Countries and Nationalities
Learn 20 A1 English words for countries and nationalities - Egypt/Egyptian, Turkey/Turkish, Japan/Japanese - with the four endings, a story and a quiz.
This lesson is really about a pattern. Once you see that nationalities almost always end in -ian, -ish, -ese or nothing at all, you can build hundreds of them yourself. Here are seventeen countries you will meet most often, plus the three words that hold the topic together. Then come and sit in my English class, where twelve people came from twelve different places.
20 words to learn
The 20 words
/ˈkʌntri/
A place like Egypt, Turkey or Japan, with its own government.
How many countries have you visited?
/ˌnæʃəˈnæləti/
The country you belong to. What nationality are you?
My nationality is Jordanian.
/ˈlæŋɡwɪdʒ/
What people speak: Arabic, English, French.
She speaks three languages.
/ˈiːdʒɪpt/
The country. A person from there is Egyptian.
The pyramids are in Egypt.
/ˈdʒɔːdn/
The country. A person from there is Jordanian.
I was born in Jordan.
/ˈsɪriə/
The country. A person from there is Syrian.
Her family came from Syria.
/ˌsaʊdi əˈreɪbiə/
The country. A person from there is Saudi.
He works in Saudi Arabia.
/məˈrɒkəʊ/
The country. A person from there is Moroccan.
Morocco is in North Africa.
/ˈtɜːki/
The country. A person from there is Turkish.
We flew to Turkey in July.
/ˈɪŋɡlənd/
One country inside Britain. A person from there is English.
London is in England.
/ˈbrɪtn/
England, Scotland and Wales together. The adjective is British.
She has a British passport, not a Britain passport.
/əˈmerɪkə/
Short for the USA. A person from there is American.
He studied in America for four years.
/ˈkænədə/
The country. A person from there is Canadian.
Canada is very cold in January.
/frɑːns/
The country. A person from there is French – and so is the language.
Paris is the capital of France.
/ˈdʒɜːməni/
The country. A person from there is German.
Many engineers work in Germany.
/speɪn/
The country. A person from there is Spanish.
We spent a week in Spain.
/ˈɪtəli/
The country. A person from there is Italian.
Italy is famous for its food.
/ˈtʃaɪnə/
The country. A person from there is Chinese.
China has the largest population.
/dʒəˈpæn/
The country. A person from there is Japanese.
The trains in Japan are never late.
/ˈɪndiə/
The country. A person from there is Indian.
India has more than twenty official languages.
Now read the story
Story · all 20 words
Twelve People, Twelve Places
There are twelve people in my evening English class and no two of us come from the same country. On the very first evening the teacher asked each of us to say our name, our nationality and one language we speak at home. It took forty minutes and it was still the best lesson of the whole year.
Rana is from Syria and speaks Arabic, French and now English. Omar is from Jordan, like me. Nada came from Egypt two years ago, and everybody in the room understands her Arabic best because of the films. Yusuf is from Saudi Arabia and Khadija is from Morocco, and those two argue happily every single week about which country makes better mint tea.
Then the rest of the world arrives. Emre is from Turkey and brings something sweet on Tuesdays. Marie is from France and Lukas is from Germany, and they sit together and correct each other’s grammar in a language that belongs to neither of them. Sofia is from Spain and cannot understand why English words are not said the way they are written. Nobody in this room can help her with that.
Giulia is from Italy and talks with her hands, which I have decided is a real language and should be on her certificate. Wei is from China, Haruto is from Japan, and Priya is from India and speaks four languages before breakfast. Our teacher is from England. She explained on day one that Britain and England are not the same word, and that we should never call somebody from Scotland English unless we have a free afternoon.
One person is missing from that list. Dan is from Canada, but he lived in America for nine years, so when anybody asks him where he is from he takes a long breath and answers with a whole story. At the end of the course we took one photograph, all twelve of us in two rows. My mother looked at it for a long time and said only one thing: “The world is very small in that room.”
Nationalities follow four patterns. Learn the pattern, not the list:
1. Add -ian or -an (the biggest group)
Egypt → Egyptian | Jordan → Jordanian | Syria → Syrian | Italy → Italian | India → Indian | Morocco → Moroccan | America → American | Canada → Canadian | Germany → German
2. Add -ish
Turkey → Turkish | Spain → Spanish | England → English | Britain → British
3. Add -ese
China → Chinese | Japan → Japanese
4. Just different
France → French | Saudi Arabia → Saudi
Capital letters, always. Countries, nationalities and languages all take a capital letter, anywhere in the sentence: I am Jordanian and I speak Arabic and English.
Two sentences that mean the same thing:
✓ I am from Jordan. (country) ✓ I am Jordanian. (nationality)
✗ I am from Jordanian. ✗ I am Jordan.
The three key words: country, nationality, language.
-ian / -an: Egyptian, Jordanian, Syrian, Moroccan, Italian, Indian, German, American, Canadian.
-ish: Turkish, Spanish, English, British.
-ese: Chinese, Japanese.
Different: French, Saudi.
Answer these three: Where are you from? What nationality are you? What languages do you speak? Say all three answers out loud, with the capital letters where they belong.
Now practise with the questions below.
Check your understanding
Answer the questions below. You will see instantly if you are right.
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