WTF is this country called America?

@ Mike Richards

"And the left-hand quarter of Iceland; which (depending on your definition) is also (or indeed is not) part of Scandinavia."

No it isn't. As previously stated, "Scandinavia" is comprised only of Denmark, Sweden and Norway (being, as they are, directly connected to the Scandinavian Mountains from which they get their communal name - Norway and Sweden to either side, and Denmark at the tail end).

Denmark + Sweden + Norway = Scandinavia (geographical)

Scandinavia + Finland + Iceland = Nordic (cultural)

There is no matter of opinion about it. It is simply fact - in exactly the same way as the distinction between GB vs. UK is a geographical vs. political distinction.

I say tomAtoes and you say tomARtoes ...

The U.S. of A. means the United States of America. Americans, who come from America, refer to their country as the United States or just the States.

The geographical part of the world is North America and includes Canada, the USA and Mexico.

The term 'AmericaS' refers to the co-joined areas of North and South America.

Limeys are British; Canucks are Canadians and Yanks/Gringo's are Americans.

Maybe I'm being Captain Obvious here, but...

The thing I found odd (and maybe missed by the canucklehead) is not the reference to America, but I was wondering where in Virginia. I know Oxford is a collection of colleges like 20 or so, but there are quite a few possibilities in Virginia. For example, Virginia is the home of black helicopters (Langley), the Pentagon (Alexandria), and GWAR (Richmond, VCU I think). There's higher tech in Blacksburg (Va. Tech) and artsy pastoral schools in Fredericksburg. Maybe Dave Matthews was involved.

I wish the Reg would cover the research being conducted at the Slave Pit though, because of the Antartic ice melting.

Dialect and Idiom

The (very poorly and rudely articulated) point of the original commentard is that not all people refer to the U.S as America, and in Canada, it gets under our fingernails. The author is writing, I assume, for an international audience and should avoid idioms that piss off his readers.

By NO means do I want to imply that the word "boffins" should be replaced by "a team of expert scientists" or anything like that. I found the definition on the Web, so can he.

Now I off down the pub for a pint (that's 20oz for you Americans) and a bite of still-beating seal heart.

Thing is

Canadians and Mexicans have a name for themselves. Its called a demotic.

The Inhabitants of the USA call themselves Americans because they are, even if they are not the ONLY Americans. However, they have to use that because they have never organized a demotic just for themselves. Usanians?

But the Reg's idiot commentator is both wrong, and even more of an idiot because he is patronizing at the same time. The USA is that relatively small country south of Canada. There's more of North America in Canada than there is in the USA.

Anyway, God bless America - and I'm quite happy for that to include Canada.

Beer because mine's a Molson - a great (Canadian) American drink.

if it's not a Country, it must be a Western

and the seals were asking for it!

Vive Les Habs!

Look how many people used "Mexico"!

So many people complaining about the use of "America" as a common name for the United States of America, but none of you seem to have a problem using "Mexico" to mean los Estados Unidos Mexicanos -- the United Mexican States.

Well then ...

Hulk Hogan's theme song, "I am a real American" was just his way of saying "I am not real".

Makes perfect sense to me.

Hurrah for spelling/grammar/etc nazis

@AC 12h56 <<"Sadly, there are ignoramuses from all countries..."

Should that not be 'ignorami'? [...] plural of virus [...] virii>>

AghfhgF why are pedants wrong 90% of the time?? Show me a dictionary that says virii! The wikipedantia dictionary perhaps.

You're writing English, right, not latin? You know how english plurals work? Or do you keep plurals in their original language, say Tupinamba for jaguar, and so forth?

GFGFfkjrh. Assclown.

So many idiots...

... so little time.

Context, people! Context!

This is The Register, a UK-based online content creator and publisher. The language it is written in is known as "English". There are a number of known versions of English, but the ".co.uk" in the URL should make it clear that the original "UK English" version is likely to be dominant.

Given that, and the immediate context of the offending phrase: "Virginia, America", we have a clear and unambiguous meaning: It refers to a location known as "Virginia" within a larger entity named "America". As "America" is a common contraction among English-speakers for the country known as the "United States of America", the intended location is perfectly clear from the context.

As no other nation in the Americas actually uses the word "America" in its name today, there is no confusion for English speakers: "America", in the UK, is invariably assumed to refer to the nation of the United States of America. Using contractions like this is no worse than referring to "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" as the UK. Contractions are not unusual.

The article was written in English and is clearly aimed at English-literate readers. Spanish, French or Italian readers have their own damned languages to get pedantic about and don't get to vote on English usage.

corrections

>Surely you mean pull a Fallout 1? I mean, it was there first, and talked about it first.

Good point. Was very late to the Fallout party so first one I played was 3 (Bethesda owns, just hope rumor that they are avoiding consoles for future games isn't true).

Also Canadians didn't burn down the white house the English did. The Canuks did hold out very well against our army but that was before the days where we spent more than most nations GDP on our military. Fighting in Canada is like Russia with few roads, harsh conditions, etc so pack a lunch if you don't get it done quick. Still Canada is smart not to overspend on their military and for how small it is it has down some remarkable things over the years such as the longest sniper kill on record as well as shooting down the Red Baron (sorry Aussies was a plane not ground fire that took him out). The relationship is a bit strained at times (mostly because we often elect Republicans) but we really do need each other and the long peace between the countries in North America is much of the reason why we are the biggest market in the world and even why the EU exists at all. Peace sells baby.

Setting the record straight

The USA = America, which is in North America, which is one of The Americas.

Canada = the 52nd State of the USA (Britain is #51).

Pangaea

lester:"a place where they don't generally go boffin' seal pups with baseball bats. So now you know. ®"

that place you refering to is 0were they use hush puppy bats for the job i take it....

also ,i though we all lived on different bits of 'Pangaea'

or 'Vaalbara' the Earth's theorized first supercontinent if you prefer the older version.

"Technically he's correct (the commentard, I mean). There's a continent called North America. Another called South America. "Americans" can encompass Canadians, Mexicans, Cubans, Brazilians, Guatemalans, and so forth - also including citizens of the United States of America."

"I thought the bit of land south of Canada was called the united states of America. "

you mean the Wyoming craton...

"But Lewis you did miss out the 'United States of' when refering to the American Federal Republic"

didnt these AFR blokes nick some of the americans land once or twice and havnt got around to giving it back yet as it had/has oil on it!

"It also raises the question: how does "God Bless America" when it does not exist?"

ElReg answers that very question today, http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/10/23/god_poll/

Atheists smite online God poll

Alert Print Post comment Does He exist? No, say 98 per cent of voters

so neather exist...according to 98% of the worlds voters, so he/she/it doesnt bless , and they are not blessed, it seems clear enough, and if by chance he did turn up sometime to say Hi, then surely he would be blessing the whole of 'Pangaea' and everything inbetween not just a bit of it...

"Poor Lorne Babcock, you don't know what boffins are?"

funny enough someone in that place people keep calling the USA does, look at Fringe

http://www.fringetelevision.com/

and its wonderful mad boffin Walter.

although since it moved filming to the place your calling canada, and the ser scripts have been taken over by non boffin types.

OC it odd that Walter Bishop as played John Noble, an Australian (the Pilbara craton (the Pilbara region of Western Australia).) employed by USA corp, working an filming in Canda playing their version of the English Boffin can get rather complicated, But he does play a good part IF they dont dumb down the science scipts he gets to act out ...

Agree with commentard

While there is a reason to call citizens of the United States Americans (they don't have any other name), I find weird to speak of Virginia, America. Jerusalem, Asia anyone?

No, it IS technically correct

There is no continent called America.

There is a North America, and a South America, but no America, sorry.

There is also no United States.

But there IS a United States of America, commonly called America for short.

There is also a Federative Republic of Brazil, commonly called Brazil, and a People's Republic of China, commonly called China.

If you cannot say "America", than you better not say "China" or "Brazil" either.

As I like to say, if you must go, go all the way.

Virginia

Virginia is not a state, it is a commonwealth. http://www.virginia.gov/

DOMINION??

John Savard, a Canadian might have referred to Canada as The Dominion, A HUNDRED FRIKKIN YEARS AGO!!! YOU KNOW, WHEN WE HAD A DIFFERENT FLAG?!?! DID WE JUST THAW YOU OUT OF A GLACIER OR WHAT?!?! JEEBUZ FLYING SPAGHETTI MONSTER & RICE, WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH YOU!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada

"Upon Confederation in 1867, the name Canada was adopted as the legal name for the new country, and Dominion was conferred as the country's title; combined, the term Dominion of Canada was in common usage until the 1950s. Thereafter, as Canada asserted its political autonomy from Britain, the federal government increasingly used simply Canada on state documents and treaties, a change that was reflected in the renaming of the national holiday from Dominion Day to Canada Day in 1982."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_flags#National_flags_2

My my, what a stupid dorky flag we used to have, eh?

asdf:

"As for resistance as some comedian said our Salvation Army could take them these days."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan_War_order_of_battle#Canada

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Forces_casualties_in_Afghanistan

You're so very welcome.

That is all.

You... you people.

You people make my ass twitch.

Well, technically...

Yes, "America" supposedly refers to the entire Western Hemisphere, basically. Technically it is incorrect to refer to the United States of America as "America". However, throughout the world, people often do call the US "America", and there is generally no confusion about it.

This isn't about geograhy

Sorry, but the original complain and the following 150 comments are just missing the point. "Virginia, America" grates because it is non-idiomatic. These double-barreled placenames always have "USA" as the second barrel.

Your chosen formulation makes you sound vaguely foreign, in the way that "London, England" would make you sound American. You don't want *that*, do you?

Hawaii

In all the 123 above comments the only one man (NBCanuck) did mention Hawaii, which doesn't belong to any America (be it Norhtern or Southern), but does to the USA.

So maybe when one sings "G-d bless America" or alternatively "I'm afraid of Americans", this relates not to Hawaiians, and therefore to the Barack Obama neither.

Must be a troll

The country south of Canada isn't America, it's the United States. Likewise, the country south of the United States isn't America, it's Mexico. America isn't a country, it's a continent (actually three of them). But I suspect you actually knew that.

Why just 'Virginia'?

The real question that needs to be answered is why did Mr Cross shorten 'University of Virginia' to 'Virginia'? He didn't shorten 'University of Oxford' to 'Oxford'. Methinks there is more than just slack writing at work here. I will leave it up to the amateur shrinks to sort that out.

Boffins? America? Seals?

By The Lard Hummpin Jaysus, Larry...

Forget boffin seals with a baseball bat. I'd rather be boffin Pamela Anderson with my porkfork.

as always...

Too far

insult our igloos all you want but as the worlds nicest people we dont kill that many seals a year

Irving Berlin

in 1917 composted a song " God Bless America" , as a patriotic effort for the war, that America finally got involved in actively in 1918.

To the point- Irving in this song always had America , not USA or United States .

The yanks still pull the song out when required to inspire patriotism.

This girl is American aint she?

For someone so keen

to send most of our MoD budget to the USA, I'm shocked that Lewis Page doesn't know where it is.

The United States of America, otherwise known as the USA or the United States, is the area directly below (and to the west of) Canada.

Before you know it, Lewis will have gotten a bit more confused and he'll be demanding we buy Helicopters from Paraguay...

can I just ...

... have the last word here?

Wait.. what?

Is this really news? It looks to me like you got trolled. And then posted the troll bait as news. Which is now being trolled.

The USA is colloquially referred to as America, and it's clear that's what was intended, although it does look a bit amateur.

I feel sorry for the poor sods....

in Central America - completely missed. Yes North, Central and South America. Who cares any way the bloody Yanks and Germans refer to the whole of Great Britain as England which is just not cricket. I was always taught that these three Americas = one continent America. Is see wakapedia is still under the false belief that America is named after Amerigo Vispucci. Somebody hasn't told them yet you name things based on the surname not the first (see By rhydy 11:52 a scholer).