America

[uh-mer-i-kuh] /əˈmɛr ɪ kə/
noun
1.
United States.
2.
North America.
3.
South America.
4.
Also called the Americas. North and South America, considered together.
Examples from the web for America
  • Since then, migratory beekeeping has become widespread in America.
  • The age of reason resulted in only a brief upsurge in deistic thought in America.
  • It is supposed to be the place where tennis first started in America.
  • The album was also favourably received by critics in north America.
  • Decca this is the label that began the trend in north America.
  • Her father was the sort of rebel destined to transform colonial America.
  • It is more common now than when europeans first entered north America.
  • Manipulating the ether the power of broadcast radio in thirties America.
  • A culture of conspiracy apocalyptic visions in contemporary America.
  • It migrates to wintering grounds in central and south America.
British Dictionary definitions for America

America

/əˈmɛrɪkə/
noun
1.
short for the United States of America
2.
Also called the Americas. the American continent, including North, South, and Central America
Word Origin
C16: from Americus, Latin form of Amerigo; after Amerigo Vespucci
Word Origin and History for America

1507, in Cartographer Martin Waldseemüller's treatise "Cosmographiae Introductio," from Modern Latin Americanus, after Amerigo Vespucci (1454-1512) who made two trips to the New World as a navigator and claimed to have discovered it. His published works put forward the idea that it was a new continent, and he was first to call it Novus Mundus "New World." Amerigo is more easily Latinized than Vespucci.

The name Amerigo is Germanic, said to derive from Gothic Amalrich, literally "work-ruler." The Old English form of the name has come down as surnames Emmerich, Emery, etc. The Italian fem. form merged into Amelia.

Colloquial pronunciation "Ameri-kay," not uncommon 19c., goes back to at least 1643 and a poem that rhymed the word with away. Amerika "U.S. society viewed as racist, fascist, oppressive, etc." first attested 1969; the spelling is German, but may also suggest the KKK.

It is interesting to remember that the song which is essentially Southern -- "Dixie" -- and that which is essentially Northern -- "Yankee Doodle" -- never really had any serious words to them. ["The Bookman," June 1910]


FREDONIA, FREDONIAN, FREDE, FREDISH, &c. &c.
These extraordinary words, which have been deservedly ridiculed here as well as in England, were proposed sometime ago, and countenanced by two or three individuals, as names for the territory and people of the United States. The general term American is now commonly understood (at least in all places where the English language is spoken,) to mean an inhabitant of the United States; and is so employed, except where unusual precision of language is required. [Pickering, 1816]

America in Culture

“America” definition


An American patriotic hymn from the nineteenth century, sung to the tune of the national anthem of Great Britain, “God Save the Queen.” It begins, “My country, 'tis of thee.”