what do you call people from.....

Question

I work in an office that has to refer to "people from other countries" by the name given to the people from that country. In other words, people from Sudan are Sudanese, China are Chinese, Korea are Korean, are Pakistani etc... but some names I just can't figure out. Like what do you call someone from Congo or Madagascar or ? When do you use the ..ian or ..ese or ..ani at the end of the name.

Anyway, if anyone could point me to a list of "Names" for the countries of the world, I would appreciate it.

RJ

Philip · Accepted Answer

AnonymousI work in an office that has to refer to "people from other countries" by the name given to the people from that country. In other words, people from Sudan are Sudanese, China are Chinese, Korea are Korean, are Pakistani etc... but some names I just can't figure out. Like what do you call someone from Congo or Madagascar or ? When do you use the ..ian or ..ese or ..ani at the end of the name.

Anyway, if anyone could point me to a list of "Names" for the countries of the world, I would appreciate it.

RJ

I'll look for a list. Meanwhile, I can offer Congolese and Cypriots for the above.

Philip · Answer

Cool Breeze · Answer

Nouns (or adjectives) referring to towns and countries are one of the awkward points of English. The words you want are Congolese, Madagascan and Cypriot.

Such words often just have to be learned one by one and there is little logic to them. I have asked many Brits what they would call a person who lives in Memphis, for example, and received a blank stare as an answer. So far, not a single American has been able to tell me the word referring to a resident of Grantham, which is a town close to Nottingham, England. (The words are Memphian and Granthamian.)

A person living in Moscow is a Muscovite, not a Moscowite. A person from Liverpool is a Liverpudlian etc. Very often, there just isn't a word at all, which is often due to the fact that no one has ever heard of many remote towns and villages around the world. There is a clumsy way to solve the problem: a person living in, say, Malmö could be called a Malmö-dweller.

Cheers
CB

Philip · Answer

Cool BreezeMadagascan

The source I offered above lists Malagasy, which seems odd to me.

Cool Breeze · Answer

PhilipThe source I offered above lists Malagasy, which seems odd to me.

Hi Philip

Malagasyseems exremely odd to me, but then again, I'm not a native speaker and quite a few peculiarities in the English language seem odd to me.

Madagascan is from Webster's.

Cheers
CB

Anonymous · Answer

A Madagascar's citizen is Malagasy, a person from Congo is Congolese and Cyprus would be Cyprusian.

Anonymous · Answer

Madagascans are people from Madagascar, people from Congo are Conganese I suppose. FYI people from Norwich are Norwichians. ??

As somebody else said, these things usually have to be dreamt up one thing at a time, there's not any rule that's "one size fits all" that I know of.

Hope that helps. ??

Khoff · Answer

I've never heard "Cyprusian," only "Cypriot."

Clive · Answer

In the everyday world, one is much more likely to hear
eg people from/in Madagascar
eg people from/in Memphis.

what do you call people from.....

Top answer

Get the Weekly English Kit 📬

Related Questions