americano

Forms

americano (feminine americana, masculine plural americanos, feminine plural americanas)^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Spanish América + -ano.^[1][2] Echegaray and Barcia set it beside Catalan americà, French américain, Italian americano and Medieval Latin americanus.^[3][4] The Academy's first dictionary of 1770 gave the same Latin form as its equivalent.^[5]

The historical dictionary of the Academy notes that the Spanish adjective is recorded late, after its French counterpart (1556) and English American (1598), and that other names for the peoples of the New World competed with it.^[6] In 1653 Bernabé Cobo wrote that the Spaniards called them indios, naturales and américos, and that the last of these had not caught on.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record in the Academy's historical dictionary is in Quevedo's La hora de todos (1635–45), in the general sense “of the Americas”: en vuestro coraje se defiende a la esclavitud la generación americana “in your courage the American race resists slavery”.^[6] In 1730 Feijoo wrote of Spaniards born debaxo del Cielo Americano “under the American sky”.^[6]

Semantic evolution

From the 18th century the word is used for Spanish America in particular (Gumilla, 1741–45); since 1783 (Francisco de Miranda's diary) it has also been used for the United States and its people.^[6] The Cuban lexicographers Pichardo and Ortiz noted that in Cuba the word had come to mean a citizen of the United States, and Ortiz expected the Academy to accept the usage in the end.^[7][8] The Academy's dictionary has given this sense since 2001, and Wiktionary labels it proscribed.^[9][10][1] In New Mexico and southern Colorado older Hispanic speakers applied it to any white person who did not speak Spanish.^[11]

In Andalusia, Galicia and Asturias an americano was also an emigrant who came home rich from the Americas (Fernán Caballero 1853, Pardo Bazán 1884); the Academy recorded this sense for Asturias and Galicia in 1939.^[6][12] Many compounds name things associated with the Americas or the United States: the calendario americano with a leaf for each day (1872), the salsa americana (1925), the plano americano of cinema, which cuts the figure at the knees (1952), and the barra americana, a hostess bar (1959).^[6] The feminine americana became the name of a man's jacket (Galdós 1879, the Academy 1899); Henríquez Ureña remarked that this was a usage of Spanish cities rather than of the language as a whole.^[6][13] In Argentina americana was also a light carriage with a hood.^[6][14]

The word passed into Tagalog as Amerikano, shortened to Kano.^[1]

Timeline

• 1635–45 – Quevedo's La hora de todos has la generación americana.^[6]
• 1653 – Bernabé Cobo lists indios, naturales and américos as the Spanish names for the natives of the New World.^[6]
• 1738 – first record in Boyd-Bowman's corpus of texts from the Americas, from New Granada.^[15]
• 1770 – the Academy's dictionary defines it as a native of America or what belongs to it.^[5]
• 1783 – Francisco de Miranda uses los Americanos for the people of the United States.^[6]
• 1853 – Fernán Caballero uses it for an emigrant returned from the Americas.^[6]
• 1879 – Galdós uses americana for a jacket; the Academy records the sense in 1899.^[6][13]
• 2001 – the Academy's dictionary adds the sense “of the United States”.^[9]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of, from or relating to the Americas; as a noun, a native of the Americas: Llegaron viajeros europeos y americanos.^[10][1]
2. Of or relating to the United States; as a noun, a person from the United States (estadounidense).^[10][1][16]
3. (regional) Said of an emigrant who has come home rich from the Americas (indiano); in Spain mainly Asturias and Galicia.^[10][12]

Noun

1. (masculine) An americano, a coffee diluted with water (café americano).^[10]
2. (feminine, americana) A cloth jacket with lapels and buttons, reaching below the hips.^[10][6]

Word family

• afroamericano
• americanismo
• americanista
• americanizar
• angloamericano
• antiamericano
• hispanoamericano
• iberoamericano
• latinoamericano

Related words

• América
• indiano
• French américain

Usage notes

Many speakers and the Academy's earlier dictionaries keep americano for the whole continent and use estadounidense or norteamericano for the United States;^[1][16] Wiktionary marks the narrower use as proscribed.^[1][16] In Cuba, by contrast, norteamericano was hardly used and americano was the usual word.^[17][7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ Wikcionario (Spanish Wiktionary), es.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. americano
3. ^ Echegaray, Eduardo de (1887–1889), Diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: José María Faquineto, p. 283
4. ^ Barcia, Roque (1880–1883), Primer diccionario general etimológico de la lengua española, 5 vols., Madrid: Establecimiento Tipográfico de Álvarez Hermanos, p. 284
5. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1770), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 2nd ed., vol. I: A–B, Madrid: Joachín Ibarra, p. 1, 222
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Real Academia Española (2021–), Tesoro de los diccionarios históricos de la lengua española (TDHLE): Diccionario histórico (1933–1936), its unpublished slips, Diccionario histórico (1960–1996), DHECan, DHECR, DHEVen, https://www.rae.es/tdhle, p. s.v. americano
7. ^ a b Pichardo, Esteban (1836), Diccionario provincial de voces cubanas, Matanzas: Imprenta de la Real Marina, p. 16
8. ^ Ortiz, Fernando (1923), Un catauro de cubanismos: apuntes lexicográficos, La Habana, p. 74
9. ^ a b Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española; Universidad de Puerto Rico, Tesoro lexicográfico del español de Puerto Rico, https://tesoro.pr, p. s.v. americano
10. ^ a b c d e f Real Academia Española; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014–), Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed., online version 23.8, https://dle.rae.es, p. s.v. americano
11. ^ Cobos, Rubén (1983), A Dictionary of New Mexico and Southern Colorado Spanish, Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico Press, p. 29
12. ^ a b Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. americano
13. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1899), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 13th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de los Sres. Hernando y Compañía, p. 60
14. ^ Garzón, Tobías (1910), Diccionario argentino, Barcelona: Imprenta Elzeviriana de Borrás y Mestres, p. 23
15. ^ Boyd-Bowman, Peter (2003), Léxico hispanoamericano 1493–1993, ed. Ray Harris-Northall and John J. Nitti, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, p. s.v. americano
16. ^ a b c Battaner Arias, Paz (dir.) (2017), Diccionario general de la lengua española VOX, Barcelona: Larousse Editorial, p. s.v. americano
17. ^ Suárez, Constantino (1921), Vocabulario cubano, La Habana: Librería Cervantes / Madrid: Perlado, Páez y Compañía, p. 24