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Use of these terms has been practiced and advocated to distinguish U.S. nationals from people living in other countries in the Americas. In practice, in the English language, American without any modifier (such as South American) is generally understood to be a U.S. national and nobody else. In other languages, notably Spanish, American is more ambiguous.
Advocates of these terms believe that, since America is part of the names of both North America and South America, American ought to be understood to mean, "inhabitant of the Americas". Indeed, in the Iberoamerican countries, the use of "American" to refer only to a US citizen could be considered politically incorrect and culturally agressive.
It should be noted that several of these terms have direct parallels in languages other than English:
In other parts of the world, there are also pejorative synonyms of the standard word for American. In Latin America, there is gringo (although that can also apply to the English), and, in several languages, local adaptations of Yankee. In the UK and Australia, the name septic tank or septic is sometimes used, based on rhyming slang for Yank. In Australia this is sometimes further shortened to seppo.
See also
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