Australian or Australians?

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august03
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Joined: Mon Apr 12, 2004 6:00 am
Location: China

Australian or Australians?

Post by august03 » Mon Apr 12, 2004 6:07 am

When should you use Australian v's Australians.

For eg:

Who are those people? They're Australians;

What nationality are you. I am Australian.

Does this work? Are 'Australians' or 'Americans' actual words?

lolwhites
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Joined: Wed Jul 16, 2003 1:12 pm
Location: France
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Post by lolwhites » Tue Apr 13, 2004 5:29 pm

You can use "Australian" as a noun or an adjective, which may be what's confusing you.

Adjective: He's Australian, They're Australian...
Noun: He's an Australian, They're Australians...

Works with "American/Americans" too, but you can't generalize it for all nationalities as sometimes the noun and adjective are different e.g. Spanish (adj.) vs Spaniard(s) (n.)

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