What do Spanish speakers in the United States call the United States? 
Do they say "United States" or "Estados Unidos"?

Dear igra-ga;

Thank you for allowing me to answer your interesting question. The old
adage: ?When in Rome, do as the Romans do? is fairly universal. In the
United States many Spanish speakers refer to the US as ?the United
States? simply because it is best understood to refer to the country
as the countrymen do. However, speaking in Spanish among themselves,
many do prefer to say, ?Estados Unidos?, or more formally perhaps,
?Estados Unidos de América?, making a clear delineation between the US
and ?Estados Unidos de México?, which, unbeknownst to some people, is
also a formal group of ?United States?.

The Spanish term ?América? however is almost never used to refer to
the US because (and rightly so geographically speaking) ?América?
literally refers to ?the Americas?, which is inclusive of the US,
Mexico and other regions besides the United States alone. The same
holds true with the term ?Norteamérica? (North America) which is not
exclusive to the United States, but also includes both the US and
Canada.

As with many countries there are certain slang terms by which other
countries are known. Border patrol agents will tell you that many of
the poorer Mexicans who live close to the US border on either side
refer to the US simply as ?El otro lado?, or literally, ?the other
side?.

One must also keep in mind that there are many types of ?Spanish?
languages. Some Cubans, for example, often use the informal familiar
term, ?La Yuma? (var. ?'La Juma?, ?El Yuma?) a slang term for the
United States which originated from the title of a 1957 Glenn Ford
western entitled ?3:10 to Yuma?, that ran for years in Cuban theaters.
It is not uncommon to hear this term in some predominantly
Cuban-American communities in Florida.

I hope you find that my answer exceeds your expectations. If you have
any questions about my research please post a clarification request
prior to rating the answer. Otherwise I welcome your rating and your
final comments and I look forward to working with you again in the
near future. Thank you for bringing your question to us.

Best regards;
Tutuzdad-ga ? Google Answers Researcher



INFORMATION SOURCES

PRENTISS RIDDLE: LANGUAGE
http://www.aprendizdetodo.com/language/?item=20041009

THE DAILY DEMARCHE
http://dailydemarche.blogspot.com/2005/01/el-otro-lado.html

PBS
http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2002/senoritaextraviada/juarez_feature01.html


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They say América.

But it is rather common to call NYC Nueva York....

Excellent answer, Tutuzdad-ga! I'll add that in Mexico and some
Central American countries, the US is simply called "El Norte".

Overall as usual,  pretty good answer from Tutuzdad-ga, I will comment
on two things;


?Estados Unidos de América? while it is possible that somebody may use
this it is unlikely that in normal conversations it would be used,
Estados Unidos refers to the United States as we know it. The US is
not the only federal nation in America Mexico, Venezuela and Brazil
are also Federal nations, however, the others are all known by their
names i/e Mexico, Venezuela and Brazil the only nation that failed to
name itself and settle for a designation given a continental location
was the United States of America so when Americans refers to the
United States we refer to it as Estados Unidos or the United States it
is understood that we are speaking of the U. S. of A.  if we were
speaking of any other federal nation we would refer to it by it?s name
as supposed to it?s designation.

?the term ?Norteamérica? (North America) which is not
exclusive to the United States, but also includes both the US and
Canada? and it includes Mexico as well. Socially speaking there is one
continent America geologically speaking there are to continental
plates North and South America when they collide for the first time
the Carribean was formed but it was not enough to create a land
bridge, the second time around they were closer and central America
was created, millions of years in the future south America will be in
the middle of the Pacific and north America will be about were it is
today, it is likely that central America will become something similar
to the Carribean today, Mexico being part of the north American
continental plate will stay in north America.