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In my classes this nationality refers to all the peoples who reside in the continents of North and South America. Reference to Americans who live in the United States is by the designation U.S. Americans.[1]
[1]. In 1820, the Mexican rabble-rousing cleric Servando Teresa de Mier, during a visit to Washington, D. C. wryly indicated this problem of nomenclature: “Since the Europeans believe that there is no other America than the one their nation possesses, an erroneous nomenclature has formed in each nation.” He explained:
The English call their islands in the Caribbean Archipelago, our Indies or the West Indies; and for the English there is no other North America than the United States. All Spanish North America is to them South America, even though the largest part of the region is in the north. The people of the United States follow that usage and they are offended when we, in order to distinguish them, call them Anglo Americans. They wish to be the only Americans or North Americans even though neither name is totally appropriate. Americans of the United States is too long; in the end, they will have to be content with the name guasintones, from their capital Washington,… just as they call us Mexicans, from the name of our capital. (From Rodriguez O [2000: 131])
On this subject, see also the article by Hanchard (1990).
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