Counterpoint: you may be interested in the term Black Irish, amongst many others.

"No other people does this." Not true. Many people identify as Asian-British (and, more specifically as, e.g., Pakistani-British).

As an aside, people from other countries on the American continents quite rightly consider themselves to be "American" and people from the U.S. can give offense by their usage of "American" = citizen of the U.S.

There are also some groups in Germany that identify with a similar pattern. For instance russian immigrants with german roots as „Russlanddeutsche“ or people from Turkey as „Deutschtürken“.

@iamnotmaynard "often used to mean exactly..." That is precisely what makes it a common misconception; if the majority of people weren't doing it then it wouldn't be a common misconception. And as for "... how often Canadians or Hondurans refer to themselves as..." I am pretty sure it is greater than 0%. The difference between in-US and outside-US using the term that way doesn't really matter; when I said it's a common misconception, I meant everywhere. In the eastern hemisphere, I assume lots think "American = US", but that does not make it correct.

And while I think this question could benefit from making this distinction more obvious, any further discussion on this should be in a chat if anyone cared to start one for it (I would participate). There isn't really much to discuss though, as the terms are pretty straightforward and well defined.

I think people from the USA use "American" because it's a lot easier to say that "UnitedStatesian" or any variant thereof. The other countries within the Americas have easier country names to "an"-ise (Canad-ian, Panama-nian, Chile-an, etc.) I expect if there were an equivalent for US people they would have established use of that, instead of [United States of] Americ-an.

@Ooker I think that the "privileges of being a minority in the US" might have been greatly exageratted in your estimation.

This is so ingrained into the American psyche that people who identify themselves as simply "American" when asked about ethnicity form a distinct group.

@Aaron oh brother. I have heard mostly South Americans do that, but it is inane. American is the only name people from the USA have, and that is a fact, not misconception. And America is not a continent - North America and South America are. Everyone knows when someone says America, they are referring to the USA. If you want to talk about a continent, North America or South America are perfectly acceptable, but "America" is a country.

@BlackThorn Please provide any real evidence that the country I live in is actually called America. I mean that seriously, as I would happily change my view if anyone could ever do that, but nobody ever has. Citing "Most people say it that way" or "What else are we supposed to call ourselves since it's hard to say USAian?" are not evidences that the U.S.A. has another named, namely "America." Aside: it is ironic that "US" (note the A for America dropped), or "United States" (same again) are at least as common, if not more, than calling it America. Care to start a SE chat?

@Aaron Dude, give up. English speakers around the world in general refers to people from the USA as "Americans" and DON'T call anyone else "Americans". That's just how the usage evolved, no matter what is "technically" true. Please stop trying to argue your point because you are simply wrong and/or misinformed. Thanks.

Thanks for promoting my point with your "evidence." Anyway, I have flagged this for mod attention and suggested it be moved to chat. Once there, if you want to provide any reasonable defense other than "Dude, give up... you are simply wrong" we could have a fruitful conversation about this topic.

@Aaron I think you're conflating people's national identities with their continents. Nobody will dispute that Kenyans are also Africans, Italians are also Europeans, Peruvians are also South Americans, and Americans are also North Americans. How one identifies himself to others is context dependent. I might choose to identify myself as European when I'm in another continent, but as British when I'm in Europe and as English when I'm in Britain. People from the USA are (nationality-wise) Americans, living on the continent of North America. People from Canada are North American, but not American.

Let's all hold off on this topic until it gets moved to chat.

@Aaron Not a single Canadian gives not a single hoot about the issue of calling themselves American. Why would we want to do something that confused people.

African American. A truth I hold to be, yet, self evident.

@Aaron - >A citizen of the United States is an "American". "United States", "American" and "U.S." refer to the country adjectivally ("American values", "U.S. forces"). In English, the word "American" rarely refers to topics or subjects not connected with the United States.[50] --- Officially it's called United States of America. Colloquially: America or the States (among several others) – List of alternative country names

Canadian chiming in here. No Canadian I know would ever refer to themselves as American. If someone from another country called me American (which has happened), I'd politely correct them and tell them I'm Canadian.

First of I would like to mention that I have never heard a single person in america use those last to terms, we call "spanish-americans" "Hispanics" or even just "Mexican-Americans" (even those not from mexico) and we never use the term "chinese-american", rather we simply use the term "asian".

Also African-Americans, Asians, hispanics, Native-Americans, New Yorkers, Southerners, Northerners, Californians, Cascadians, Mormons, Nevadans, westerners, Hawaiians, puerto ricans, Alaskans and the Alaskan pioneers are probably the most distinct ethnic groups in america. Irishness and Germanness doesn't matter. There is also the border regions between the northerners and southerners which are a mix of both northern and southern culture though there are to many there to list.

You've got the basis of the phrase entirely wrong. @ikegami they're the states of America that are united in a specific federation - as opposed to the states of America that were not united in that federation and had remained distinct and separate, like all the Canadian states and all the Mexican states, which now form different federations that could just as much argue to be United States of America as well.

Like you said, that's how it could be, but your theories don't match reality. Here in Canada, I am not an American, and I don't live in America, which is a synonym for USA.

Modern usage isn't what you're claiming to be the basis of the phrase, so can you pick an argument and a statement and stick to them, please?

I've one stated one "argument". USA, or just America, is the country, so it makes sense for its citizens to be called Americans, and it makes no sense to call others Americans.

This practice has been around for a century, and people have been objecting to it that long. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyphenated_American

@CactusCake You've misunderstood the question. The question is about why the "hyphenated-American" terms are common, not about why people from the USA call themselves "Americans" rather than "Unitedstatesians" or similar. In other words, it's asking why many Americans don't just say "American".

@DavidRicherby my comment was in reference to Michael and Aaron's comments, not the original question.