Indeed, U.S.A. is not America!
America is the name of a whole continent. United States of America means that the United States belongs to America and NOT that America belongs to the United States. So, next time you want to refer to The United States of America, you can do it as U.S. or the States or whatever you want but not as only America. Gotcha?
How should I use the term America then?
Here we will show you some wrong and correct uses of the term America:
This is how we do it in America.
This is how we do it in the States.
- America is my country and I love it.
- The United States is my country and I love it.
- America lost the Vietnam war.
- U.S.A. lost the Vietnam war.
- Here in America we love Mc Donald's.
- Here in the U.S. we love Mc Donald's.
Please, note that this page in not about demonyms (gentilics) but about the way to call a country.
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Comments (1251)
David said: ". It’s like when the simple-minded Mrs. Anonymous repeatedly asks me, ‘Where did the name ‘America’ first come from?’ She knows that I know where it comes from. I educated her about where it comes from." So, if you know that it comes from Amerigo Vespuccio to name the new continent. So America, means the new continent. This is the same meaning that immigrants from Europe accepted. If this is the meaning, why do you continue to say that it has another meaning when the purpose of the name was to name the continent not a country? If the USA took the name of the continent to use it for its own, it still means a continent the word does not change, the people change it for their own use, but the word does not change its meaning. America is still a continent period.
It’s obviously both a continent and a country. The word has multiple meanings. What irrefutable rule says that only your preferred meaning is the correct one?
Not my preferred one, but the only meaning the word was coined for...not for a country, but for a continent. The USA took the name of a continent the one it is on. The name has one meaning not two! The USA uses the same meaning the name was coined for, a continent. The emerging nation of the English colonies adapted the name of the continent when choosing its name as United States of America. The thing is that you can't go further than our brain tells you. But if you go back to when the continent was founded and read what was going on all those years until we are here today, you might get it. You might understand that for the USA to have added the name of America, it had to be because it was the name of continent they were rising a nation on!
*your brain, not our brain! lol
Las Americas is the subdivision of America; North America, Central America and South America. America is the whole continent. America is the name given to the continent. The USA used the name in their new nation to denote that the nation was not in Europe but in the continent of America. Later, people mistakenly adapted the name America as if it is only the USA. The USA is in America but so is Costa Rica, Canada, Argentina, etc.
What’s the mistake that you are always babbling about? Please be specific.
I feel sorry that you were not educated well. The schools in USA have done their own history and continue to erase it as it goes according to their ideals. The rest of the world knows the correct history especially when it comes to the new world and how it got the name of America. You and others deny this fact because you have been conditioned by the ideals taught at schools in USA and its partners English Speaking countries. I don't blame you for being so adamant about what you were taught because it seems it is the only thing you know. You can't just go by what you see, you have to understand what happened through history and read both sides, the English and the others. But it seems you rather get stuck where you are because it might be the only thing you are capable of understanding.
Now the english version!
♫♫ "The Americaaaaaaasss !! The Americaaaasss !! a whole immense garden that is The Americas, when God made Eden thought in The Americas!" ♫♫
(from the song "América, América" by the Spanish singer Nino Bravo de 1973)
Names do not change from one language to another. That is a wrong practice.
Please provide a link to the rule book where this law is explained. Thanks.
so Calletano you don't name Alemania to Deutschland (Germany), Greece to Ellada, India to Bhārat, or China to Zhongguó.
Don't name like these those countries any more, because they don't have that names.
People find names to call "foreign locations" in their own languages, especially when it isn't so simple to pronounce. However, if your name is Juan and you travel to the US, Germany or Greece, your name does not change to John, Johannes or Ioannes. It is still the same: Juan.
Similarly, America is a continent and period. Anything else can initially be ignorance, later becomes disrespect. Los nombres propios no se traducen.
Thank you Calletano! They just don't get it.
Точно Calletano! Я узнал это от моих испанских друзей
“♫♫¡¡¡Américaaaaaaaa Américaaaaaaa, todo un inmenzo jardín!!! ¡Eso es Améeerica! ¡¡Cuando Dios hizo el Edén pensó en América!!♫♫”
Yes, dumbass. We know. ‘América’ in Spanish most commonly refers to all of the Americas. Is this all that you have to offer? I thought you were supposed to impress us with your big Argentine brain. Pinche payaso.
insult me in Argentine! "pinche" is a Mexican insult, Argentine insults are "boludo" and "pelotudo"... pelotudo!!!
They are not going to consider it a great example but in football soccer there is a club tournament (the most important) in South America called the Copa Libertadores de América and the winner is called "champions of America!"
It’s a perfectly fine example, but nobody here is seriously arguing that the most common meaning of ‘América’ in Spanish isn’t ‘the Americas’. We know what it means in Spanish. Why do you keep mentioning it and acting like you are winning some argument? It’s amusing and sad that this is all you have to offer. You act like this is some devastating proof that is destroying the arguments of ‘stupid United Statians’. It isn’t. It’s like when the simple-minded Mrs. Anonymous repeatedly asks me, ‘Where did the name ‘America’ first come from?’ She knows that I know where it comes from. I educated her about where it comes from. She still pretends it originally referred to all of the Americas, even though I educated her about the fact that it originally referred to only South America. You have nothing to offer, so you just keep repeating sh1t that everyone already knows, and pretending that you are proving me and other Americans wrong. None of you have ever proved me wrong. NEVER. NEVER!!!
P.S. “The official name of Mexico is … Mexico....”
¡Loquísimo!
Poor you! Whatever you are dreaming of, its your own fantasy! You have not educated me but I educated you..Haaa! You keep saying the same thing over and over but let me tell you it won't stick. Even though the word America was written on what Brazil and S.A. is today, the word was to name the entire continent! Read read read! you need to educate yourself.
Exactly what have you educated me about? Please be specific.
♫♫¡¡¡Américaaaaaaaa Américaaaaaaa, todo un inmenzo jardín!!! ¡Eso es Améeerica! ¡¡Cuando Dios hizo el Edén pensó en América!!♫♫
“The official name of Mexico is … Mexico....”
¡Loquísimo!
No dandies; no poodles; no inflatable gunjun-rubber bustles, spiralpalpitators, false calves, false curls, false teeth, false smiles and false professions! All these are civilized and christianized commodities, delicacies and Beelzebubbles! Oh, that we were a heathen - a pagan - a cannibal! - Anything but a highly favored United Statian... (The Weekly Caucasian, No. 52 - Whole No. 364, United States, Lexington, Lafayette County, Mo., Saturday, April 19, 1873)
Opaaaa United Statian again I'm impressed this site is like a library I learn and learn
Of course we all know that “America” is not the USA’s official name. Of course we all know that “America” is the name of the continent.
Of course we all know ‘America’ is a common name of the USA.
Hey, you cannot be on both sides. Are you bi?
“The official name of Mexico is … Mexico....”
¡Loquísimo!
It is very very funny to see that someone made an excerpt from a text that is CRITICAL with the use of the word "americano" as a demonym for the United States, and that the excerpt is the author's complaint that they do so, not a description. Obviously at the time this text was written, he was suffering because that -apparently- was happening in his country (Mexico) at the time of writing, but that has not happened for a long time, I am from Argentina (Spanish speaking country) and it is very difficult to find someone who calls americanos to the citizens of the United States, except the elderly. We all call them estadounidenses!!!
But it was very very funny to see someone try such a dumb and silly resource!
https://www.fondodeculturaeconomica.com/obra/suma/r1/buscar.asp?word2=americano
Says the payaso who doesn’t know what ‘official’ means, and who doesn’t know what the official name of Mexico is.
¡¡Uuuuhh!! ¡¡Este ta re loco!! ¡loquísimo!
LOL. Dumbass.
Even the main dictionary of the English language, the Merriam-Webster, recognizes the continental meaning (relative to the America continent or The Americas) of the word "American" above that of demonym for The United States of America.
"'American' noun
Definition of American (Entry 1 of 2)
1: an American Indian of North America or South America
2: a native or inhabitant of North America or South America
3: a native or inhabitant of the U.S. : a U.S. citizen
4: AMERICAN ENGLISH
'American' adjective
Definition of American (Entry 2 of 2)
1: of or relating to America
American people
2: of or relating to the U.S. or its possessions or original territory
//American soldiers
//American embassies
//American states
//American culture"
“...the main dictionary of the English language...”
If any dictionary is the main dictionary of the English language, it’s definitely the Oxford English Dictionary. It is the most comprehensive and authoritative dictionary to ever exist in the world.
It is a fact that the most common meaning of ‘America’ and ‘American’ in English are in reference to the USA and people or things that are related to the USA. The order of the definitions in a dictionary doesn’t change this.