Don't call Yank"

[TT Dave]

Originally Posted by KathrynAragon

Right on.

I personally get a kick out of it. With my southern drawl mixed with a Texas twang, it's not very often I get called a Yank!

I think it's funny too. Texans and other southerners usually don't get called a "Yank" by anyone that lives in other parts of the U.S...lol.

[H'ton]

Here's the thing about the term 'Yankee'...it means different things to different people and had evolved over time.

The original meaning was a conservative protestant from New England. Most likely a colonist escaping Europe because they wanted religious freedom. This is were Britain got its early term 'Yankee' because they were concerned primarily with their colonies and less so about the New Netherlands, or French Quebec, so they grouped the term 'Yankee" to ALL colonists in what was once British -America.

However, within the colonies, there are multiple writings of New Yorkers fearing of the influence of the 'Yankees' from New England and what their political and religious beliefs would do to their city.

That is the original meaning but somewhere along the way it grew to mean all North-Easteners. This was especially true around the period of the Civil War. Ironically, the Southerners were fearful of the 'liberal' ways of the Yankees and felt that their political and religious beliefs would somehow negatively influence the 'pure' South. After the Civil War. I'm sure 'Yankee' and 'Carpet Bagger' were interchangeable.

And then somewhere along the way (around the late 1800's) the term Yankee meant someone specifically from New York City...hence the New York Yankees, etc.

Today, it is perfectly acceptable for someone from Europe (especially Britain) to call ANYONE from America a Yankee.

So really this term has 3 meanings (New Englander, New Yorker/NorthEastener, American).

Take terms with a grain of salt...the term Latin American has totally flipped meanings also. It used to reference people with roots in the Latin Cultures of Europe (Latin language, Catholicism, European ancestry, etc.) but now it means something totally different. it means someone who has roots in Indo-America this is why someone from Peru (with no European roots) is a considered a Latin American but someone like Celine Dion (french speaking, catholic, with European roots) is NOT considered a Latin American.

[joqua]

I lived in Merry Olde for two years and always found it quaint to hear Brits refer to those "in the colonies" as "yanks."

[doctorjef]

It's a matter of context. Yank means something entirely different than Yankee means in the US, and Yankee in New England means something entirely different than it does in the South. In New England, a Yankee is an actually native of one of the six states comprising New England. Someone from Connecticut is a Yankee; a New Yorker is not (in that context). To Southerners, a Yankee is anyone living in the North. In England a Yank is simply an American. My spouse and I moved to London from Austin, TX. I rarely encountered Yank or Yankee being used there to describe Americans. To one of our friends at church, we - as well as those from elsewhere in the former British Empire - were "the colonials".

[joqua]

As a related side note, there are still a lot of people in the Canadian province of New Brunswick (particularly in St. John, NB) who honor the American Loyalists (aka Royalists) - people who fled to Canada during the American Revolutionary period and have ancestors living there today.

[doctorjef]

English Canada really got it's start when approximately 50,000 loyalists fled north of the border at the end of the Revolutionary War. Before that it was just British garrisons and French settlers.

[katygirl68]

I wouldn't mind. I just assume that's how Brits refer to people in the States.

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by End Alzheimer's

How do Texans, and Southerners in general, respond to being called a "Yank" by people from the UK and its former colonies.

First tell me how much you like being called a limey.