From Colombia

This is the translation of an article that I wrote in Octuber, 2010. It is about my point of view on the habit of Spanish speakers to call people and things from the United States 'americanos' (American), when a correct name exists: estadounidenses (something like Unitedstaters). Last week I attended the presentation of the Unitedstater Studies Institute (Instituto de Estudios Estadounidenses) in Bogota, Colombia, attracted by the posibility of getting to know something else about the United States, county which I like since my childhood and in which I have had the chance of living briefly somewhen. What attracted my attention the most was the name of the institute itself. Its name is  Unitedstater Studies Institute and not American like some others which exist in some Spanish-speaking countries. And I believe that  Unitedstater is the correct name for the people born and nationalized in the United States. Not American because that name belong to all the inhabitants o...

In 1821, two years after their independence from Spain; Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador and Panama became La Gran Colombia (The Great Colombia), a whole nation that lasted less than two decades due to the disagreements of the two political trends, Federalism and Centralism, and the regional tension. In 1829 Venezuela became independent from Colombia followed by Ecuados in 1831. In 1903 Panama separated from Colombia, being backed by the United States who was concerned in the zone because it wanted to build up the Panama Canal there. Since then the diplomatic relations between Colombia and each one of the separated nations has been relatively good with some border brushes with Venezuela;but we Colombians consider Venezuela, Ecuador and Panama "Sister Nations". But things have changed in the last years regarding to Venezuela and Ecuador. They do not seem to be sisters of Colombia since their governments have moved away from ours. In 1999 Hugo Chavez, a Venezuelan Army colonel, be...