[-ish] Ireland, Scotland = Irish, Scottish
[-an] Morocco, Germany = Moroccan, German
[-ese] Portugal, China = Portuguese, Chinese
What rule is at play here? 🤔
Cheers!
Afghani, Pakistani,
FYI, there’s a little debate over this in the English language, but many would say that the proper demonyms are Afghan for the Pashtun ethnic group, and Afghanistani (or rarely Afghanese) for people from Afghanistan regardless of ethnicity.
Afghani is their currency.
I believe it comes from a discrepancy between the Persian and Pashto languages. Afghani being the correct term in Persian, and Afghan being the term in Pashto.
Afghani is pretty widely used in English, and even appears in some dictionaries, but many argue that it’s not correct.
So a person is an Afghan, they eat Afghan food, wear Afghan clothing, have Afghan customs, and their currency is the Afghan Afghani (in case some other country ever adopts a currency called the Afghani and you need to differentiate between them)
Canada = Canadese (nuts fit in your mouth?)
Shortened from Canada geese
Canadick
They should be Canadans
Canadish
Canadanian
Canuck is what we call ourselfs, eh?
: P
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
'Murican seems pretty unique and generally accurate. Just to be clear - that is a two syllable word.
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”
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”
I think the rest of the world calls them Freedum Dolts.
Seppos
So Philippines is Philippinese?
Find what sounds most natural, if that can’t be found, go with what sounds the least catastrophically unnatural.
There is a Words For Granted podcast episode about that. Don’t remember much tho. Have fun!
Ray Belli is amazing and I’ve failed to learn so many things from his podcast because as soon as he starts speaking my mind wanders. It’s like the audio version of reading the same paragraph four times because my brain decides to think about something else while my eyes move across the page
It’s based on what sounds best.
Then explain Liverpudian or Mancunian.
That’s why people say Scouse and Manc (not to be confused with Manx)
They’re both aposematisms - they’re meant to be a clear signal to discourage interactions.
Nothing sounds good in those accents, so it’s anything goes.
Hence ‘Brummy’
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.
There is no rule. It just is whatever it is.
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.
Also resolve the confusion around the “dutch angle” in film… it was actually a thing that was started in Germany.
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.
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.
But isn’t Dane a noun? I thought the adjective was danish.
Yes you’re right , the Danes are Danish
Danish. Also doubles as the name of a tasty pastry.
People from Iceland are only called Icelandic because “Icish” would sound a bit silly.
Icelandese.
Icelandian.
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
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).
So we should call them Ices from now on?
Mmm… Icees…
Don’t forget Englandic people.
And Finnlandic
And Titanic! Wait… No.
Nah they’re Engl
We’re all Earthicans, no need to divide it up further than that
Terrans? Earthers?
I believe “Earthling” is traditional.
Earthling if you’re an alien with bigger guns than us.
Terran if we got bigger guns than you.
Earther if you’re a racist alien.
Hooman if you’re an alien that wants to rip us off in trade.
Yeah, but every ant, rat, and snake is an earthling to. That’s saying we are from the planet earth. The other terms are more about being part of the political entity of earth. If you are a Marsling, you could immigrate to become an Earthican, but you can never be an Earthling. Same for the other direction, being from earth we may some day become Martians, but can never be Marslings. Source: it’s as made up as every other part of the English language.
Fine. Human, then.
Aroo!
Earthricans
People from Indiana are called hoosiers - this, like many things in English, doesn’t have a hard and fast rule… the sounds at the end of the word certainly impact it, but there are exceptions. Just ask a Peruvian.
Just attach “man” to the end of all of them for maximum offence.
What the fuck are you talking about? The Chinaman is not the issue here, Dude! I’m talking about drawing a line in the sand, Dude. Across this line, you do not. Also, Dude, “Chinaman” is not the preferred nomenclature. “Asian-American” please.
- Walter Sobchak
Is that some weird shortening for People’s Republic of Chinamen? Wouldn’t that be too easy to confuse with Republic of Chinamen?
As in Margaret Thatcher was an Englishman?
Margaret Thatcher even in her death was the inventor of the world’s first gender-neutral bathroom so she can have the exception.
Portugalman
The English Language, where the grammar is made up and the rules don’t matter.
I can add:
[-er] New Zealander
New Zealander is the least odd sounding of the lot.
New Zealandish
New Zealandan
New Zealandese?
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”.
Odd way to spell Kiwi but you do you pal
New Zealander is the least odd sounding of the lot.
New Zealandish
New Zealandan
New Zealandese?
Booo I’ma still say New Zealish
New Zealot
for aiur
Adun toridas.
Newfoundlander
Yeah I think if it ends in land it’ll probably be a lander.
Or just a different word completely. Dutch.
Pfft. The Dutch…
