Fredora
at 2021-04-23 22:20:19 UTC
They first had 亜米利加 for America made up of the readings ア, メ, リ and カ for each of those signs.
This then got shortened. But since the first one (亜) was already used to refer to Asia they used the second one (米) with the pronounciation ベイ (bei) instead.
Xinzhe_Li
at 2021-05-26 14:14:41 UTC
Now Japanese use "アメリカ" for calling the USA.
Leebo
at 2021-05-26 14:28:22 UTC
@Xinzhe_Li
Yes, アメリカ is how people would refer to the country. But you'll still see 米 to mean America regularly in the news, because it's a space saver.
saulnewman
at 2023-06-08 20:24:21 UTC
There's a wiki entry about this usage -
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ateji
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How did 米 become to mean USA?
I was just wondering why the symbol for rice is associated with the USA? Thx : )