Steven writes:
I have seen this sentence "The United States Map," but I have also seen this sentence "The Map of the United States." My question is: why/when do you use this sentence "The United States Map" and why/when do you use this other "The Map of the United States"? Is there any difference? Because if I did not know that "The United States of America" is well-written, I'd surely say: "America United States." By the way, can be said "America United States"?
I love questions like these, because they make me think about what I've always taken for granted.
To answer your second question first, you can't say "America United States." "America actually applies to the whole western Hemisphere, North and South America. When the thirteen colonies broke away from Britain, they turned themselves into states, like France or Spain. Then they joined in a federation and became the United States of America—and America 200 years ago had no other independent states.
Now, of course, the Americas are full of independent states (like the United States of Mexico), but the "Americans" are understood to be the people living in the United States.
To answer your first question, we have a usage problem. It's OK to say "United States map" or "map of the United States," but it's not OK to say, for example, "France map" or "England map." We would have to say "map of France" and "map of England."
We could switch from nouns (France, England) to adjectives (French, English) and say "French map," "English map."
Even if we did that, we could confuse readers: Does "French map" mean a map of France, or a map made in France?
For some reason, "United States" seems to work as both a noun and as an adjective: "the policies of the United States" and "United States policies" are equally correct. But "America" and "American" are like "England" and "English"—so we could say "the policies of America" but "American policies."
Comments