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Other meaning for USA people

Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved Asklemmy
asklemmy
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  • T [email protected]

    I've heard gringo is about language, primarily English. Not about being a whitey

    tempotato@beehaw.orgT This user is from outside of this forum
    tempotato@beehaw.orgT This user is from outside of this forum
    [email protected]
    wrote on last edited by
    #71

    Mexican upbringing here, it is most definitely a "Whitey" thing.

    T 1 Reply Last reply
    0
    • zagorath@aussie.zoneZ [email protected]

      Most americans, the majority of whom don't live in the US

      Gonna stop you right there. The number of Americans who don't live in in the US is tiny.

      "American" is the demonym for someone from the United States of America. You don't have to like it, but that's the way it's been in the English language for hundreds of years, and getting angry about it doesn't change linguistics, which is defined by usage.

      English speakers don't recognise the Americas as a single continent, but as two separate continents separated by the isthmus of Panama. So it doesn't make sense to have a single demonym to refer to everyone from those two continents.

      The arrogance of some Spanish speakers of thinking they have the right to dictate the English language is astounding. And I refuse to buy into it. I'm not coming into Spanish-speaking spaces and trying to change how they talk about things in their language.

      E This user is from outside of this forum
      E This user is from outside of this forum
      [email protected]
      wrote on last edited by
      #72

      Hi, Brazilian here.

      I'm sorry, but "the number of Americans who don't live in the US is tiny"?? WTF?

      Hi, South ~~AMERICAN!!!! here.

      the US doesn't get to shove their so-called "democracy" up our asses, impose their monetary exchange, be proud of their stupid ass imperialism, force people to learn their dumb as fuck language and then go "yeah, it's OUR language, you can't dictate how we call ourselves"

      Sorry, dude, but you kinda lost the privilege to "dictate" your own language when you decided to think about the whole third world as your backyard and to name yourselves after THE WHOLE FUCKING CONTINENT.

      peace, bye!

      zagorath@aussie.zoneZ 1 Reply Last reply
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      • E [email protected]

        In Brazil, we use USians or Statesians

        I used the second one on an academic paper and it went through.

        I NEVER use "American", because

        America no es solo USA, papá
        esto es desde el Tierra del Fuego hasta el Canada

        C This user is from outside of this forum
        C This user is from outside of this forum
        [email protected]
        wrote on last edited by
        #73

        America no es solo USA

        Nah, we often call them Americans too, despite them being like Canada's trousers. Many (most? I'm not certain) Canadians know how Americans label themselves abroad and are okay being a separate group to avoid bad impressions. "eres Americano? No; soy Canadiense" or so.

        But thanks for thinking of us. It's great to be considered!

        1 Reply Last reply
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        • E [email protected]

          Hi, Brazilian here.

          I'm sorry, but "the number of Americans who don't live in the US is tiny"?? WTF?

          Hi, South ~~AMERICAN!!!! here.

          the US doesn't get to shove their so-called "democracy" up our asses, impose their monetary exchange, be proud of their stupid ass imperialism, force people to learn their dumb as fuck language and then go "yeah, it's OUR language, you can't dictate how we call ourselves"

          Sorry, dude, but you kinda lost the privilege to "dictate" your own language when you decided to think about the whole third world as your backyard and to name yourselves after THE WHOLE FUCKING CONTINENT.

          peace, bye!

          zagorath@aussie.zoneZ This user is from outside of this forum
          zagorath@aussie.zoneZ This user is from outside of this forum
          [email protected]
          wrote on last edited by
          #74

          Might want to check who you're actually talking to here. You seem to be making some incorrect assumptions.

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          • T [email protected]

            What about Canada?

            zagorath@aussie.zoneZ This user is from outside of this forum
            zagorath@aussie.zoneZ This user is from outside of this forum
            [email protected]
            wrote on last edited by
            #75

            What about it?

            1 Reply Last reply
            0
            • dessalines@lemmy.mlD [email protected]

              Most americans, the majority of whom don't live in the US, dislike the usurpation of that term. There's a longer history starting in the late 1800s of US politicians using "america", "greater america", to coincide with its imperial ambitions in Latin america and the carribean.

              The USA even had a time when it had more people in its colonies living outside its contiguous borders, than it did inside.

              There's a lot on this in the book, how to hide an empire.

              southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
              southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
              [email protected]
              wrote on last edited by
              #76

              That has very little to do with the topic, which is colloquial language as it exists now, compared and contrasted between English and Spanish in specific.

              And, tbh here, if you wanna talk populations, brazil is half the population of South America. And that total is still only 100million higher than the US. Since we're talking about mainly Spanish and English here, you can decide if you want brazil included or not, but even that's still not some kind of crazy difference.

              Since Canada and Mexico are the other parts of North America, and don't generally give a flying fuck about the terminology, are we going to include them in the count too? Like, the Mexicans I know use their own Spanish terms for Americans, sometimes even when speaking English.

              Like, dude, I get it, you wanna link everything into colonialism and imperialism, which is fine. But let's not pretend that Americans hasn't been the term used in English across the world for damn near as long as the US has existed. It was what, 1788? 1789? That one of the French diplomats used it in writing the first time? Might have been before that, but that's the one I remember. The term was certainly in use before that.

              Now, using "Americans" to refer to everyone over here did exist before the U.S., going back to at least the 1500s. I think that was only in use in English, I've never looked up what was used in French and Spanish back then. But since the USA came into being as country, it has been the default term for US citizens colloquially.

              Even some of the other languages use variations of it. There's Mexicans and Nicaraguans at least that use Americanos rather than other terms. I swear the Guatemalans near here default to that as well, when they aren't using gringo or race specific terminology, but I don't have as much interaction with them.

              All of which goes back to the point that the whining about it online is a fairly recent thing, and it was definitely not a thing back far as the nineties irl for the general population. That may be biased by my exposure to Latinos being almost exclusively people that live here, rather than visitors.

              If people wanna try to shift language into something else, all it takes is coming up with a replacement term that's not unwieldy or stupid sounding (like usians), then getting people to use it.

              But nobody has come up with a realistic english replacement. Usians isn't going to happen. You might run into it online because it's easier to type, but you won't see it used in speech because it sounds stupid. It would be like calling brits ukians.

              Hell, go find something in another language, English is great at adopting words. Beikoku-jin (japanese) or Usanano (Esperanto) are cool as hell, flow off the tongue, and beikoku would definitely get the weebs on board. Give it a go, see what happens.

              dessalines@lemmy.mlD 1 Reply Last reply
              0
              • southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS [email protected]

                That has very little to do with the topic, which is colloquial language as it exists now, compared and contrasted between English and Spanish in specific.

                And, tbh here, if you wanna talk populations, brazil is half the population of South America. And that total is still only 100million higher than the US. Since we're talking about mainly Spanish and English here, you can decide if you want brazil included or not, but even that's still not some kind of crazy difference.

                Since Canada and Mexico are the other parts of North America, and don't generally give a flying fuck about the terminology, are we going to include them in the count too? Like, the Mexicans I know use their own Spanish terms for Americans, sometimes even when speaking English.

                Like, dude, I get it, you wanna link everything into colonialism and imperialism, which is fine. But let's not pretend that Americans hasn't been the term used in English across the world for damn near as long as the US has existed. It was what, 1788? 1789? That one of the French diplomats used it in writing the first time? Might have been before that, but that's the one I remember. The term was certainly in use before that.

                Now, using "Americans" to refer to everyone over here did exist before the U.S., going back to at least the 1500s. I think that was only in use in English, I've never looked up what was used in French and Spanish back then. But since the USA came into being as country, it has been the default term for US citizens colloquially.

                Even some of the other languages use variations of it. There's Mexicans and Nicaraguans at least that use Americanos rather than other terms. I swear the Guatemalans near here default to that as well, when they aren't using gringo or race specific terminology, but I don't have as much interaction with them.

                All of which goes back to the point that the whining about it online is a fairly recent thing, and it was definitely not a thing back far as the nineties irl for the general population. That may be biased by my exposure to Latinos being almost exclusively people that live here, rather than visitors.

                If people wanna try to shift language into something else, all it takes is coming up with a replacement term that's not unwieldy or stupid sounding (like usians), then getting people to use it.

                But nobody has come up with a realistic english replacement. Usians isn't going to happen. You might run into it online because it's easier to type, but you won't see it used in speech because it sounds stupid. It would be like calling brits ukians.

                Hell, go find something in another language, English is great at adopting words. Beikoku-jin (japanese) or Usanano (Esperanto) are cool as hell, flow off the tongue, and beikoku would definitely get the weebs on board. Give it a go, see what happens.

                dessalines@lemmy.mlD This user is from outside of this forum
                dessalines@lemmy.mlD This user is from outside of this forum
                [email protected]
                wrote on last edited by
                #77

                Now, using "Americans" to refer to everyone over here did exist before the U.S., going back to at least the 1500s. I think that was only in use in English, I've never looked up what was used in French and Spanish back then. But since the USA came into being as country, it has been the default term for US citizens colloquially.

                Confidently wrong. US leaders didn't start referring to its citizens as americans or its country as america until ~1900.

                I know you won't read the book I linked, and are going off of white-supremacist vibes, so here's an article for everyone else about the history of this imperialist usage.

                southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS 1 Reply Last reply
                1
                • dessalines@lemmy.mlD [email protected]

                  Now, using "Americans" to refer to everyone over here did exist before the U.S., going back to at least the 1500s. I think that was only in use in English, I've never looked up what was used in French and Spanish back then. But since the USA came into being as country, it has been the default term for US citizens colloquially.

                  Confidently wrong. US leaders didn't start referring to its citizens as americans or its country as america until ~1900.

                  I know you won't read the book I linked, and are going off of white-supremacist vibes, so here's an article for everyone else about the history of this imperialist usage.

                  southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
                  southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
                  [email protected]
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #78

                  IDGAF about what leaders called it/us. That's almost irrelevant.

                  But other people in the world absolutely were using the term American to refer to citizens of the US before the 1900s.

                  I'm also not sure why you insist on staying on this tangent when the conversation was about current usage.

                  dessalines@lemmy.mlD grapho@lemmy.mlG 2 Replies Last reply
                  0
                  • southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS [email protected]

                    IDGAF about what leaders called it/us. That's almost irrelevant.

                    But other people in the world absolutely were using the term American to refer to citizens of the US before the 1900s.

                    I'm also not sure why you insist on staying on this tangent when the conversation was about current usage.

                    dessalines@lemmy.mlD This user is from outside of this forum
                    dessalines@lemmy.mlD This user is from outside of this forum
                    [email protected]
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #79

                    Getting you to read is impossible. Stop white-supremacist vibing and actually read about its historical usage. I even linked you an article, which I know you didn't read.

                    southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS 1 Reply Last reply
                    1
                    • dessalines@lemmy.mlD [email protected]

                      Getting you to read is impossible. Stop white-supremacist vibing and actually read about its historical usage. I even linked you an article, which I know you didn't read.

                      southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
                      southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS This user is from outside of this forum
                      [email protected]
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #80

                      Dude, stop with the ad hominem bullshit.

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                      • tempotato@beehaw.orgT [email protected]

                        Mexican upbringing here, it is most definitely a "Whitey" thing.

                        T This user is from outside of this forum
                        T This user is from outside of this forum
                        [email protected]
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #81

                        Thank you for the information. Guess I can't joke about being a gringo lol

                        1 Reply Last reply
                        0
                        • N [email protected]

                          From Spain here, when we want to speak about USA people we use the term "yankee" or "gringo" rather than "american" cause our americans arent from USA, that terms are correct or mean other things?

                          davel@lemmy.mlD This user is from outside of this forum
                          davel@lemmy.mlD This user is from outside of this forum
                          [email protected]
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #82

                          Being a native, a Yankee to me is a New Englander. My Spanish friend had to gently explain to me, “shut up, you’re all yanquis.”

                          T J 2 Replies Last reply
                          0
                          • zagorath@aussie.zoneZ [email protected]

                            Honestly, reading this comment is really just reinforcing for me why we say American. Reading "USAien" over and over again hurts my head.

                            Q This user is from outside of this forum
                            Q This user is from outside of this forum
                            [email protected]
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #83

                            it was difficult writing it too...

                            1 Reply Last reply
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                            • S [email protected]

                              I'd say leave east/west out of the Yankee/Dixie dichotomy you're imagining, because every single southeastern state was a slave state that supported the confederacy.

                              It also falls apart when you go west of the Mississippi River, which was (outside of Texas and California) mostly unincorporated territory during the time of the civil war and not a part of what would have been considered the union or the confederacy at that time.

                              Also don't refer to Hispanic Americans as "gringo" because that is a term used in Latin America to refer to people who are not Latin American.

                              L This user is from outside of this forum
                              L This user is from outside of this forum
                              [email protected]
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #84

                              Yeah thanks. I said pseudo because I do t really know the meaning of these words apart from vic3, nor do I know of anyone from the americas 🙂

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                              • southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS [email protected]

                                IDGAF about what leaders called it/us. That's almost irrelevant.

                                But other people in the world absolutely were using the term American to refer to citizens of the US before the 1900s.

                                I'm also not sure why you insist on staying on this tangent when the conversation was about current usage.

                                grapho@lemmy.mlG This user is from outside of this forum
                                grapho@lemmy.mlG This user is from outside of this forum
                                [email protected]
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #85

                                other people in the world absolutely were using the term American to refer to citizens of the US before the 1900s.

                                I mean, a few, I imagine. There's always been people saying shit wrong. Would help your case if you actually had a source and not just a vibe to refute an evidence based position.

                                By population, however, most of the world isn't the anglosphere. Spanish speakers, which is most of America, by and large call you "Estadunidenses" whenever it's not "gringo". A good chunk of us also speak English and object to gringos colonizing "america" much like Indonesians or Indians or Malaysians probably would have if Japan decided it was "Asia".

                                You might not have decided that we speak English, but the same government that made it a necessity for us in the global south to learn the language is the one that decided to steal that term. Language matters.

                                southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksS 1 Reply Last reply
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                                • davel@lemmy.mlD [email protected]

                                  Being a native, a Yankee to me is a New Englander. My Spanish friend had to gently explain to me, “shut up, you’re all yanquis.”

                                  T This user is from outside of this forum
                                  T This user is from outside of this forum
                                  [email protected]
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #86

                                  Given that you're the native, you should gently explain to the colonial that they are the ones who are wrong.

                                  1 Reply Last reply
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                                  • H [email protected]

                                    In the USA, Yankee refers to mainly northeast US, including the New York City area. Western Americans would be neutral about being called that and you might piss off some southerners.

                                    My exposure to the term gringo has mainly been that it refers to white Americans. I don't know if you would call a black American gringo or how they would accept it.

                                    T This user is from outside of this forum
                                    T This user is from outside of this forum
                                    [email protected]
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #87

                                    Eh, NY has the Yankees sports team but they are not part of New England and I'd say a good portion of the country would say NY has no Yankees in it besides the team.

                                    H 1 Reply Last reply
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                                    • dessalines@lemmy.mlD [email protected]

                                      Most americans, the majority of whom don't live in the US, dislike the usurpation of that term. There's a longer history starting in the late 1800s of US politicians using "america", "greater america", to coincide with its imperial ambitions in Latin america and the carribean.

                                      The USA even had a time when it had more people in its colonies living outside its contiguous borders, than it did inside.

                                      There's a lot on this in the book, how to hide an empire.

                                      T This user is from outside of this forum
                                      T This user is from outside of this forum
                                      [email protected]
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #88

                                      Sounds like that fight was lost 100 years ago.

                                      dessalines@lemmy.mlD 1 Reply Last reply
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                                      • E [email protected]

                                        In Brazil, we use USians or Statesians

                                        I used the second one on an academic paper and it went through.

                                        I NEVER use "American", because

                                        America no es solo USA, papá
                                        esto es desde el Tierra del Fuego hasta el Canada

                                        icastfist@programming.devI This user is from outside of this forum
                                        icastfist@programming.devI This user is from outside of this forum
                                        [email protected]
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #89

                                        Thing is, it's "United States of America", much like "United States of Mexico" and, before 1968, "United States of Brazil". So when they call themselves americans, they're technically correct.

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                                        • N [email protected]

                                          From Spain here, when we want to speak about USA people we use the term "yankee" or "gringo" rather than "american" cause our americans arent from USA, that terms are correct or mean other things?

                                          icastfist@programming.devI This user is from outside of this forum
                                          icastfist@programming.devI This user is from outside of this forum
                                          [email protected]
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #90

                                          Call them murican. Everyone gets it, even the usa-ians

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