I do not think you should call Americans Yanks..unless you know they are from the northern states. It is not a term that many Southern US Americans would want to be called. I also am not convinced, although I can not prove it, that the word "nigger" was in common usage as an inoffensive word. Probably by some people..anything is probably by some people..but I think it was a word used to humiliate and abuse and control people. I think other, less inflammatory words were used if intentions were neutral or respectful at least for the conditions of the times....among them "Nigra," "Negro", colored folk etc. mg