[-ish] Ireland, Scotland = Irish, Scottish
[-an] Morocco, Germany = Moroccan, German
[-ese] Portugal, China = Portuguese, Chinese
What rule is at play here? 🤔
Cheers!
I’m in Michigan, that makes me a Michigander. The rules are made up and the suffixes don’t matter.
If you’re from Halifax, NS, you’re a Haligonian.
I’m a Connecticutian by birth. Though I’ve also heard someone call themselves Connecticuter once or twice, but never cared for that one.
Either one seems to break a lot of normal grammar/spelling rules.
Michiguy or Michigal
I’m from South Dakota, I’m South Dakotant. It is what it is.
Do you change the emphasis? da-ko-TANT?
Emphasis still on KO
Find what sounds most natural, if that can’t be found, go with what sounds the least catastrophically unnatural.
There is no rule. It just is whatever it is.
People from Iceland are only called Icelandic because “Icish” would sound a bit silly.
Icelandese.
Icelandian.
Iceland = Icelandic
Thailand != Thailandic
Thailand comes from adding the Germanic -land suffix to the demonym Thai, a common pattern for non-Indo-European places. There’s also Swaziland and Somaliland (though there is also a Somalia).
Don’t forget Englandic people.
And Finnlandic
And Titanic! Wait… No.
Nah they’re Engl
So we should call them Ices from now on?
Mmm… Icees…
I think I could get behind New Zealandic
I believe they’re properly called New Zoolanders.
As an outsider I’ll say that “Kiwi” is an awesome name for you folks.
(hope I don’t assume too much based on the instance name)
and is one that we are happy enough to use
Denmark -> Dane
I guess that actually the other way around, Denmark : Dane’s field/farm(there is a better English word for mark but can’t remember)
Netherlands → Dutch
No wonder Euros say they don’t exist.
Dutch is such a weird one. We don’t call ourselves “Dutch” in Dutch, we call ourselves “Nederlands”. This would be something like “Netherlandish” in English. We do call Germans “Duits” though, and they call themselves “Deutsch”. Somehow in English German and Dutch got a bit messed up. The reason is probably that during the middle ages we did refer to our language as “Dietsch”, so that probably stayed around.
It’s because Germany wasn’t a unified place until not that long ago, so different neighbors came up with their own way to refer to them.
Dutch is the English name for the dominant language of the Netherlands, and in English we often name people after their language. The Netherlands is also called Holland in English, even though Holland is just the most economically-dominant sub-region of the Netherlands, and the location of its main trading ports, rather than the whole country. Which makes sense if you are an English sailor who only knows the Netherlands through its trading ports and has little need to go inland.
But we also don’t call our language “Dutch”, we call it Nederlands. It’s a relic of an old time, but actually German should be called Dutch and Dutch should be Netherlandish. It’d help a lot with the confusion of young German and Dutch people learning English for the first time haha. Would also resolve the confusion around “Pennsylvanian Dutch” being German.
Yes, you are right. I had never put it together that Dutch and Deutch are so close, but it’s obvious now that you pointed it out. Thanks for the info.
Also resolve the confusion around the “dutch angle” in film… it was actually a thing that was started in Germany.
Lol I wasn’t aware of that being a thing, here in Germany we usually only say that Bielefeld (a German city) doesn’t exist.
Danish. Also doubles as the name of a tasty pastry.
But isn’t Dane a noun? I thought the adjective was danish.
Yes you’re right , the Danes are Danish
So Philippines is Philippinese?
The English Language, where the grammar is made up and the rules don’t matter.
I can add:
[-er] New Zealander
Booo I’ma still say New Zealish
New Zealot
for aiur
Adun toridas.
New Zealander is the least odd sounding of the lot.
New Zealandish
New Zealandan
New Zealandese?
New Zealander is the least odd sounding of the lot.
New Zealandish
New Zealandan
New Zealandese?
Or just a different word completely. Dutch.
Pfft. The Dutch…
Odd way to spell Kiwi but you do you pal
Newfoundlander
Yeah I think if it ends in land it’ll probably be a lander.
New Zealand -> Kiwi.
Only in the same way Australia -> Aussie, or England -> pom. Colloquial terms
When does a colloquial term become a non-colloquial? Usage by government/official contexts?
In August 2022, Minister of Immigration Michael Wood referred to 85,000 holders of recently approved New Zealand 2021 resident visas as “new Kiwis”.
Meanwhile there is no specific demonym for people from the united states, you can say american buy that would also include every other north and south american country
I think the rest of the world calls them Freedum Dolts.
Nobody calls Mexicans or Canadians Americans. Nobody calls Brazilians or Peruvians Americans. They maybe North Americans and South Americans but American means someone from the United States. The Canadians and Mexicans I know would be offended if I called them American.
Literally nobody who isn’t a Latin American with a chip on their shoulder has a problem distinguishing Americans from “people who live on either north or south america”
'Murican seems pretty unique and generally accurate. Just to be clear - that is a two syllable word.
People outside the US all assume “American” means US. Nobody thinks there’s even a small chance you are referring to anything else. If you want to refer to South Americans you say “South Americans”
Seppos
Demonyms don’t follow any particular rules, as far as I know. I’m an “-egian” myself.
Human languages: the words are made up and the rules don’t matter.
Especially true for English.
Canada = Canadese (nuts fit in your mouth?)
They should be Canadans
Shortened from Canada geese
Canuck is what we call ourselfs, eh?
: P
Canadick
Canadish
Canadanian
It’s based on what sounds best.
Then explain Liverpudian or Mancunian.
They’re both aposematisms - they’re meant to be a clear signal to discourage interactions.
That’s why people say Scouse and Manc (not to be confused with Manx)
Nothing sounds good in those accents, so it’s anything goes.
Hence ‘Brummy’
I was literally thinking about this yesterday… what’s someone from Belgium called? I couldn’t figure out an ending to add. Belgian?
Belgian?
yes
I can tell you that this is called demonym, but I don’t know the answer to your question… The Wikipedia page has a long list of suffixes, but no rules: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demonym
The answer is that many languages import their demonyms from different foreign languages. The reason for the inconsistencies is the different, unrelated sources for words.
Netherlands = Dutch
When I was a kid our family went on vacation to the US. Everyone kept asking if I was Dutch, which I thought was German (Deutsch).
So I kept correcting them, saying I was Netherlandish :)Deutsch is Pennsylvania Dutch, which is German
If you mean that Pennsylvania Dutch is a dialect of German and that Dutch and Deutsch share a common origin, then that is true.
Also, in Deutschland, the descendents of the Alemmani are called Germans for some awful reason.
So I take it that’s why it’s Allemagne?
The German people, as a people, started as the unification of the Germanic tribes. The unified tribe called itself the tribe of all men, Alle Männer in modern German. The history of those times is narrated by romans and Greeks so we have a romanised version of that name, alamanni.
Aha! Hence, the French “Allemand(e)” for “German”.
TIL. Pretty neat!
There is no common rule. It varies by the way the language evolved over time.
Also the word you are looking for is “Demonym”
