Holland? You mean ''The Netherlands''

[Woeler]

So yeah, as I Dutchman (and I speak for many) this international confusion is quite... annoying XD.
The Netherlands is not Holland. People in Holland are often stereotyped as stupid here in the Netherlands. So this is why I would just like to explain the country a little bit, just so you know.

Beware: It's complicated.

So, welcome to the great nation of Holland. Where the tulips grow, the windmills turn, the breakfast is chocolaty and the sea tries do drown it all. Except, this country is not called Holland.

The correct name for this tulip growing, windmill turning, hagelslag eating, container ship moving, ocean conquering nation is The Netherlands. But confusion is understandable. The region has been renamed a lot over a 1000 years including as ''the Dutch republic'', ''the United States of Belgium'' and ''the kingdom of Holland''.

But it's not just history that makes the name confusing because the Netherlands is divided into 12 provinces: Groningen, Drenthe, Overijssel, Gelderland, Limburg (I live here yay!), Noord-Brabant, Zeeland (and btw this is the Zeeland that makes this Zealand new), Friesland, Flevoland, Utrecht...

... and here's the confusing part Noord(North)-Holland and Zuid(South)-Holland.

These provinces make calling the Netherlands Holland like calling the United States Dakota. Though unlike the Dakotas which are mostly empty, the two Hollands are the most populated provinces and have some of the biggest attractions like Amsterdam and Keukenhof. Chances are if it's Dutch and you've heard of it it's in one of the Hollands. Even our travel website is Holland.com, probably because it sounds friendlier and it's what people actually search for.

Confusion continues because people who live in the Hollands are called Hollanders, but all citizens of the Netherlands are called Dutch, as is our language. But in Dutch we say: ''Nederlands sprekende Nederlanders in Nederland'' aka ''Dutch speaking Dutch in the Netherlands'' which sounds like we'd rather be called the Netherlanders speaking Netherlandish.

Meanwhile next door in Germany ''Deutsche sprechen Deutsch in Deutschland'' which sounds like they'd rather be called Dutch. This linguistic confusion is why Americans call the Pennsylvania Dutch ''Dutch'' even though they are German.

To review: This country is the Netherlands. Their people are Dutch and they speak Dutch. There is no country called Holland, but there are provinces of North and South-Holland.

Got it? Great because it's about to get more complicated.

The Netherlands is part of a kingdom with the same name ''The Kingdom of the Netherlands'', which is headed by the Dutch royal family. The Kingdom of the Netherlands contains three more countries and to find them we must go the the Caribbean: Aruba, Curacao and Saint-Martin. These are not territories, but self governing countries within The Kingdom of the Netherlands and as such they have their own governments and their own currencies.

While Aruba and Curacao are islands, Saint-Martin is just the southern part of a tiny island also named ''Saint-Martin''. The other half of which is occupied by France and also named... ''Siant-Martin''. So despite being separated by Belgium on the European map, The kingdom of the Netherlands and the French republic share a border on the other side of the world.

So why does The kingdom of the Netherlands reach to the Caribbean? Because of their empire. In the 1600's the Dutch laid their hands on every valuable port they could. For a time America's East coast was New-Netherland with its capital New Amsterdam (now known as new York!). There was New-Zealand as mention previously and nearby the king of the islands ''New-Holland'' (now known as Australia). Now that the empire is gone the three Caribbean nations remain. And while 4 countries in one kingdom isn't unheard of (UK) it doesn't stop there.

The country of the Netherlands also extends its borders to the Caribbean on three more islands: Bonaire, Sint-Eustatius and Saba. These are not countries in the kingdom, but cities in the country of the Netherlands. Residents of these cities vote in elections for the Dutch government just as any Hollander would. Though they don't belong to any province and they don't use the Dutch currency of euros, but use dollars instead. It's kind of like if Hawaii wasn't technically as state, but a part of the district of Columbia All the while using Yen.

These cities in the Country of the Netherlands and these countries in The kingdom of the Netherlands are together known as the Dutch Caribbean and their citizens are Dutch citizens. Which because The kingdom of the Netherlands is a member of the European Union means that these Dutch Caribbeans are also Europeans.

So in the end there are 6 Caribbean islands. 4 countries. 12 provinces. 2 Hollands. 2 Netherlands and one Kingdom.

All Dutch

Source: CGPGrey

[cleargreenwater]

I genuinely appreciate that because the islands of the Carribean confuse the EVERLIVING HELL out of me. Puerto Rico is a commonwealth, Turks & Caicos are territories, Cuba is a totally independent nation, and there is such a history of colonialism blanketing the region it makes my brain sag trying to figure it out.

So the 3 Dutch regions in the Carribean are independent, self-governing full-on COUNTRIES that belong to the conglomerate of The Netherlands, and there are several cities that are outposts of Dutch nationals but not political entities, sovereign or otherwise, themselves.

OK. I can't say I'll ever have a savy handle on the Carribean islands, but would like to go there one day and personally won't go to an area I don't have a basic understanding of. That's honestly informative and nicely understandable, thank you.

[DGFone]

Just in case you were wondering, for most of the world, Holland = The Netherlands.

I can kinda understand you getting peeved about this very common misconception, but really, was it worth a whole page and a half of a new topic?

[Woeler]

Yes it was.

[DGFone]

Do explain. After all, last time I checked, if I simply copy down what you told me Americans are, I might get banned for using vulgar language...

Also, there's a certain comment you made about all gun supporters being murderers, all people suspicious of the US government thinking that Obama is a commie, X people are bad thing Y, the list goes on...

Just saying, I find this topic to be very high up on the "hypocritical scale".

I simply don't see why you felt like it was such an egregious error that you needed to post a whole new topic in the "World Issues" forum about a very common mistake that just about all people make, when you yourself make much worse assumptions.

[Woeler]

I don't see why you should care what topics I make. I don't see why it's any of your business. It's not obligatory to post in them. Now you're going completely offtopic by posting ramdom yhings about me. This topic is about a historical, linguistic mistake. I don't see how you link that with me saying those things.

But, oh well. At least I'm not that one calling all nationalists "discriminating fascistic nazis".

[Si-Amber]

I guess this is similar to the people who think that Scotland and Wales are part of England. I've heard quite a few foreigners say "England" when they mean Britain or the UK.

I can see how that would be annoying!

[Woeler]

[quote="Si Targaryen"]I guess this is similar to the people who think that Scotland and Wales are part of England. I've heard quite a few foreigners say "England" when they mean Britain or the UK.

I can see how that would be annoying! [/quote]
Yeah, it's kind of thhe same thing. The UK is the kingsom as a whole, England is a country in it.

[AdAstrα]

Locked on request.