“America” generally refers to the USA. People use “North America” or “South America” when referring to the continents. Since, y’know, “America” isn’t the name of any continent.
Depends on language and culture and context. In the United States we use America to refer to the country and North America and South America to refer to the continents. Many Latin American countries use a six continent system though, where North America and South America are just one continent called America. This can lead to some tension and confusion when people from the United States call themselves American, since that would imply everyone in the western hemisphere to them basically. While sometimes “Americano” is used to refer to people from the United States, you’ll also you get descriptors like “estadounidense” in Spanish for this reason. Though this also has ambiguity, since technically Mexico is also a “united states.”
Anyways, point is, a seven continent system with the western hemisphere separated into north and south America isn’t used everywhere, for some people America is a continent. In some places Europe and Asia are combined, and there’s other variations too. None of them line up with plate tectonics or anything perfectly, so they’re all a little arbitrary in the end.
Sure, but consider this: the ones who travel and say “I’m from America” sound like boneheads, and ones who say “I’m from the US” sound more thoughtful.
Source: American who’s spent a bunch of time learning through mistakes while traveling.
You should always listen to context. Languages are not competely logical.
The United States of America (USA or U.S.A.), commonly known as the United States (US or U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America, between Canada and Mexico.
This has been pretty much true for every country I have visited or lived in, except one time in France some one referred to my Canadian cousin as American.
“America” or “Americas” can refer to the continents which is why you should pay attention to context. When someone says they have an American citizenship, they are not citizens of a continent.
In this comic, if someone is in North America, when they say America, they are referring to USA.
Don’t bother, by the time people start the “USians” stage they generally can’t be argued with and will only be pleased by the entire USA being skinned alive.
In my experience USians is usually used by weird liberals who are in favor of manifest destiny, but are worried about the racist baggage attached to the term. Go to Toronto or Tijuana and insist that the locals are Americans and you’ll get your teeth knocked out.
The Dutch, Austrians, and large amounts of Switzerland are technically Germans. But if suddenly people from the Federal Republic of Germany started going on about how Austrians are also technically Germans, and you should refer to people from FRG as Bundesen, all of Europe would start to freak the fuck out.
In my experience “USians” is usually used by butthurt Spanish speakers who think that because America means one thing in Spanish it has to mean the same thing in every other language.
In my experience “USians” is usually used by butthurt Spanish speakers who think that because America means one thing in Spanish it has to mean the same thing in every other language.
Well, there’s more countries speakers of Spanish, so we have a point, I think.
It’s funny you talk about language nonsense, when so many of the US citizens believe that their dialect is the original English and the UK is a deformed version of it…
No, you don’t have a point. You’re missing the point. The point is that America in English is not the same word as America in Spanish. They’re false friends.
False friends is the linguistics term for two words spelled the same in two languages, but with different meaning. For example, the word “glass” means ice cream in Swedish. We don’t tell the Swedish they’re using the word “glass” wrong, we accept that it has a different meaning in Swedish.
Sometimes the false friends are pretty subtle. The word “må” means “may” in Danish, but “must” in Norwegian. This can sometimes lead to misunderstandings, because unlike the ice cream example above, you don’t get any hints from context. You just have to know.
It’s the same deal with America. English-speaking countries (yes, the UK too), and all of the Nordics for that matter, use a continental model where North and South America are separate continents, and America is shorthand for United States of America. And the superior amount of Spanish speaking countries don’t give them the right to tell English speakers what words should mean in their native language.
To be fair, the last time Germany did that it helped pull the majority of the planet into a very bad time and we as a species picked up new forms of trauma. I’d get a bit twitchy too, but your point is valid
They say America as if they live in another continent…
“America” generally refers to the USA. People use “North America” or “South America” when referring to the continents. Since, y’know, “America” isn’t the name of any continent.
It is in several countries, including all Latin America
This tracks, Cap grew up in the OG Brooklyn, he knows who the real ones are
TIL that CA is from Breukelen!
“The Ice”
The majority of the worlds population uses a split Americas model.
Likewise you’re communicating in English not Greek or a Romance language.
Get over it.
Depends on language and culture and context. In the United States we use America to refer to the country and North America and South America to refer to the continents. Many Latin American countries use a six continent system though, where North America and South America are just one continent called America. This can lead to some tension and confusion when people from the United States call themselves American, since that would imply everyone in the western hemisphere to them basically. While sometimes “Americano” is used to refer to people from the United States, you’ll also you get descriptors like “estadounidense” in Spanish for this reason. Though this also has ambiguity, since technically Mexico is also a “united states.”
Anyways, point is, a seven continent system with the western hemisphere separated into north and south America isn’t used everywhere, for some people America is a continent. In some places Europe and Asia are combined, and there’s other variations too. None of them line up with plate tectonics or anything perfectly, so they’re all a little arbitrary in the end.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent
Sure, but consider this: the ones who travel and say “I’m from America” sound like boneheads, and ones who say “I’m from the US” sound more thoughtful.
Source: American who’s spent a bunch of time learning through mistakes while traveling.
You should always listen to context. Languages are not competely logical.
Source: Wikipedia
This has been pretty much true for every country I have visited or lived in, except one time in France some one referred to my Canadian cousin as American.
“America” or “Americas” can refer to the continents which is why you should pay attention to context. When someone says they have an American citizenship, they are not citizens of a continent.
In this comic, if someone is in North America, when they say America, they are referring to USA.
The comic’s usage of “America” is correct.
Don’t bother, by the time people start the “USians” stage they generally can’t be argued with and will only be pleased by the entire USA being skinned alive.
In my experience USians is usually used by weird liberals who are in favor of manifest destiny, but are worried about the racist baggage attached to the term. Go to Toronto or Tijuana and insist that the locals are Americans and you’ll get your teeth knocked out.
The Dutch, Austrians, and large amounts of Switzerland are technically Germans. But if suddenly people from the Federal Republic of Germany started going on about how Austrians are also technically Germans, and you should refer to people from FRG as Bundesen, all of Europe would start to freak the fuck out.
In my experience “USians” is usually used by butthurt Spanish speakers who think that because America means one thing in Spanish it has to mean the same thing in every other language.
Well, there’s more countries speakers of Spanish, so we have a point, I think.
It’s funny you talk about language nonsense, when so many of the US citizens believe that their dialect is the original English and the UK is a deformed version of it…
No, you don’t have a point. You’re missing the point. The point is that America in English is not the same word as America in Spanish. They’re false friends.
False friends is the linguistics term for two words spelled the same in two languages, but with different meaning. For example, the word “glass” means ice cream in Swedish. We don’t tell the Swedish they’re using the word “glass” wrong, we accept that it has a different meaning in Swedish.
Sometimes the false friends are pretty subtle. The word “må” means “may” in Danish, but “must” in Norwegian. This can sometimes lead to misunderstandings, because unlike the ice cream example above, you don’t get any hints from context. You just have to know.
It’s the same deal with America. English-speaking countries (yes, the UK too), and all of the Nordics for that matter, use a continental model where North and South America are separate continents, and America is shorthand for United States of America. And the superior amount of Spanish speaking countries don’t give them the right to tell English speakers what words should mean in their native language.
There are also more native English speakers than Spanish speakers. Land doesn’t talk, only people do
To be fair, the last time Germany did that it helped pull the majority of the planet into a very bad time and we as a species picked up new forms of trauma. I’d get a bit twitchy too, but your point is valid
Nah, a painless and quick death can do also.
Yeah well, if the US military couldn’t kill my ancestors your bitch ass sure as he’ll won’t do it.
They? Bro it’s a comic.
That just forwards the stupidity to the author. So the point stands.
You can’t even draw the curtains.
Yeah and who started that bullshit?