page_title: Yankee
section_title: Origin and history of the word
hierarchical_section_title: Yankee / Origin and history of the word
context_page_description: The term Yankee and its contracted form Yank have several interrelated meanings, all referring to people from the United States; its various senses depend on the context. Outside the United States, Yank is used informally to refer to any American, including Southerners. Within the Southern United States, Yankee is a derisive term which refers to all Northerners, or specifically to those from the region of New England. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, it is "a nickname for a native or inhabitant of New England, or, more widely, of the northern States generally"; during the American Civil War, it was "applied by the Confederates to the soldiers of the Union army".
  Elsewhere in the United States, it largely refers to people from the Northeastern states, but especially those with New England cultural ties, such as descendants of colonial New England settlers, wherever they live. Its sense is sometimes more cultural than geographical, emphasizing the Calvinist Puritan Christian beliefs and traditions of the Congregationalists who brought their culture when they settled outside New England.
caption: Loyalist newspaper cartoon from Boston ridicules "Yankie Doodles" militia who have encircled the British forces inside the city
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