Nederland or Holland?

[Leman]

This little conundrum looks like it is going to run forever, not helped by the Dutch themselves. Usually little souvenirs etc. have Holland on them. Articles sometimes have 'Made in Holland' on them. Now the big orange football bus has Holland emblazoned right across the front. To my knowledge there are players in the team from other provinces of Nederland, not just North and South Holland.

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

Both Netherlands and Holland are correct in English, although we ought to follow what the majority of Dutch citizens use.

[Raider4]

Technically it's the Netherlands, but Holland appears to be used informally (or by mistake) to mean the whole country.

A bit like when people use England, when they're really talking about the UK . . .

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

A bit like when people use England, when they're really talking about the UK . . .

And quite correct too.....

[FierceKitty]

A slander on the noble Celtic peoples.

[steve_holmes_11]

And quite correct too.....

Correct when referring to the bad bits. 

[steve_holmes_11]

It's an odd one.

In purely Geographical and political terms, Holland represents two provinces of seventeen.
In historic terms they were dominant in politics, population and commerce.
This to a point where defence plans focused protecting festung Holland with the rest of the country sacrificed to preemptive withdrawls (Limburg), demolitions, flooding and short defensive actions at water based delay lines.

Add to this the "founding legends", whether Civilis defying the Romans in the Swamps around Leiden, or the brave resistance against Spanish armies in the eighty years war.
Much of the action takes place in Holland, with the other provinces joining later.

Finally, the commercial powerhouse is now considered the Randstad, which adds Utrecht to North and South Holland.


Neither term is sufficiently unambiguous to be a clear winner either.

Netherlands used to incorporate Belgium (Compare with our use of British Isles), and raises the dreadful spectre of territorial claims.
Hostility to neighbours is hardly the modern Dutch style (See there's another word - Dutch) - except during international football tournaments when Germany, and more lately Belgium come in for a bit of stick.

Holland, is widely understod, but is a subset comparable to England used for Britain or UK (as discussed above).


Returning to the football fans, who usually get a disproportionate say in matters of national identity.
I don't recall any songs about Netherlands.
Several songs about kings and queens.
At least one about stolen bicycles (We know where you are Germany), and the old pub classic Hup Hup Holland.

For most football fans I spoke with, they are the Oranje first, and perhaps Holland second.

[Dave Fielder]

When I was in the European Union Naval Force (EU NAVFOR) between 2017-19, under British Command until 29th March 2019 BTW, I worked with a Dutch 'POLAD', Political Advisor. He explained that The Netherlands (Nederland) is the acceptable and agreed nomenclature within both NL and the EU. Holland (as mentioned) is only part of the Dutch nation and hence is incorrect as country name.

[d_Guy]

For most Americans (a term itself not without ambiguity, but what we call ourselves none-the-less) "Holland" is where tulips, windmills, dykepluggers, and Hans Brinker come from; "The Netherlands" is the modern nation state somewhere "over there", and we've never heard of  "Nederland". "Dutch" is semi-prejorative, "being in Dutch", "going Dutch", "Dutch courage", "Dutch uncle", etc.

It's collectively up to them to name themselves.

[Leman]

That's ok. I always ask people with North American accents which part of Canada they're from.