"Us Americans" or "We Americans"?
If there is a group of individuals identified by a name, what's the right way for one of the group to refer to them all?
For example, if one of a group of 10 Americans wants to refer to the group, is it more correct to say "Us Americans" or "We Americans"?
What are the Americans doing?
Apply the usual "we vs. us" test: Remove any nouns and adjectives between we/us and the verb, and test.
[We/Us] drink beer cold : We Americans drink beer cold.
The Aussies call [we/us] Seppos : The Aussies call us Americans Seppos.
The same test applies when referring to any group collectively:
[We/Us] recite poetry to appreciative audiences: We Vogons recite poetry to appreciative audiences.
The "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" describes [we/us] in highly disparaging terms: The "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" describes us Vogons in highly disparaging terms. (A lawsuit is pending. In triplicate.)
To address the points that @FumbleFingers raises in his bounty:
Merriam-Webster Unabridged offers these observations in its definition of the pronominal us (albeit not without some nose-holding, and a few pokes at "grammarians"):
f — used by speakers on all educational levels and by many reputable writers though disapproved by some grammarians in the predicate after forms of be, in comparisons after than and as when the first term in the comparison is the subject of a verb, and in other positions where it is itself neither the subject of a verb nor the object of a verb or preposition:
- the miraculous generation which is us [Arnold Bennett]
- you are bigger and stronger than us women [K. A. Menninger]
- us and our little problems
g (1) — used chiefly in substandard speech and formerly also by reputable writers as part of the compound subject of a verb or especially with an immediately following appositive noun as the subject of a verb which it does not immediately precede
- our neighbors and us don't like that
- us kids were always given a swallow [Walter Karig]
(2) chiefly dialectal — used as the subject of a verb from which it is not separated by other words
- us lived in a two-story house [Ralph Ellison]
h — used like the adjective our with a gerund by speakers and writers on all educational levels though disapproved by some grammarians
- she approved of us getting summer jobs
Likewise, M-W Unabridged defines these (ahem) non-standard usages of the pronominal we:
3a dialectal, chiefly England : us — used emphatically as object of a verb or preposition
- to poor we thine enmity's most capital [Shakespeare]
- the likes of we
b chiefly substandard : us — used in a compound object or in apposition with a following noun
he disturbed those in the dining room, those in the hall, and even we who had retired upstairs
as to we men [Fanny Burney]