[blackshoe]

PassedOut, on 2012-April-19, 14:57, said:

Levon Helm


Only if you don't count Canadians as Americans.

An American is an inhabitant of the United States. A North American is an inhabitant of the United States, Canada, or (except, as I understand it, in Mexico) Mexico. Mexicans refer to Americans as Norte Americanos, ("North Americans").

So no, Canadians are not Americans.

[Cyberyeti]

blackshoe, on 2012-April-19, 23:24, said:

An American is an inhabitant of the United States. A North American is an inhabitant of the United States, Canada, or (except, as I understand it, in Mexico) Mexico. Mexicans refer to Americans as Norte Americanos, ("North Americans").

So no, Canadians are not Americans.

How parochial, in the UK the phrase "American Spanish" uses American as the whole continent as distinct from European, ie z pronounced z not "th".

What it means depends where you are speaking from.

[blackshoe]

Cyberyeti, on 2012-April-20, 08:17, said:

How parochial, in the UK the phrase "American Spanish" uses American as the whole continent as distinct from European, ie z pronounced z not "th".

What it means depends where you are speaking from.

Yes, I'm partial to my native country. Sue me.

I thought it was pronounced "zed".

[barmar]

If "American" doesn't refer to citizens of the USA, what term would? There's no such word as "USAn". Note that the name of our country is "United States of America" -- the preposition is not "in" or "on".

AFAIK, Canadians don't refer to themselves as Americans.

[wyman]

estadounidense, while we're on the topic of spanish.

[kenberg]

barmar, on 2012-April-20, 13:37, said:

If "American" doesn't refer to citizens of the USA, what term would? There's no such word as "USAn". Note that the name of our country is "United States of America" -- the preposition is not "in" or "on".

AFAIK, Canadians don't refer to themselves as Americans.

This is my guess too.

Imagine a Canadian over in the UK, having a friendly chat.
Someone from the UK says "It's good to hear the views of an American". Two guesses: First, if the host knew that his guest was a Canadian he would not refer to him as an American and secondly, the Canadian might well correct him.

We Yanks, if you prefer that, are in fact aware that Canada is in North America. I think of Mexico as being in North America but much to my surprise I found just within the past couple of years that it is often considered to be part of Central America.

And then, of course, there is South America. I am willing to bet that when someone says American he is rarely thinking of someone from Rio.

If someone really feels compelled to call me a Unistatsian I suppose I can handle it. We Americans are not an uptight sort.

[Fluffy]

kenberg, on 2012-April-20, 16:20, said:

And then, of course, there is South America. I am willing to bet that when someone says American he is rarely thinking of someone from Rio.

In spanish it might be, we use the article to differentiate, "America" is referring to either USA, or all america (north and south) together, while "Las americas" is used for latin american.

This is in castellan, IE spanish from Spain. Probably spanish from mexico/argentina is not the same.

[cherdano]

Fluffy, on 2012-April-20, 19:03, said:

In spanish it might be, we use the article to differentiate, "America" is referring to either USA, or all america (north and south) together, while "Las americas" is used for latin american.

This is in castellan, IE spanish from Spain. Probably spanish from mexico/argentina is not the same.

"The Americas" is getting some traction in American English, referring to North and South America.

[tbr]

If that's the case, why does the American Contract Bridge League host the "North American Bridge Championships?" ACBL does include Mexico, Canada, Bermuda and the United States. Many more members are all around the globe too.

[blackshoe]

kenberg, on 2012-April-20, 16:20, said:

I think of Mexico as being in North America but much to my surprise I found just within the past couple of years that it is often considered to be part of Central America.

I bet that's a result of our wonderful educational system.

[blackshoe]

Interesting. In some ways, or some cases, Central America is considered part of North America. Some people consider southern Mexico part of Central America, some don't. South America (south of the Isthmus of Panama, basically) doesn't seem to get divided up. There seems to be some question whether North America and South America are continents, as I was taught half a century ago, or sub-continents of one large continent called "the Americas". Geologists, geographers, politicians and others all have their opinions. They're probably all wrong.

Greenland is "an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark", is part of North America, but is not part of Zone 2 ("North America") of the WBF. It's not, as far as I can tell, part of any zone, unless the WBF considers it part of Denmark. Of course, the place has a total population of some 56,000 people, and who knows how many of them are bridge players?

[crazy4hoop]

So much for this being the RIP thread...

[kenberg]

Classifying Mexico as Central American seems bizarre to me so maybe I am misrepresenting the reasons, but I gather it is culturally based. This seems wrong to me on several levels. For one thing, I like simplicity. You look at a map, you see Mexico, most of it anyway, looks to be in North America so that's where it is, end of story. But it also seems like the thinking is "They speak Spanish and they are, relative to the U.S. and Canada, a poor country so lump them in with other Spanish speaking poor countries in Central America". We should be able to acknowledge that the cultural differences between the U.S. and Mexico are greater than the cultural differences between the U.S. and Canada without re-mapping them into Central America.

Or yes, it may just be our school system. I understand that more than a few Americans think Paraguay is in Europe. Wherever that is.

[blackshoe]

Europe? It's over that-a-way. Somewhere near Rome, I think.

[Cyberyeti]

blackshoe, on 2012-April-20, 12:54, said:

Yes, I'm partial to my native country. Sue me.

I thought it was pronounced "zed".

I meant any time a z appears in a word rather than the name of the letter.

In European Spanish, a c before an i or e will be pronounced as in theta, in American spanish it will be pronounced as an s, z is similarly pronounced differently in the two versions.

Native of the US = Yank

But seriously American is used to cover the US and the whole continent, context is often used to distinguish.

[Aberlour10]

blackshoe, on 2012-April-21, 06:42, said:

Europe? It's over that-a-way. Somewhere near Rome, I think.

The real America, its somewhere in north Poland and the people who are living there are called Amerykanie heh

[lalldonn]

kenberg, on 2012-April-20, 16:20, said:

I think of Mexico as being in North America but much to my surprise I found just within the past couple of years that it is often considered to be part of Central America.

Those are not mutually exclusive. Central America is not a continent...

[ggwhiz]

Aberlour10, on 2012-April-21, 16:12, said:

The real America, its somewhere in north Poland and the people who are living there are called Amerykanie heh

I once read about some American tourists in Czechoslovakia impressed by the number of USA signs they saw until they were told that in the local language it means door.

[PassedOut]

ggwhiz, on 2012-April-21, 16:49, said:

I once read about some American tourists in Czechoslovakia impressed by the number of USA signs they saw until they were told that in the local language it means door.

Yes, it is often a mistake to assume that words have the same meaning across languages.

[Vampyr]

kenberg, on 2012-April-21, 06:39, said:

Classifying Mexico as Central American seems bizarre to me so maybe I am misrepresenting the reasons, but I gather it is culturally based. This seems wrong to me on several levels. For one thing, I like simplicity. You look at a map, you see Mexico, most of it anyway, looks to be in North America so that's where it is, end of story. But it also seems like the thinking is "They speak Spanish and they are, relative to the U.S. and Canada, a poor country so lump them in with other Spanish speaking poor countries in Central America".

So what? Central American countries are also in North America.