Re: CHAT: silly names, prepositions

jesse stephen bangs wrote:
>
> Andreas Johansson sikayal:
>
> > I don't think anybody was even think about trying to force anyone anything.
> > However, I, and it seems like I'm not alone, find it somewhat ambiguious to
> > use "Americans" for "US citizens" since the word "Americans" looks like it
> > refers to (any) inhabitants of the Americas, and is indeed sometimes so
> > used.
>
> No, it's not!  The fact remains that, ambiguous or not, the term
> "American" is virtually always understood to refer to someone from the US.
> People from the US use it that way.  People from foreign countries usually
> understand 'American' that way, both in English and in whatever the local
> language is.  The literal interpretation of the term may be misleading,
> but since "American" is never understood literally, it's a moot argument.
Well, if the term "American" is "virtually always understood" to mean
someone from the USA, then logically a "South American" should be
understood to mean someone from one of the southern states, right? But
it's not. That's where we're coming from, at last.

> Furthermore, the origin of the term "American" is not deliberately
> arrogant.  There simply isn't any other common term available for
> describing citizens of the US, and so "American" gets used.  Accusing
> Americans of arrogance for this is unfair and rediculous, because
> Americans can't change it and never meant anything by it in the first
> place.
You've got three good words in the name of your country (if we ignore
"of", that is) that you can use, and the other two wouldn't cause as
much trouble as "American", so there are other terms available. I agree
that it's not deliberatly arrogant. I don't think the people who came up
with the term said "How many people can we piss off today?" - but to
outsiders, especially American outsiders (the real Americans) it seems
especially arrogant.

Cheerfully,
        RJEH.