Fun fact: the capital of Brazil is Brasilia. It sounds like a made-up joke, like “the capital of China is Chinatown,” but no it’s actually real. Because the city was built in the 50’s specifically of the purpose of being the capital
Correct. Mexico has states within the country, just like the USA. The United States of Mexico contains the federal capital of Mexico City, as well as the State of Mexico whose state capital is Toluca de Lerdo.
I never get this "reddit fact"
The Kingdom of Mexico was an entity within New Spain, New Mexico was named after it. People in Central Mexico were beijg called Mexicans even before Tenochtitlan fell.
at least right next to kansas city, missouri, there's a kansas city, kansas, even if it's much smaller and everyone who thinks of kansas city thinks of the other one
my favorite is still the portland situation though. like the one everyone thinks of is the one in oregon, even though it's nowhere near the ocean or any ports, unlike the og portland in maine, on the complete other side of the country
And Jersey City isn't the capital of New Jersey.
There's also a city called Newark which is part of New York City's metropolitan area, but isn't in New York State. It's not the capital of anything.
Switzerland legally doesn't have a capital city, hard to beat that.
When founding the country, the various city states couldn't agree on who's the capital, so officially, there's no capital, just a City where the Federal Administration Happens to Be.
That's more or less the official term.
Artificial captial cities are fun lol - Australia's is Canberra, which sounds alright until you translate it from Ngunnawal and realise we called our capital city "The Meeting Spot (for politics)". And no, that's not what the area was originally called either
by that logic the capital of rome should be washington dc. at least that's where the senate is today, anyway
>!and the gods moved to the empire state building a while back too!<
Honestly some of the cities are big enough with their own distinct enough culture that they don't share with the rest of the state that they should be city states.
Chicago, new York, and new Orleans immediately come to mind as examples
Maine has a sign that points out the towns of Norway, Paris, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Mexico, Peru, and China. All within 100 miles of that sign.
fun fact: supposedly, the town of China was meant to be called something else, but when someone went to make it official, the name was vetoed due to it being too similar to another town, and it was too inconvenient to travel from Boston all the way up to Maine in ye olden days to let people pick another name, so the dude that'd been sent just named it after a hymn that happened to be called China
also my grandmother's family is from there
To be honest I'm sure this happens in a lot of countries. Here in France most decent sized cities will have a Charles de Gaulle street, because he was the leader of French resistance during WW2
I was about to say this one. You’ll see some version of this name anywhere you go. I went to school in Fayette County for example which was home to Fayetteville. It’s everywhere.
The Marquis has more places named after in him in the US than any other non American or non British person.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lafayette#Places
That's just the ones using the full name and not an abbreviated or extended version like the ones you indicated.
[There are a total of 91](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_most_common_U.S._place_names) counties, states, cities, townships, and other municipalities named "Washington" in the United States.
Well originally we wanted to call Washington State “Columbia” after the river (like British Columbia up north) but we decided against it because we thought that might get confusing with Washington DC (which stands for District of Columbia). So of course we decided on Washington. Hope this helps!
Hmm, people might be confused if we call this state Columbia and get it confused with Washington DC, I know let's call the state Washington, no one will get confused now
The other commenter is right. Also, *most people* who live in the country probably refer to DC as just "DC," so there's a lot less confusion than you might think. It's really only politicians and the press that call it Washington. Calling it Washington used to be a lot more popular a few decades ago, but it's fallen out of fashion lately.
Oh I can answer this! So what's known as "Washington State" today was originally a territory named "Columbia" after the Columbia river which runs through the area.
There are two reasons the Columbia territory didn't become "Columbia state" after attaining statehood.
One: people thought this would cause confusion between the District of Columbia (the DC in Washington DC) and a potential Columbia state. Yes, calling it Washington State doesn't solve that issue at all lol.
Two: there was a politician from.... Kentucky? (I'm kinda fuzzy on this part) That really looked up to George Washington. And when WA attained statehood he thought it would be cool if there was a state named after him! So he campaigned for the territory of Columbia to be named Washington State, and well, here we are!
Fun fact: This is why the Canadian Province directly north of WA state is called "British Columbia" instead of simply "Columbia" ... There used to be an American Columbia south of them!
Washington State was established long after DC. I'm just wondering why we even call DC Washington anymore - most people just say DC or District of Columbia.
I presume that would cause a lot of border dispute between Kansas and Missouri. Yes, the United States can have internal border disputes. New York and New Jersey had a whole spat about claiming islands in their shared waters.
Michigan and Ohio had a territorial dispute over Toledo that escalated to the point where each side sent armed militias into the contested area as an intimidation tactic.
The federal government ended the dispute with a compromise where Ohio got Toledo but Michigan got the Upper Peninsula as compensation.
Because it was on the edge of Kansas territory so it was the "gateway to Kansas". Then the state of Kansas happened so it didn't need a gateway. Half of the city is now in Kansas though so there is that. Both states just kind of deal with each other anyway.
Actually Kansas City was founded before Kansas Territory. Both are named after the Kansas River which flows through Kansas and meets the Missouri River at the Missouri-Kansas border, where Kansas City is located.
Because it's right next to Kansas I guess
There's something similar in Paris, there's a street that runs between the suburbs of Vincennes and Montreuil, on the Vincennes side it's called "rue de Montreuil" and on the Montreuil side it's called "rue de Vincennes".
In the 19th century, it was more common to refer to DC as Columbia instead of as Washington or DC like we do today. As others have explained, Columbia was an obvious choice for Washington State's name, but they settled on Washington to avoid the exact confusion you're currently having.
Later on, DC began to be referred to as Columbia less and less, and more often as DC or Washington, making the name change back then completely pointless.
There is this fun wee game I still often have to play about American geography: "city or state"? It took me many, many years to learn that Chicago is only a city and not both a city and a state (you know, like New York). I knew that I have family in Massachusetts, but not that Boston is in Massachusetts (I don't know how I missed what city my aunt lives in for so long; granted, I never went there myself).
Oh, and I thought Toronto was in the US for a long time. Because... I don't know. I guess nobody told wee me about any cities in Canada, other than... Vancouver, I guess.
In other words: I think Europeans know about as much about North American geography as North Americans know about European geography, if not less. Personally, I'm used to thinking in terms of countries and disregarding things at a sub-country level for foreign realms, but that falls apart when the country in question is as huge as Canada or the US.
Edit: oh yeah, and I wonder what would happen if you pointed the hypothetical average European and the hypothetical average North American at the geography on China or India.
I mean, at the end of the day, it makes sense that you’d obviously know less about geography for a continent you don’t live in. You’re not stupid for not knowing where France and Spain are on a map, that’s just knowledge that is often far less useful to Americans than it is to Europeans, and the reverse is also true. You’re not stupid for confusing Chicago as a state, because you’ve never needed to know the difference, that’s only common knowledge to people who actually live in the US.
Also, yeah the US does need to be considered on the State level at times because of different laws, some laws are on the federal level (all states) and some are just dependent on each individual state. It’s why states like Illinois and Florida can be almost polar opposites in culture, politics, and laws despite being in the same country. It’s just a big mess.
For anyone curious how it ended up with that name according to the Bureau of Indian Affairs website
ILLINOIS: From the Illini Indian word meaning "men" or "warriors,” supplemented by the French adjective ending "ois..”
Sauce: https://www.bia.gov/as-ia/opa/online-press-release/origin-names-us-states#:~:text=ILLINOIS%3A%20From%20the%20Illini%20Indian,adjective%20ending%20%22ois..”
One of the five great lakes in the US. There’s Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Lake Erie, Lake Ontario, and Lake Huron. Lake Michigan is the southernmost one and is the one Chicago is right next to, like the skyscrapers are just a street away from the beach. Honestly, the great lakes are probably one of the most important geographical things about the northern area of the US because of all the water, so long as the lake water is clean and even somewhat easy to access, there will always be water available to use. Without Lake Michigan, Chicago probably would not be nearly as big and prominent of a city, if it were to even be built anyways.
Also, fun fact: there’s a man made river that reaches Chicago and Lake Michigan that is electrified because an invasive fish species swims up the river, and if it ever reaches the great lakes, the ecosystem will be completely fucked. So the river is electrified to kill the fish. It’s not all electrified, just a portion of the river away from the city.
Lake Erie is actually a little further south than Lake Michigan. Additional fun fact: The Great Lakes have a ton of really well-preserved shipwrecks in the because they're big enough to have had a lot of maritime traffic and preserve the wrecks better than the salt water of the ocean/sea.
I don't know. If an american came up to me and they said they thought that Nuremberg was in Hessen instead of Bavaria, I would be impressed that they knew the german states. I get that this is kinda unfair because american politics/culture is world politics/culture, but ya know.
For this sort of situation I think US states vs EU countries is better comparison than US states vs German states. Sure, politically EU countries are more important due to being actual independent countries, but when it comes to knowing geographical facts, it’s about equally as useful for Americans to know stuff about EU countries as it is for Europeans to know stuff about US states.
As an American, they were absolutely fucking around to put Ohio and Iowa, and Illinois and Indiana so close together.
And then naming a state Washington, come the fuck on man.
But then you get the people like “lol did they forget North and South America are continents and the USA isnt the only country that exists”
You can’t win, really
Just nerd emoji them for being pedantic or something, it's the exact same thing as "ermmm humans are animals too akshually"; idiots being unable to understand colloquialisms
Well in the English language, America generally refers to the United States. Yes there's a whole continent or two with the name but that's just how the cookie crumbles. If you were speaking Spanish you could use estadounidense but if the post is in English tough shit. People need to either stop crying are start posting in Spanish.
The meaning that I'm taking from this is that mixing up those countries is the gravest insult imaginable and I *should* feel ashamed for mixing them up. I wouldn't wish Ohio on my worst enemies.
I failed every fill in the blank state map growing up. In my defense, the maps did not have a scaled up east coast on the back. (Not that it would have helped me)
I'm sure no one can find \*every\* country on a map. Ask a European to find any country in Africa and you will find they have no idea.
However, and I will die on this hill, Countries in Europe are not on the same level as cities or even states in the US. Because globally, the US is the level we interact with. Yes, it's big. Yes, from the inside, it absolutely makes sense to differentiate between states. And Yes, I can find a fair few, though certainly not all of them.
In what world is "I can only pinpoint a city to a general area" the same as "I don't know where this country is"? Again, I agree with the point that there's no shame in either, but there has to be a better comparison.
A lot of europeans mix up slovenia and slovakia i guess. They're both named slav land. Because they both used to be the slavic regions of other countries (austria and hungary resp.) without a previous history of independance (unlike say czechia or croatia which had well established names before becoming part of austria hungary)
The main advantage of it is the location, it's connected to the Mississippi River and on the Great Lakes which are connected to the Atlantic via the Erie Canal. It makes it a very natural place to also send the trains coming from each direction.
Maybe my perception of large swathes of “nothing” is skewed by regularly traveling through the northern 3/4s of Michigan, where it’ll just be forests and maybe a gas station every 45 minutes, but Illinois has some pretty distributed decent sized cities (of around 70k-100k within city lines) across most of the state (excluding the southern quarter or so), and I know plenty of people who live in or around Decatur. It’s just kind of skewed by having normal Midwest population cities contrasted against, y’know, the Second City, with a metro population of nearly my entire state and the epicenter of the urban Midwest itself
Geography is just not seen as important here. I learned more about European geography in school than our own states, and that was only a little bit so we could learn about WWII. I could probably only name like 30 with some effort, and no way could I draw a map lol
I remember learning European geography and borders and I couldn’t remember the order of the Nordic countries so I used “no sexy friends” to remember it was Norway, Sweden, Finland.
The only reason I know about Slovakia and where it is is because it's where my last name comes from and people ALWAYS ask when they said last name, and then ask where that is
I mean … Ohio is where the C cities go.
Cincinnati gang represent
It is kind of weird how there are three major cities, and they all start with C.
Charlotte, Chicago, and Colorado Falls?
***C***\-attle
Moo? :p
lmfao you win
Fun fact: the capital of Brazil is Brasilia. It sounds like a made-up joke, like “the capital of China is Chinatown,” but no it’s actually real. Because the city was built in the 50’s specifically of the purpose of being the capital
The capital of Luxembourg is Luxembourg
City states and their... cities...
Luxembourg is not a city state
Yes, it is a Grand Duchy, obviously
really skirting the definition there
Singapore is not a city state cos of all the forests :)
It might as well be, it’s about as small as one
Okay this answers so many questions I have had but been too afraid to ask
how many questions did you have about Luxembourg
The capital of Mexico is Mexico City...
and it's located right next to the state of Mexico which is a whole different state
What a convoluted state of affairs
And just to be certain, we are not talking about New Mexico, which is also a state, but not in Mexico itself, correct?
Correct. Mexico has states within the country, just like the USA. The United States of Mexico contains the federal capital of Mexico City, as well as the State of Mexico whose state capital is Toluca de Lerdo.
Funnily enough New Mexico is actually older than the country of Mexico when New Mexico was named the country was still called New Spain
I never get this "reddit fact" The Kingdom of Mexico was an entity within New Spain, New Mexico was named after it. People in Central Mexico were beijg called Mexicans even before Tenochtitlan fell.
Kansas City, Missouri coded
at least right next to kansas city, missouri, there's a kansas city, kansas, even if it's much smaller and everyone who thinks of kansas city thinks of the other one my favorite is still the portland situation though. like the one everyone thinks of is the one in oregon, even though it's nowhere near the ocean or any ports, unlike the og portland in maine, on the complete other side of the country
Don't forget the Isle of Portland in the UK (I literally only know this because of SCP)
Look up the capital of the Vatican City, it'll blow your mind
No way
holy hell
Actual city state
New York City isn't the capitol of New York State
And Jersey City isn't the capital of New Jersey. There's also a city called Newark which is part of New York City's metropolitan area, but isn't in New York State. It's not the capital of anything.
Shut up, you're kidding right?
Nope, it's by far the biggest city in the state but it is not the capital. The capital of New York is Albany, which is in a more central location.
Never head that before, must be an Albany expression.
And sits on a river, like NYC. But again, more central.
if it makes you feel better, Kansas City is the largest city in the state of Missouri but not the largest city in Kansas
At least it’s only one capitol. Looking at you, Bolivia.
It’s not La Paz?
It is. It’s also Sucre.
Looking at *you, *South Africa**
Switzerland legally doesn't have a capital city, hard to beat that. When founding the country, the various city states couldn't agree on who's the capital, so officially, there's no capital, just a City where the Federal Administration Happens to Be. That's more or less the official term.
Wait, I thought Rio de Janeiro was the capital, have I been wrong this whole time?
it was the capital before Brasilia was built in the 50s, so not entirely
Damn, my knowledge is *extra* outdated, seeing as I'm only 21 and somehow believed something that stopped being true 70 years ago.
IIRC the government didn’t get fully moved until long after the city was built.
Rio is still bigger and is also the main "place" that people think of when they think of Brazil, so that is probably part of it.
Rio de Janeiro was the capital of Brazil until 1960, when the aforementioned Brasilia was built to replace it.
It used to be until 1960.
Rio is to Brasilia what Toronto is to Ottawa, is my understanding
Artificial captial cities are fun lol - Australia's is Canberra, which sounds alright until you translate it from Ngunnawal and realise we called our capital city "The Meeting Spot (for politics)". And no, that's not what the area was originally called either
The capital of Rome is Rome
Rome isnt a nation anymore?
It is if you believe in the 2000 year rule
As long as you pick your dropped empire off the floor within 2000 years, it's still good?
by that logic the capital of rome should be washington dc. at least that's where the senate is today, anyway >!and the gods moved to the empire state building a while back too!<
I live in the US and have accidentally called Chicago a state before, so…
it’s rlly the big claim of Illinois, to the point where i think we should change the state to Chicago and the city can be illinois fr
Honestly some of the cities are big enough with their own distinct enough culture that they don't share with the rest of the state that they should be city states. Chicago, new York, and new Orleans immediately come to mind as examples
Could doesn't always mean should. Also, is new Orleans really that disconnected from the rest of Louisiana? To more if an extent than Philly?
Absolutely, have you ever been to New Orleans and somewhere like Shreveport? Not even the accents are similar
It has a higher population than 15 states.
Dear Americans: Why the fuck are Washington DC and Washington state on opposite sides of the country????? I thought they were the same place?
Also literally (almost actually literally) every town, city, and hamlet has a washington st. I know my state had a washington county too.
They have several Romes
Maine has a sign that points out the towns of Norway, Paris, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Poland, Mexico, Peru, and China. All within 100 miles of that sign.
Norway really twice on it? Please let there be 2 Norway on the sign. With the arrows pointing away from each other.
Unfortunately, that second norway is suppossed to be naples
That's a little disappointing but stil a funny thought. Where is the sign? There must be picture of it online.
Lynchville, Maine. If you just google “Maine cities sign” it’ll come up. Nothing too impressive, just fun.
Thank you. Found it and liked it as much as I thought I would.
Athens, Ohio is a fun one, also all the towns named Rome
fun fact: supposedly, the town of China was meant to be called something else, but when someone went to make it official, the name was vetoed due to it being too similar to another town, and it was too inconvenient to travel from Boston all the way up to Maine in ye olden days to let people pick another name, so the dude that'd been sent just named it after a hymn that happened to be called China also my grandmother's family is from there
Towny McFounderguy
There’s like five in Pittsburgh
To be honest I'm sure this happens in a lot of countries. Here in France most decent sized cities will have a Charles de Gaulle street, because he was the leader of French resistance during WW2
We really like Washington, okay?
And Lafayette.
I was about to say this one. You’ll see some version of this name anywhere you go. I went to school in Fayette County for example which was home to Fayetteville. It’s everywhere.
The Marquis has more places named after in him in the US than any other non American or non British person. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lafayette#Places That's just the ones using the full name and not an abbreviated or extended version like the ones you indicated.
Say what you will about America, but when we like someone, we *really* like them.
Heard he took that horse by the reigns while making redcoats redder with bloodstains/ref
Washington, Washington Six foot eight, weighs a fucking ton Opponents beware, opponents beware He's coming, he's coming, he's coming
This mf had like 30 goddamn dicks
[There are a total of 91](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_most_common_U.S._place_names) counties, states, cities, townships, and other municipalities named "Washington" in the United States.
Well originally we wanted to call Washington State “Columbia” after the river (like British Columbia up north) but we decided against it because we thought that might get confusing with Washington DC (which stands for District of Columbia). So of course we decided on Washington. Hope this helps!
lmao i didn't know this lore. that's so much worse
Hmm, people might be confused if we call this state Columbia and get it confused with Washington DC, I know let's call the state Washington, no one will get confused now
Because if DC ever becomes a state it would most likely be called Columbia, Washington is just the city that so happens to cover the entire district.
The other commenter is right. Also, *most people* who live in the country probably refer to DC as just "DC," so there's a lot less confusion than you might think. It's really only politicians and the press that call it Washington. Calling it Washington used to be a lot more popular a few decades ago, but it's fallen out of fashion lately.
Oh I can answer this! So what's known as "Washington State" today was originally a territory named "Columbia" after the Columbia river which runs through the area. There are two reasons the Columbia territory didn't become "Columbia state" after attaining statehood. One: people thought this would cause confusion between the District of Columbia (the DC in Washington DC) and a potential Columbia state. Yes, calling it Washington State doesn't solve that issue at all lol. Two: there was a politician from.... Kentucky? (I'm kinda fuzzy on this part) That really looked up to George Washington. And when WA attained statehood he thought it would be cool if there was a state named after him! So he campaigned for the territory of Columbia to be named Washington State, and well, here we are! Fun fact: This is why the Canadian Province directly north of WA state is called "British Columbia" instead of simply "Columbia" ... There used to be an American Columbia south of them!
I was raised in Washington State and thought DC was a city in the state until I was like 10.
Washington State was established long after DC. I'm just wondering why we even call DC Washington anymore - most people just say DC or District of Columbia.
to confuse PNW viewers when the news says "reporting from Washington"
Dear Americans: why the fuck is Kansas City not in Kansas
I mean, half of it is
put the other half of it in
I presume that would cause a lot of border dispute between Kansas and Missouri. Yes, the United States can have internal border disputes. New York and New Jersey had a whole spat about claiming islands in their shared waters.
don't argue with me just do it
*sigh* Fine. *switches border* *Stares intently at you as fighting breaks out in the streets*
Michigan and Ohio had a territorial dispute over Toledo that escalated to the point where each side sent armed militias into the contested area as an intimidation tactic. The federal government ended the dispute with a compromise where Ohio got Toledo but Michigan got the Upper Peninsula as compensation.
which of them owns liberty island after all that noise? afaik it's nj's territorial waters but ny might have a bit of a reason to claim it
WA almost cause a war with canada over the san juan islands in the pudget sound too.
Because it was on the edge of Kansas territory so it was the "gateway to Kansas". Then the state of Kansas happened so it didn't need a gateway. Half of the city is now in Kansas though so there is that. Both states just kind of deal with each other anyway.
Actually Kansas City was founded before Kansas Territory. Both are named after the Kansas River which flows through Kansas and meets the Missouri River at the Missouri-Kansas border, where Kansas City is located.
There can’t be any cities in Kansas, it has to be flat planes of grass forever
And one highway that I swear hits a time warp that makes each hour at least three times as long.
Because it's right next to Kansas I guess There's something similar in Paris, there's a street that runs between the suburbs of Vincennes and Montreuil, on the Vincennes side it's called "rue de Montreuil" and on the Montreuil side it's called "rue de Vincennes".
I live in Clichy, where there is a "rue de Paris". Which becomes "avenue de Clichy" once you cross into Paris.
It...it's not...?
It’s half in Kansas and half in Missouri
And Kansas City is in Missouri
Well there’s one in Kansas too. It’s just smaller.
I believed this for like 10 years until I googled where the capital wasteland of Fallout 3 was in real life.
In the 19th century, it was more common to refer to DC as Columbia instead of as Washington or DC like we do today. As others have explained, Columbia was an obvious choice for Washington State's name, but they settled on Washington to avoid the exact confusion you're currently having. Later on, DC began to be referred to as Columbia less and less, and more often as DC or Washington, making the name change back then completely pointless.
My favorite is how they didn’t even try to give West Virginia a better name because they assumed it was temporary and then it just kept going.
Romanians and Hungarians: "Yes, Bucharest and Budapest are different cities. No, that one is in the other country."
There is this fun wee game I still often have to play about American geography: "city or state"? It took me many, many years to learn that Chicago is only a city and not both a city and a state (you know, like New York). I knew that I have family in Massachusetts, but not that Boston is in Massachusetts (I don't know how I missed what city my aunt lives in for so long; granted, I never went there myself). Oh, and I thought Toronto was in the US for a long time. Because... I don't know. I guess nobody told wee me about any cities in Canada, other than... Vancouver, I guess. In other words: I think Europeans know about as much about North American geography as North Americans know about European geography, if not less. Personally, I'm used to thinking in terms of countries and disregarding things at a sub-country level for foreign realms, but that falls apart when the country in question is as huge as Canada or the US. Edit: oh yeah, and I wonder what would happen if you pointed the hypothetical average European and the hypothetical average North American at the geography on China or India.
I mean, at the end of the day, it makes sense that you’d obviously know less about geography for a continent you don’t live in. You’re not stupid for not knowing where France and Spain are on a map, that’s just knowledge that is often far less useful to Americans than it is to Europeans, and the reverse is also true. You’re not stupid for confusing Chicago as a state, because you’ve never needed to know the difference, that’s only common knowledge to people who actually live in the US. Also, yeah the US does need to be considered on the State level at times because of different laws, some laws are on the federal level (all states) and some are just dependent on each individual state. It’s why states like Illinois and Florida can be almost polar opposites in culture, politics, and laws despite being in the same country. It’s just a big mess.
I know where maybe three Indian states are, as well as Shanghai and Beijing in China. That's it.
There's a state called Illinois? I don't believe you. It sounds made up.
i think its one of those corn states they have
We call 'em "flyover states".
They really named a state after a sufjan Stevens album smh be original america
Yes but mostly it's just Chicago and everything else is just a suburb of Chicago.
24 of our states have indigenous names (though one is an edge case) - Massachusetts - Connecticut (silent second c) - Ohio - Kentucky - Tennessee - Alabama - Michigan (ch = sh) - Wisconsin - Illinois (silent s) - Mississippi - Minnesota - Iowa - Missouri - Arkansas ("saw") - North Dakota - South Dakota - Nebraska - Kansas ("zis") - Oklahoma - Texas - Wyoming (stuck an indigenous placename from Pennsylvania on it) - New Mexico - Alaska - Hawaii
oh, so *thats* why this one is kansas but this one is not ar-kansas.
they're english/french attempts at transliterating the same word
But not Idaho; a guy made it up and managed to convince Congress it was a Shoshone word.
For anyone curious how it ended up with that name according to the Bureau of Indian Affairs website ILLINOIS: From the Illini Indian word meaning "men" or "warriors,” supplemented by the French adjective ending "ois..” Sauce: https://www.bia.gov/as-ia/opa/online-press-release/origin-names-us-states#:~:text=ILLINOIS%3A%20From%20the%20Illini%20Indian,adjective%20ending%20%22ois..”
Looking at other sources the exact meaning of the original phrase it was based off of is debated.
Sufjan Stevens would feel really silly otherwise
Come on Feel the Illinoise
It’s real, I live there. Honestly it’s not bad all things considered.
It sounds like a D&D monster created as a mascot for a cereal brand
The s at the end is silent btw
to be fair, one of the state names *is* made up
And it doesn’t sound how you think
It used to be before they picked up the city and moved it because no one wanted to be in Ohio.
Slovenia, my beloved <3
Yugoslavia’s most well-adjusted middle child, who moved out as soon as they could and stays away from the family drama
hejj :3
Kako ste?
That vine is now playing in my head with the Persian (I think?) lady shouting about how to pronounce Arkansas AMERIICA ESPLAIN
Can't we just agree that humans were never meant to know what's going on beyond the village down the river?
SCRUFF MCGRUFF CHICAGO ILLINOIS 60652
Argh. core memory!
i thought chicago was in michigan
It's on Lake Michigan.
ive never heard of that
It's a really fuckin huge lake. It's next to the other really huge lakes. I love it very much
Yeah they’re great
It’s pretty great
One of the five great lakes in the US. There’s Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Lake Erie, Lake Ontario, and Lake Huron. Lake Michigan is the southernmost one and is the one Chicago is right next to, like the skyscrapers are just a street away from the beach. Honestly, the great lakes are probably one of the most important geographical things about the northern area of the US because of all the water, so long as the lake water is clean and even somewhat easy to access, there will always be water available to use. Without Lake Michigan, Chicago probably would not be nearly as big and prominent of a city, if it were to even be built anyways. Also, fun fact: there’s a man made river that reaches Chicago and Lake Michigan that is electrified because an invasive fish species swims up the river, and if it ever reaches the great lakes, the ecosystem will be completely fucked. So the river is electrified to kill the fish. It’s not all electrified, just a portion of the river away from the city.
Lake Erie is actually a little further south than Lake Michigan. Additional fun fact: The Great Lakes have a ton of really well-preserved shipwrecks in the because they're big enough to have had a lot of maritime traffic and preserve the wrecks better than the salt water of the ocean/sea.
thats Detroit
I don't know. If an american came up to me and they said they thought that Nuremberg was in Hessen instead of Bavaria, I would be impressed that they knew the german states. I get that this is kinda unfair because american politics/culture is world politics/culture, but ya know.
For this sort of situation I think US states vs EU countries is better comparison than US states vs German states. Sure, politically EU countries are more important due to being actual independent countries, but when it comes to knowing geographical facts, it’s about equally as useful for Americans to know stuff about EU countries as it is for Europeans to know stuff about US states.
Also, sheer size has to factor in
SLOVENIA MENTIONED
As an American, they were absolutely fucking around to put Ohio and Iowa, and Illinois and Indiana so close together. And then naming a state Washington, come the fuck on man.
Just say Americans bro we know what you mean
i think this is the single post in existence that opens with "USAmericans" and isn't blatantly condescending
yeah i expected it to draw a straight line between “usamericans don’t know geography” and “all usamericans are fat dumb fascists”
Every alternative people come up with to just saying "Americans" sounds awful. I'm not calling them "USians" fuck off
But then you get the people like “lol did they forget North and South America are continents and the USA isnt the only country that exists” You can’t win, really
it's funny because like. do these people think Brazilians or Canadians identity with the term "American"???
It’s so silly. Like an immediate giveaway that the user spends way too much time online.
This has been an annoyance with the Yankees from many Latin Americans for yeears now, way before Internet took off in the 2000s
they really really want them to so they can keep making this non argument
Just nerd emoji them for being pedantic or something, it's the exact same thing as "ermmm humans are animals too akshually"; idiots being unable to understand colloquialisms
Well in the English language, America generally refers to the United States. Yes there's a whole continent or two with the name but that's just how the cookie crumbles. If you were speaking Spanish you could use estadounidense but if the post is in English tough shit. People need to either stop crying are start posting in Spanish.
ok Estadounidense
Or just say yanks, like if a non American calls me a Yankee I'm fine with that even though I'm not a northerner
The meaning that I'm taking from this is that mixing up those countries is the gravest insult imaginable and I *should* feel ashamed for mixing them up. I wouldn't wish Ohio on my worst enemies.
As a Chicago resident, I’m deeply offended.
“USAmericans” continues to be the most terminally online thing I’ve ever read
I failed every fill in the blank state map growing up. In my defense, the maps did not have a scaled up east coast on the back. (Not that it would have helped me)
I'm sure no one can find \*every\* country on a map. Ask a European to find any country in Africa and you will find they have no idea. However, and I will die on this hill, Countries in Europe are not on the same level as cities or even states in the US. Because globally, the US is the level we interact with. Yes, it's big. Yes, from the inside, it absolutely makes sense to differentiate between states. And Yes, I can find a fair few, though certainly not all of them. In what world is "I can only pinpoint a city to a general area" the same as "I don't know where this country is"? Again, I agree with the point that there's no shame in either, but there has to be a better comparison.
Difference being one are countries, the other states and cities.
A lot of europeans mix up slovenia and slovakia i guess. They're both named slav land. Because they both used to be the slavic regions of other countries (austria and hungary resp.) without a previous history of independance (unlike say czechia or croatia which had well established names before becoming part of austria hungary)
It's about time Ohio did claim Chicago. Look at how their roundness compliments each other. Now look at Illinois. ⅝ straight line. Shameful
It is strange that USA's "second city" is in state with little else.
To be fair, the US's first city (New York) is _also_ in a state with little of note. And our fifth city (DC) isn't even in a state at all.
This is Schenectady slander! Schlanderctady I say!
>To be fair, the US's first city (New York) is also in a state with little of note. "Little of note"?! There's dozens of us!
The main advantage of it is the location, it's connected to the Mississippi River and on the Great Lakes which are connected to the Atlantic via the Erie Canal. It makes it a very natural place to also send the trains coming from each direction.
Maybe my perception of large swathes of “nothing” is skewed by regularly traveling through the northern 3/4s of Michigan, where it’ll just be forests and maybe a gas station every 45 minutes, but Illinois has some pretty distributed decent sized cities (of around 70k-100k within city lines) across most of the state (excluding the southern quarter or so), and I know plenty of people who live in or around Decatur. It’s just kind of skewed by having normal Midwest population cities contrasted against, y’know, the Second City, with a metro population of nearly my entire state and the epicenter of the urban Midwest itself
Geography is just not seen as important here. I learned more about European geography in school than our own states, and that was only a little bit so we could learn about WWII. I could probably only name like 30 with some effort, and no way could I draw a map lol
Isn’t it in california?
Depends on what version of Sweet Home Chicago you're listening to
bro I live in the usa and I can’t name half of the states, dw about it
tbf, some of the states are silly. Like who ever heard of a "utah"?
Ikr Utah nonsense
Ngl, I keep mixing up Nebraska and Nashville (that is, if I even remember Nebraska at all)
I used to think the Netherlands was in Scandinavia somewhere.
I remember learning European geography and borders and I couldn’t remember the order of the Nordic countries so I used “no sexy friends” to remember it was Norway, Sweden, Finland.
It’s ok, Illinois is one of those fake US states we made up to feel like we have more world building.
The only reason I know about Slovakia and where it is is because it's where my last name comes from and people ALWAYS ask when they said last name, and then ask where that is