Does "North America" Exist? Some Say Not.

I find it frustrating at times to interact with people, especially Spanish speakers, who inform me that Canada is an American country. It sounds silly, put like that, but they learn in school that "América is a continent, from the Arctic to Tierra del Fuego. The name of the US is United States of America. Canada and all the Iberian American countries are American countries."

They are partially correct. That is the proper terminology to use in Spanish.

In English, North America (a continent) and South America (a continent) make up a unit that is either called “The Americas” or “the New World” or even “the Western Hemisphere,” but never just “America.” 

That's my assertion, which just on the face of it, has neither more nor less weight than the opposite assertion.

We could just argue about that, but I’d rather point you at one of many, many English language sources. We can start with our good friends at Wikipedia (Americas).

In modern English, North and South America are generally considered separate continents, and taken together are called the Americas in the plural, parallel to similar situations such as the Carolinas. When conceived as a unitary continent, the form is generally the continent of America in the singular. However, without a clarifying context, singular America in English commonly refers to the United States of America.

In some countries of the world (including France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Romania, Greece, and the countries of Latin America), America is considered a continent encompassing the North America and South America subcontinents, as well as Central America”

So, like I said, it’s a Spanish-language thing to call both North America and South America simply America.

The source also mentions that, in French, “America” includes North America and South America. However, the Canadian government, in its French-language usage, does not do so, but calls them Les Amériques , or “the Americas.” (Le Canada et les Amériques). Another example: L'Amérique du Nord et du Sud - IR (10.7 µm).

The National Geographic Society agrees that they are separate continents (North America: Human Geography):

North America and South America are named after Italian navigator Amerigo Vespucci. Vespucci was the first European to suggest that the Americas were not part of the East Indies, but an entirely separate landmass. The portions of the landmass that widened out north of the Isthmus of Panama became known as North America.

I don’t think you’ll find much support in recent English-language writing to the idea that “America” is a single continent. In fact, I can assure you that, in Canadian high schools (as I suspect, in American ones), the continents of North America and South America are named separately.