--Ruhrjung 05:43, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Those born in Germany are european. Those born in Spain are also european. Those born in USA are american, in the same way that brazilians are also american.

Those europeans who are born in Germany are also called germans, and those that are born in Spain are also called spaniards. Those born in Brazil are also brazilians, and those born in the USA are also "US citizens" or whatever equivalent you want it to be; as long as it is not ambiguous with the term american.LtDoc 03:30, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

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Well, New Zealand is a country in the same situation as the United States in that there does not seem to be a good adjective for their nationality. From what I've seen and heard, it is quite normal and acceptable to say "New Zealand wool" or "New Zealand people". Likewise, it is common (and sounds perfectly acceptable to me) to say "U.S. singers" or "U.S. President". The term "American" in its formal encyclopaedic sense SHOULD be an adjective for a person's continent (group of continents?), not their country. Unfortunately popular "American" culture seems to have forgotten that there are other countries in America. So I say that the term "American" ought to be avoided where possible, except in the Unites States articles if people wish to use it there. Let's keep Wikipedia non-ethnocentric. -- Mark Ryan 04:14, 22 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Funny. I just heard Tony Blair give a speech in which he did not use "United States" or "people of the United States" and instead used "America" and "American." He also did not say "United Kingdom" "people of the United Kingdom" but instead said "Britain" and "British". This is in fact very common outside the United States. But links to nations should be explicit so if you say "America" meaning United States, then sublink United States because America is not going to take you there. There are also different adjectives used in different time periods. During the American Civil War "Union" was used. So it is appropriate to write [[United States|Union]] General Such and Such. Saying United States General would be very odd indeed. --mav 04:27, 22 Nov 2003 (UTC)~

"This is in fact very common outside the US", says you. In Latin America, Latin Europe and most of Asia, most deinitively not. Therefore, I cant see how something could be "very common" not being in most of the world population.LtDoc 21:31, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

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Since I have volunteered myself to disambiguate this round of "America" and "American" from the Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links, I suppose I should weigh in with the rules that I am using. If you don't like my usage, at least we can be up-front and talk about it here. First, I have no evidence that anyone (other than RickK's statement above) considers either usage to be offensive, pejorative or emotionally loaded. Second, as an encyclopedia, we have an obligation to be as precise as we can (without, of course, making the article unreadable). Third, accepted rules of grammar sometimes limit our ability to be precise (meaning you can not be "a US", though you can be "a US writer"). Fourth, Usian is not (yet) an accepted word and using it would make our encyclopedia less useful, not more.

1. Where the context refers to the continent, I am relinking to either the Americas, North America or South America as appropriate.
2. Where the context refers to the political entity, I am relinking to the United States (sometimes through one of the redirects like USA).
3. Where the context refers to citizenship or birthplace, I am generally relinking to U.S. using the form "Hepburn - a US actress".
4. Where the context is irrelevant such as "a mirror server in America", I am changing to an equally irrelevant "a mirror server in the US".
5. Where the style of the prose flows better to say "America", I am using piped links.
6. Where talk pages are explicitly discussing the problem of America or American as ambiguous terms (such as this one) or are just using America as an example of the problems of ambiguity, I am leaving the talk pages alone. Rossami 21:32, 2 Dec 2003 (UTC)

RickK is not alone in the fact that there are (plenty) of others who feel that the use of "american" for citizen of the US is highly offensive and politically incorrect. Its general opinion in all Latin America that this use shows the presence of a very strong culturally imperialistic force by the USA.LtDoc 03:34, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand RickK's position. He was objecting in the other direction. (Note that his comments were made back in 2003. He has not commented recently on it so I don't think we know his current position.) Rossami (talk)

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(anon 209.26.112.106 says:) Changing citizenship to anything other than "American" is to be disrespectful. Insisting on something other is bearing a grudge against Americans. "American" was used to describe colonists in the British Colonies in North America. We, the people of the United States of America, refer to ourselves as Americans, less commonly as United States Citizens. Other terms would be derogatory. I personally like Yankee, but others from other regions would find it insulting. So "Samuel Clemens- a US author" is disrespectful. He is an American author.

One of those British colonies was Canada. We didn't all revolt. Michael Z. 05:45, 2004 Aug 24 (UTC)

Some people seem to have implied that "United States" or "USA" is somehow offensive, but I think you're the first to try to spell it out. I'm from America/the USA/ the US/ the United States, and have never found any of those terms to be offensive. Could you please elaborate on what is offensive about some of those terms and why? Wondering, -- Infrogmation 06:07, 12 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Telling someone that the term they prefer for themselves is wrong is self-evidently insulting. Refusing to use that term is also insulting. Is that really so perplexing? - Toadmato 06:20, 12 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Hunh? I'm not aware of anyone saying any term in use is "wrong". When, where, has that been done? -- Inf.

As a US citizen, I can hardly begin to say how strongly I disagree with the point of view expressed above. There is no basis in common usage or practice that supports the view that calling someone "a US author" is disrespectful. For the label to be disrespectful or derogatory, it would have to have negative connotations which are unwanted by the recipient of the label. In this case, the desire not to be labeled could be inferred if a recipient's changed his/her citizenship. Without such evidence, calling someone "a US xxx" is a factual statement of citizenship or residence - nothing more. Yes, common usage in the US uses the shorthand label "American". Those of us who value precision in speech and thought or who have even a little bit of sensitivity for the other nations in the Americas prefer to say "from the US" where we can make if flow grammatically and say "Americans" when it won't. We are writing an encyclopedia. We have an obligation to avoid ambiguity. --- Sorry. I know I'm coming across a bit (okay, a lot) strong here, but it's a point that I feel rather passionate about. Rossami 14:51, 12 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It's not 'wrong' to call yourself American if you are a U.S. citizen, but it is ambiguous - in many parts of the world saying an 'American author' would not rule out the author coming from South America or Canada. It's fine to call yourself whatever you like, but if there is an easy option for an encyclopedia to be more precise, then it seems that we should take it. Mark Richards 07:56, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

What parts of the world are these? If anything, the "American = from the US" connection seems to be stronger outside the US than in it. The term seems to be used especially frequently in British newspapers, and often British papers even go so far as to use America for the country, which is relatively unusual in the United States itself—American papers will say "US spars with UN over blah", while British papers seem to commonly say "America spars with UN over blah". The usage extends to cognates in other languages—Greeks will say oi Ameriki when they want to say the United States (reserving oi Hnomenes Politeies for more formal or political contexts). But in any case, the point is that some people try to make pedantic points about it, but when you look at what people actually say and write, American is pretty widely used across many parts of the world as the adjective form of U.S., especially if you only look at usage over the past 75 years or so. America, on the other hand, should be replaced with the United States whenever possible, and I wish British, Greek, and other countries' papers would stop using it. --Delirium 08:22, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)

Part of this is likely that "United States" or just "US" implies state or the specific land area of the US on a legal basis, whereas "America" implies nation. In the case of "US spars with UN over blah", that is really stating that the national government per se is what is sparring with the UN, rather than the country in general. Similar, calling someone a "US citizen" is just saying that they are a citizen of the legal entity of the US gov't, whereas calling someone an "American" is saying that they're actually American by nationality - even if they aren't legally a US citizen per se (like if they gave such up in one way or another, or never had such due to living primarily within an American cultural context but not having been born in the US or having gotten naturalized). This sort of distinction with respect to connotations may very well not exist outside of the US, which could explain why even English-speakers outside of the US may use "America" in places where Americans would use "US". -- 146.151.47.17 22:41, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

You've lost me. I think you're trying to draw a distinction between citizenship and nationality. I just double-checked Webster's and they're synonyms. (Your example of an illegal alien who is not a citizen but who identifies with the nation is interesting but not, I think, technically correct.) Rossami 02:24, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Note that I'm speaking of the connotations of said terms, and how they differ, here, not the denotations, which are identical with the way they are being literally used. Note that I didn necessary mean illegal alien; I meant non-citizen permanent resident when I wrote that, and that's more applicable here in most cases. For example, someone who was born outside of the US, but who lives primarily in the US and is of American parents. Even though they're not a US citizen, most would consider them to be American per se, besides those who dispute the meaning of said term. -- 146.151.47.17; 06:48, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Delirium asks what parts of the world dont use (or find offensive using) "american = US citizen". Well, it clearly shows that he has no knowledge whatsoever of the world opinion in this matter. Did I say world opinion? Im sorry, I meant that tiny, insignificant piece of land outside of the US called "planet Earth".LtDoc 03:38, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

CIA World Factbook

I'm sure this has been mentioned before, but the CIA World Factbook has this to say on the subject: Country name:

conventional long form: United States of America

conventional short form: United States

abbreviation: US or USA

Mark Richards 05:51, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Oh, like they're any authority on the matter. :P -Sean 08:12, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

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One might consider that other countries start with "US" or are the "United States of" various things and places. This implies that USA is more appropriate. (The only conflict I could think of was South Africa, which is, according to its constitution, the Republic of South Africa.) This does, however, sound hideous as an adjective. It might be worth considering that no one makes the other countries feel guilty about referring to themselves as, say, "South Africa" in lieu of the "Republic of South Africa." Perhaps we should simply use "American" as the adjective based on the reasoning that other countries are in an area that could be described as "South Africa," but everyone has the sense to know precisely what you mean. It's no more ambiguous or unconventional than "United States." However, since it's not as outrageously awkward in the noun form, I think USA would be more appropriate for that, if only to be as thoroughly clear as possible.

Without claiming native-speaker authority, i'd add that the more common term for the geographic region in the South of Africa seems to be "Southern Africa", which clearly distinguishes it from the Republic of South Africa. Bad comparision there. Jakob Stevo 15:25, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)

wikipedia is not a collection of american slang and common misinformation

an encyclopedia does not leave a reader as misinformed and ill-informed as upon arrival. "everybody's saying it" is not a relavent argument. United States (disambiguation) and America demonstrate the ambiguities. after specifying the full name once, "u.s.", "united states", "america", and "american" can be used if unambiguous in context. Badanedwa 16:21, Jun 12, 2004 (UTC)

Nonsense; the English Wikipedia uses the English language, a natural language spoken and written by several hundred million people. It does not use its own constructed language of formalisms, even one resembling English. The American debate is quite well covered above, and regardless of what you might think about that, the United States is in almost all contexts in English a perfectly unambiguous noun referring to the country of that name. It is true that there are other things that begin with that phrase, but they are not referred to as simply the United States without qualifier. This situation (technical ambiguity but clear understanding) is not particularly unique to the phrase the United States either, and if we were forced to disambiguate each one, the encyclopedia would read more like formal logic than like English. --Delirium 08:30, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)

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I think there's a lot of confusion here due to cultural differences... Many people aren't understanding what's "wrong" with using U.S. or U.S. Citizen. As far as I can tell, "America" is the word people use when they are feeling patriotic, or experiencing national pride. America has many positive feelings associated with it. Try to find anyone on July 4 saying "United States"... everyone is saying "America." United States is a much more dry term, usually seen in textbooks and the like. It's like the difference between "home" and "house". Even USofA and USA are warmer terms than United States.

IMHO, people from USA aren't trying to say they're the only country in the Western Hemisphere that matters when they use "American". Most people here just call nationalities by their country name, such as Mexican, Venezuelan, and Canadian. They're calling themselves by their country name when they say "America." They're not trying to call themselves by the continent name. If the continents were changed to North and South Oogleboogle they'd still call themselves American, not Ooglebooglean. ---

I live in Canada, about an hour's drive from the US border. Sometimes one of us refers to a US trip by saying something like "last week I went to America." The phrase sounds totally self-concious and usually everyone giggles. [we're not laughing at the US or at Americans, just at the usage of the term] —Michael Z. 05:54, 2004 Aug 24 (UTC)

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This is one of the strangest talk pages I have yet encountered on Wikipedia. I am a U.S. citizen, and I am in utter bafflement over the Americans who state that they are offended by the use of U.S. or US. "Offended"??? As someone recently said at the Pump, there are some people who find very creative ways in which to be offended. func(talk) 19:47, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Well, the offense is less at the term itself than it is at being told, effectively from without, that they must use other terms than those which they generally use to self-identify. Also, remember that the term "US" is more associated with the nation-state construct per se, and "American" with the overall culture and like of English-speaking North America north of Mexico and south of Canada. --146.151.47.17 10:58, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

"United States" being used as an adjective

I've noticed there are several people who are using "United States" as an adjective, as in Thomas Edison was a United States inventor. Personally, I think this is wrong - nobody would try to say someone's an Italy painter or a Japan poet. Is there any reason for using "United States" instead of "American"? MK 06:58, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Laziness? Maybe they meant to do [[United States|American]]. That's what it should be changed to, at least. --Golbez 07:25, Oct 16, 2004 (UTC)

I've seen examples of people editing articles to change "American" to "United States" - it's clearly an intentional choice in at least some cases. MK 22:53, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I'd imagine it stems from that old notion that the Americas include more countries than just the United States. I think United States as an adjective in the context you suggested is a perfectly valid term, and certainly better than Usian (something you might see on some other websites). Then again, I also think American is probably acceptable there, just like European, Asian, African, et al (though it is a little more inclusive, covering two continents). ~leif 07:49, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

It derives from people wanting to try to avoid using "American" to refer to people from the United States because they think they can dictate what we call ourselves. RickK 08:15, Oct 16, 2004 (UTC)

You may, of course, call yourselves what you like, and if you like you may, of course, ignite a flamewar with inappropriate comments like that. You may have heard of two countries named Canada and Mexico that share a continent named North America with the United States, and also of something like thirty independent countries in central and South America There are dozens of countries in Central and South America (and also the Caribbean), which together with North America form America aka The Americas. At least that's how geographers see it. The matter has been discussed before, and if I recall correctly, the result was that, while some US citizens see no problem in calling themselves "Americans", people from elsewhere tend to feel that this is an inappropriate use, as it apparently excludes the majority of the population of The Americas. From Alternative words for American: In the Iberoamerican countries, the use of "American" to refer only to a US citizen could be considered politically incorrect and culturally aggressive. Kosebamse 11:17, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

But none of these countries call themselves American. Nobody would call Jean Chretien or Vicente Fox an American political leader. MK 22:53, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

And on an afterthought, why would the United States of Mexico resent the United States of America using the word "American"? It would they'd have a better reason to resent it if we actually started claiming exclusive use of the "United States" as an adjective. MK 23:07, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Does this take into account that we write articles in English, and thereby use and express all the inherent bias that is unavoidable in language? I think American equals USian or whatever silly word is more correct, that is in this language. That spanish-speaking latin americans don't express themselves the same way is no wonder -- they speak a different language. ✏ Sverdrup 12:14, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. In English if not other languages (and the former is all that matters)Using "America" exlcusively for the USA may be unacceptable in a broader conext, but "American" in the context of nationality is lingustically unabiguously connected with the USA. In terms of the contiunent if "North American" and "South American" are not being used, "American" as a resident of the continent(s)is is also abundantly clear by context. Neologisms such as "Usians" are just ****ing terrible (I'm sorry for the thinly disguised swearing but no other adjective can encompass my venom agaisnt such cultural fascism that makes me think I've arrived in an Orwellian universe) If I've offended anyone then stick in your pipe and smoke it (oh I forgot, references smoking may infer I kill babies) Dainamo 12:26, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC) (not an American/Usian/Unclesamite by the way)

The "politically incorrect and culturally agressive" argument aside, from my (European) perspective "American" just doesn't look right, because "America" is far bigger than the Unites States. My impression is that "U.S. American" is inoffensive and not an ugly neologism, so how about replacing "American" with it like in "Thomas Edison was a U.S. American inventor" ? Kosebamse 13:10, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

"U.S. American" is highly offensive. Our nationality is American. Nothing else. And it certainly IS a neologism, and incredibly ugly, at that. RickK 19:01, Oct 16, 2004 (UTC)

Good idea. I do think there is a genuine distinction between the accepted use of the noun and adjective as using the argument for not using America in reference to the US goes but, possibly for the lack of any other non contrived adjective, American does not follow this where the context is clear. However, in fairness, I like the compromise of U.S. American. At first I thought it clunky, but it fits and certainly reads better than using "United States" as a adjective and avoids awful neologisms. Dainamo 14:23, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

"Avoids awful neologisms"? It is an awful neologism. We had better start using British European, and oh no, I mean, United Kingdom European, and Federal Republican European. I don't know how we will differiantiate the various Kingdom Europeans, perhaps Dutch Kingdom Europeans, Danish Kingdom Europeans, etc.. This is the English Wikipedia and in English the form for citizens of the United States of America is "American". We also use U.S. as an adjective, just as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland uses Briton and UK. We don't often use the spelled-out "United States" as an adjective, however. I think you would also "a UK citizen" not "a United Kingdom citizen". Rmhermen 14:36, Oct 16, 2004 (UTC)

... This is moronic that people are even debating this. We aren't trying to be as poltically correct as possibly. AMERICAN is the common term used today by almost all people. it's the dictonary defination, we aren't trying to change the language here with wikipedia. In even other languages they refers to people in united states of american as americans(Like Amerika Person in Japanese means a person from U.S.A)

The point that some of our esteemed fellow Wikipedians seem to miss is that using the name of a continent to denote citizens of a single country is rather unique. No Briton, German, Swede would call him/herself a "European" except to make a political statement. And arguing that "AMERICAN is the common term used today by almost all people" does not get us any further, since this argument rests on a rather narrow definition of what constitutes "all people". A majority of US citizens, probably yes. All people, definitely no. "it's the dictonary defination (sic)" - what dictionary, please? Wikipedia at least has several definitions for American. "we aren't trying to change the language here with wikipedia" - true, but we should at all cost strive to make articles as NPOV as possible, and if there is an alternative that does not offend the readers, we would need better arguments against using it than these. Kosebamse 17:54, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

In Canada, "American" does not refer to people from the continent(s), it refers to people from the United States. I'm certainly not "American." I'm not sure what Spanish or French usage on the rest of the continent is, or what English-speaking people say in Belize and wherever else they speak English. Adam Bishop 17:52, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The usage of "American" as the accepted adjective for the U.S. is scarcely disputable. I had understood that U.K. usage of "America" meant the U.S. uniquely, and would be surprised to find a Londoner in Toronto thinking he'd "come to America", but perhaps I stand to be corrected there. ("America", outside the forms "North America", "South America" or "The Americas"—always plural, as there is no continent of America—is rare in Canada, where the U.S. is "the U.S." or "the States".) Offense might be taken if "American" were used to refer to the whole of North America or as the sole location of English in the New World, but anyone reading that into "American" is looking for a scrap and will find one whatever we do.

At any rate, use of "U.S." in adjectival form is grey because English permits use of nouns as modifiers, and several phrases are in common use: for example, "United States dollar", "United States Senator", "U.S. Army"; for all of which the distinct -ian form would be used for many countries (Canadian Armed Forces, Australian dollar). I would myself use it only in established phrases. I'd probably change it only it cases that seemed particularly wrong.

I can see the possibility of United States being an acceptable adjective for something associated with the government, as are the examples you gave. I could accept "George Bush is a United States President" but "Julia Roberts is a United States actress" still looks ridiculous to me.MK 22:53, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC) Sharkford 18:14, 2004 Oct 16 (UTC)

1. Yes, it is the most common word for this in English, pretty much everywhere.
2. No, there is no convenient non-neologistic substitute.
3. Yes, it may sound awkward to Spanish-speakers, but they are not the primary audience of the English-language Wikipedia.

Jmabel | Talk 20:22, Oct 16, 2004 (UTC)

• Although I had considered suggesting the usage of "Yankee" or "Yank" instead, I decided I didn't want to alienate all those lovely Bostonians who like using the Wikipedia.  ;-) But humor aside, consider this: If I stood up in a crowd in some unnamed location in the world and yelled, "I AM AN AMERICAN!" what meaning do you think they would find in that statement? —Mike 20:58, Oct 16, 2004 (UTC)
  • It's not the Bostonians who would mind, it's the Southerners. There's an old joke about a man from Alabama travelling in Latin America, seeing a sign saying "Yankee go home" and saying "I couldn't agree with you more." -- Jmabel | Talk 00:42, Oct 17, 2004 (UTC)

Doesn't the same question come up with term "British"? We don't call say "United Kingdom inventor", do we? anthony (see warning) 22:44, 16 Oct 2004 (UTC)

• But there it's the other way around. Actually, I think it's kind of weird that we seem to want to turn all of the English into "British", but generally leave the Scots and Welsh alone. To paraphrase Musil on the meaning of Austro-Hungarian, it would seem that a Britisher is an Englishman plus a Scotsman plus a Welshman minus the Scotsman and the Welshman. (Apologies in the genderedness of that, I don't know a singular gender-neutral noun for someone from Wales or England.) -- Jmabel | Talk 00:42, Oct 17, 2004 (UTC)
  • Welshperson and Englishperson ;)
• It seems to me that we already have policy that covers this. If an article concerns a US topic, then one would speak of an "American inventor". If it's a UK, Canadian, Australian, etc- releated article, than the most common usage found in that nation goes, (presumably: "US inventor"). For all other articles, my understanding was that it was a sort of first-come, first-pick sort of deal. func(talk) 04:52, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)
  • This is a long going topic of discussion, with many points and emotions repeated regularly. See: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (US vs American) -- Infrogmation 06:17, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I didn't know when I posted my first message on this topic that it had already been so heavily debated. It seems to me that there are people carrying a lot of baggage on both sides and most of it's unnecessary. This needn't be an issue of politics; it's just a question of grammar. While there's a number of acceptable alternatives available as a noun - America, United States, USA, the Big Bird, etc. - there's only one generally recognized adjective; American. Being as it's the only word around and no other country is using it, I think it should be considered as readily available for the purpose of describing subjects associated with the USA. MK 07:08, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

If this is a vote, I vote "American" to mean "of U.S.A. origin". It's the predominant usage in the English language. PhilHibbs 15:18, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Lets just call USA related stuff COLUMBIAN and cause real confusion

(excerpted from OED)

Columbian, a. and n.

A. adj. Of or belonging to America or (esp.) the United States.

n. An American; an inhabitant or native of the U.S.A. Obs. exc. Hist.

 1789 S. LOW Politician Outwitted II. ii, in M. J. Moses Repr. Plays Amer. Dramatists (1918) I. 377 As the East is to the West..or the Aborigines of America to the Columbians of this generation, so is that line to this line. 1815 W. THORNTON Outl. Const. Columbia 1, I was born in America..and..I feel an unspeakable attachment to the whole race of Columbians. 1947 St. Louis Globe-Democrat 7 Sept., Now they could call themselves Columbians instead of Americans.

NOTE: This is why you have Columbia Pictures and CBS

Personally I think everything should say USA to be absolutely clear.

And think about this: OAS

132.205.15.42 03:43, 22 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Summary of old talk

• "America" in modern English (as used by non-Latinos) is not a continent.
• "The Americas" is a new English term meaning both continents of North America and South America.

  As in "Which America do you mean, North or South?"

• "America" in most contexts means "the United States of America".
• "American" in most contexts means "of America (USA)", i.e., a US citizen, a US car or movie, a US government policy

However, many residents of countries to the south of the USA, particularly Mexico, use the English word differently. I guess this is because the Spanish word America is spelled and pronounced the same but has a different meaning. That is, the Spanish and English meanings of "America" are different.

Now, Wikipedia is not an "American (USA)" encyclopedia, but an "English (language)" encyclopedia. We've had to deal with the British-English (including Scotch and Irish) vs. American-English (primarily USA) issue, not to mention Australia, South Africa, etc. I suppose it would be good to deal with Spanish (and Portugese?) usage as well.

• "America" in English (as used by Latinos) is a continent! It includes what native speakers of English generally refer to as North America and South America, i.e. "the Americas".
• "America" sometimes means the USA, but many Latinos avoid using the term this way. When referring to the USA (in English) they will use synonyms such as "the US", "the USA", "the United States, or in context simply "this country" or "here".
• There seems to be some resentment among Latinos that the English term "America" or "American" excludes the majority of the people who were born in America (continent). At best it's baffling, at worst it's arrogant.

I do not propose a solution here. I am simply condensing the discussion.

Do I have it right? Has everyone been heard? Is this what everyone thinks about the usage of "America" and "American"? --Uncle Ed 15:29, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

• Two very minor thoughts. 1) I would not have characterized the use of "The Americas" as a "new" English term. I remember it used that way as far back as grade school (which for me was in the 1960s) and believe it may be older than that. 2) I'm not sure the alternate usage is limited to Latinos. I've heard Canadians and soem Europeans express this same concern. Rossami (talk) 17:17, 22 March 2006 (UTC)
• The above seems a summary of some of the opinions expressed. There seems to be continuing disagreement. I am one of those who think the words "America" and "American" have the meanings found in better dictionaries-- refering to either the United States of America or to the New World in general, depending on context. I disagree with the use of bots substituting "American" for "United States" in hundreds of articles and categories. I think this has been an imposition enacted without adiquate agreement, sacrificing accurate encyclopedic language for vague conversational terms at the expence of precision to promote some type of POV. -- Infrogmation
• It should be noted that as much as Latin Americans might want to be refered to as Americans, Canadians are extremely hostile to the idea - it is entirely unacceptable to speakers of Canadian English to use American to refer to any place other than the States. I personally want to fill this page with a quote from Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction about whether the contributers speak english. It is definitely worth noting that even if you're trying to be unoffensive, you cannot succeed. Refering to Canadians as Americans is almost as offensive as this joke I know about Terry Fox. Anyone who called me an American would get a stern reprimand, and could probly easily push me to give them a punch in the nose. WilyD 20:45, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

One very minor niggle, which seems worth making here since we're discussing the naming of countries... there is no such thing as Scotch English, unless you've been drinking too much whiskey. In Scotland, however, there is such a thing as Scots English. ;-) – Kieran T ^(talk) 00:14, 17 May 2007 (UTC)