Why are canadiens called canucks?

Answer 1

French Canadians living in New England were called Canucks
the origin of the word Canuck is ''Johnny Canuck'',who first appeared in 1869 as a younger simpler cousin to the U.S.As Uncle Sam or Britains ''John Bull. And later became a popular WW11 comic book as a ''hero'' and in a wartime recruitment poster. earlier there was a Canadian postal service flight initiated by the Aero Club of Canada(Before Canada Post and air mail) And the plane they used was a biplane called a'' Curtis JN-4 canuck'' . Later they even made a postal stamp featuring the plane.
still earlier there was a newspaper called''Jack CAnuck''which started in 1911and lasted untill 1918.,which satarized and criticized Canadian Social injustice.

Answer 2

It's just an Americanism from the 1800s to refer to French-Canadiens. These days though, it is used to refer to any Canadien. And from what I've read, they don't find the word offensive. They even have a hockey team named the Canucks.

Answer 3

As a Canadian I can assure you that Canuck is NOT an offensive term to us. We are proud to be Canucks.

AND it is pronounced "Kanuck" NOT "Kanook".

The term has been around for a couple of hundred years - yet no-one is entirely sure of the origin. Personally, I would imagine it is some bastardization of First Nations language - as that is wehre the original word for Canada (Kanata) comes from.

from the wikipedia entry - Possibilities include:

kanata1 "village" (See Canada)
Canada + -uc (Algonquian noun suffix)
Canada + -inuk (Inuit for "man")
Connaught, an obscure term for Irish-French-Canadians.
Cann-uck, a small yellow French-Canadian bird, much like Woodstock from the Peanuts comic strip.