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Many places today bear names resultant from colonialism, which should be changed in order to reflect decolonization. The hubris of the colonialists was such that they did not even bother to use the pre-existing namesof the lands they colonized, but treated these lands as nothing but free real estate:
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Thisis not an exaggeration; for example, the name "Rhodesia" (after Cecil Rhodes) is literally no different than Donald Trump naming golf courses etc. after himself. Zambia set a good example by tossing out the name "Northern Rhodesia" in 1964; we hope many more follow suit in future.
A few of the more obvious ones:
The name of the Philippines (Filipino: Pilipinas [pɪlɪˈpinɐs]; Spanish: Filipinas) is a truncated form of Philippine Islands, derived from the King Philip II of Spain in the 16th century.
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Due to the colonial origin and direct meaning of the country's current name, proposals for name change have surfaced since the late 19th century up to present time. Among the proposed names that have surfaced include Sovereign Tagalog Nation (Haring Bayang Katagalugan)[6][7], Katipunan (Assembly/Gathering)[8], Kapatiran (Brotherhood)[8], Luzviminda (Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao)[9], Luzvimindas (Luzon, Visayas, Mindanao, and eastern Sabah)[9], Mahárlika (Nobility)[8], Rizalia[8], Rizaline Republic (República Rizalina)[10], and Dayaw Republic (Repúblikang Dayaw).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Philippines
Dutch explorer Abel Tasman sighted New Zealand in 1642 and named it Staten Land "in honour of the States General" (Dutch parliament). He wrote, "itis possible that this land joins to the Staten Land but it is uncertain",[10] referring to a landmass of the same name at the southerntip of South America, discovered by Jacob Le Maire in 1616.[11][12] In 1645, Dutch cartographers renamed the land Nova Zeelandia after the Dutch province of Zeeland.[13][14] British explorer James Cook subsequently anglicised the name to New Zealand.[15]
Aotearoa (pronounced /ˌaʊtɛəˈroʊ.ə/; often translated as "land of the long whitecloud")[16] is the current Māori name for New Zealand.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand#Etymology
The English term Guinea comes directly from the Portuguese word Guiné, which emerged in the mid-15th century to refer to the lands inhabited bythe Guineus, a generic term used by the Portuguese to refer to the 'black' African peoples living south of the Senegal River (in contrast to the 'tawny' Sanhaja Berbers, north of it, whom they called Azenegues). The term "Guinea" is extensively used in the 1453 chronicle of Gomes Eanes de Zurara.[1] King John II of Portugal took up the title of Senhor da Guiné (Lord of Guinea) from 1483.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinea_(region)#Etymology (this also applies to Equatorial Guinea and Guinea-Bissau)
When the Portuguese and Spanish explorers arrived in the island via the Spice Islands, they also referred to the island as Papua.[2] However, the name New Guinea was later used by Westerners starting with the Spanish explorer Yñigo Ortiz de Retez in 1545, referring to the similarities of the indigenous people's appearance with the natives of the Guinea region of Africa.[2] The name is one of several toponyms sharing similar etymologies, ultimately meaning "land of the blacks" or similar meanings, in reference to the dark skin of the inhabitants.
The Dutch, who arrived later under Jacob Le Maire and Willem Schouten, called it Schouten island, but later this name was used only to refer toislands off the north coast of Papua proper, the Schouten Islands or Biak Island. When the Dutch colonized it as part of Netherlands East Indies, they called it Nieuw Guinea.[2]
The name Irian was used in the Indonesian language to refer to the island and Indonesian province, as "Irian Jaya Province". The name was promoted in 1945 by Marcus Kaisiepo,[1] brother of the future governor Frans Kaisiepo. It istaken from the Biak language of Biak Island, and means "to rise", or "rising spirit". Irian is the name used in the Biak language and other languages such as Serui, Merauke and Waropen.[2]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Guinea#Names
In 1920, Ernest Francois Eugene Douwes Dekker (1879–1950), who was also known as Setiabudi, introduced a new name for this proposed independent country (successor state of colonial Dutch East Indies) — which unlike its currently used name of "Indonesia" — did not contain any words etymologically inherited from the name of India or the Indies.[7] The new proposed name was the locally developed name Nusantara. This is the first instance of the term Nusantara appearing after it had been writteninto Pararaton manuscript.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nusantara#The_first_appearance_of_Nusantara_concept_in_the_20th_century
In 1568, the Spanish navigator Álvaro de Mendaña was the first European tovisit the Solomon Islands archipelago, naming it Islas Salomón ("Solomon Islands") after the wealthy biblical King Solomon.[4] It is said that they were given this name in the mistaken assumption that they contained great riches,[6] and he believed them to be the Bible-mentioned city of Ophir.[7]
During most of the period of British rule the territory was officially named "the British Solomon Islands Protectorate".[8] On 22 June 1975 the territory was renamed "theSolomon Islands".[8] When Solomon Islands became independent in 1978, the name was changed to "Solomon Islands".
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solomon_Islands#Name
The island appears with a Portuguese name Cirne on early Portuguese maps, probably from the name of a ship in the 1507 expedition. Another Portuguese sailor, Dom Pedro Mascarenhas, gave the name Mascarenes to the Archipelago.
In 1598, a Dutch squadron under Admiral Wybrand van Warwyck landed at Grand Port and named the island Mauritius, in honour of Prince Maurice van Nassau, stadholder of the Dutch Republic.Later the island became a French colony and was renamed Isle de France.On 3 December 1810, the French surrendered the island to Great Britain during the Napoleonic Wars. Under British rule, the island's name reverted to Mauritius
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mauritius#Etymology
Originally, Portuguese and French merchant-explorers in the 15th and 16th centuriesdivided the west coast of Africa, very roughly, into four "coasts" reflecting local economies. The coast that the French named the Côte d'Ivoire and the Portuguese named the Costa do Marfim—both, literally, mean "Coast of Ivory"—lay between what was known as the Guiné de Cabo Verde, so-called "Upper Guinea" at Cap-Vert, and Lower Guinea.[9][10] There was also a Pepper Coast, also known as the "Grain Coast", a "Gold Coast", and a "Slave Coast". Like those, the name "Ivory Coast" reflected the major trade that occurred on that particular stretch of the coast: the export of ivory.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivory_Coast#Names
European contacts within Sierra Leone were among the first in West Africa in the15th century. In 1462, Portuguese explorer Pedro de Sintra mapped the hills surrounding what is now Freetown Harbour, naming the shaped formation Serra da Leoa or "Serra Leoa" (Portuguese for Lioness Mountains).[21] The Spanish rendering of this geographic formation is Sierra Leona, which later was adapted and, misspelled, became the country's current name.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sierra_Leone#European_trading
Gabon's name originates from gabão, Portuguese for "cloak", which is roughly the shape of the estuary of the Komo River by Libreville.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabon#Etymology
Portuguese explorers reached the coast in the 15th century and named the area Rio dos Camarões (Shrimp River), which became Cameroon in English. Fulani soldiers founded the Adamawa Emirate in the north in the 19th century, and various ethnic groups of the west and northwest established powerfulchiefdoms and fondoms. Cameroon became a German colony in 1884 known asKamerun.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cameroon
For most of its history, up until independence, the country was known as Santo Domingo[36]—the name of its present capital and patron saint, Saint Dominic—andcontinued to be commonly known as such in English until the early 20th century.[37] The residents were called "Dominicans" (Dominicanos), whichis the adjective form of "Domingo", and the revolutionaries named theirnewly independent country "Dominican Republic" (República Dominicana).
Inthe national anthem of the Dominican Republic (himno nacional de la República Dominicana), the term "Dominicans" does not appear. The authorof its lyrics, Emilio Prud'Homme, consistently uses the poetic term "Quisqueyans" (Quisqueyanos). The word "Quisqueya" derives from a nativetongue of the Taino Indians and means "Mother of the lands" (Madre de las tierras). It is often used in songs as another name for the country.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominican_Republic#Names_and_etymology
The name "Colombia" is derived from the last name of Christopher Columbus(Italian: Cristoforo Colombo, Spanish: Cristóbal Colón). It was conceived by the Venezuelan revolutionary Francisco de Miranda as a reference to all the New World, but especially to those portions under Spanish rule (by then from Mississippi river to Patagonia). The name waslater adopted by the Republic of Colombia of 1819, formed from the territories of the old Viceroyalty of New Granada (modern-day Colombia, Panama, Venezuela, Ecuador, and northwest Brazil).[18]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colombia#Etymology
The Spanish expedition led by Alonso de Ojeda, sailing along the length of the northern coast of South America in 1499, gave the name Venezuela ("little Venice" in Spanish) to the Gulf of Venezuela — because of its imagined similarity to the Italian city.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonial_Venezuela
A few of the more subtle ones:
In the early 17th century, the Dutch East India Company established a commercial post at Fort Zeelandia (modern-day Anping, Tainan) on a coastal sandbar called "Tayouan",[30] after their ethnonym for a nearby Taiwanese aboriginal tribe, possibly Taivoan people, written by the Dutch and Portuguese variously as Taiouwang, Tayowan, Teijoan, etc.[31] This name was also adopted into the Chinese vernacular (in particular, Hokkien, as Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Tāi-oân/Tâi-oân) as the name of the sandbar and nearby area (Tainan). The modern word "Taiwan" is derived from this usage, which is seen in various forms (大員, 大圓, 大灣, 臺員, 臺圓 and 臺窩灣) in Chinese historical records. The area occupied by modern-day Tainan represented the first permanent settlement by both European colonists and Chinese immigrants. The settlement grew to be the island's most important trading centre and served as its capital until 1887. Use of the current Chinese name (臺灣) was formalized as early as 1684 with the establishment of Taiwan Prefecture. Through its rapid development the entire Formosan mainland eventually became known as "Taiwan".[32][33][34][35]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan#Etymology
(The only correct name is:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Tungning )
Then there is:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_African_Republic
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Africa
which need to be renamed because we need to discontinue the Eurocentric term "Africa" altogether. (Namibia was until 1990 known as "South-West Africa", therefore its name change sets a positive example that these other countries can follow.)
And of course the most obvious one of all that is so obvious it is sometimes forgotten:
The name "Israel" (Hebrew: Yisraʾel, Isrāʾīl; Septuagint Greek: Ἰσραήλ Israēl; 'El(God) persists/rules', though after Hosea 12:4 often interpreted as "struggle with God")[60][61][62][63] in these phrases refers to the patriarch Jacob who, according to the Hebrew Bible,was given the name after he successfully wrestled with the angel of theLord.[64] Jacob's twelve sons became the ancestors of the Israelites, also known as the Twelve Tribes of Israel or Children of Israel.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel#Etymology
(The only correct name is:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_name_%22Palestine%22 )
Please add to this list as well as discuss existing items.
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How fitting that Colón has such a surname. (Colón is actually cognate with “Dove,” the bird, but never mind that.)
It would be tactical in propaganda to synonomize Colonial mindset with *Colónial*—referring to the mindset of Columbus as he “stumbled” across the Carribean.
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newsinfo.inquirer.net/1091675/duterte-stresses-desire-to-rename-philippines
President Rodrigo Duterte on Sunday reiterated his desire to change the name of the Philippines weeks after he said the late president Ferdinand Marcos was right in wanting to change the country’s name to “Maharlika.”
But Duterte said he had no particular name yet in mind.
“I want to change it in the future. No particular name yet but sure I would like to change the name of the Philippines because the Philippinesis named after King Philip,” he said in a speech during the groundbreaking ceremony of the Isabela City gymnasium in Basilan.
Do it! And make sure you rename the gymnasium (and the city the gymnasium is named after) while you are at it!
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citizen.co.za/news/south-africa/1990322/eff-wants-sa-renamed-azania-says-shivambu/
Talking to JJ Tabane on Power FM, EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu addressedthe issue of name changes in South Africa, saying he believed ‘South Africa’ had colonial connotations and should be changed to Azania.
“The name South Africa was an attempt to give direction to the colonial output. We must decide as a country to democratically change the name ofthe country to Azania,” he said.
Shivambu’s view seems to be in line with that of PAC general secretary Narius Moloto, who called for SAto be renamed Azania in June 2017.
“Azania is the original name of the Southern tip of Africa, and the research by Professor Es’kiah Mphahlele clearly reveals that the real name of South Africa is actuallyAzania,” he told Talk Radio 702 at the time.
According to Moloto: “The name Azania is derived from the term Azanj, which is Arabic.”
“It has its own historic referral rather than geographical. This country did not have a real name, rather a geographical name,” he continued.
Shivambu said the EFF also wanted to rename anything in South Africa that was still named after apartheid leaders.
“The names of so many things in SA after racist apartheid leaders is one that definitely should be addressed, and we are working on that,” he said.
Nice! Azania it is!