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You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

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dakanga

You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by dakanga »

Following on from the discussion Do you translate peoples names ?, is the issue of Endonym vs Exonym.

Endonym / Exonym

Endonym : native name for a geographical place, group of people, individual person, language or dialect,
Exonym : a name used by outsiders to refer to an ethnic, racial, or social group or its language, or its geographical place that the group itself does not use.

So there can be many different Exonym's for the same place/group/language.

Related articles :

https://endonymmap.com/

https://i.redd.it/gbb27uj1gyz21.png
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/598 ... -languages
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... _languages
https://www.aiatranslations.com/post/wh ... -languages
https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/nam ... uages.html

Comments, and sharing of more detailed history for specific Endonym's/Exonym's would be appreciated.

Do you think, especially for English speakers, would it be better if we took the initiative to call a geographical place, group of people, individual person, language or dialect by the name the people/group call themselves ?

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LICA98
Finland

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by LICA98 »

for countries it doesn't make sense

-it's quite rare that the exonym is completely different from the endonym (like Germany/Deutschland), usually they're just variations of the same word and different languages take the word that is most fit for their language

-many countries speak multiple languages so you'd still have to choose one over the other

-some of the countries listed on the map are English-speaking countries which speak another language, like there's no reason to say Éire or Aotearoa if the vast majority there speaks English

-many of the sounds in the endonyms don't exist in English, so even if you adopt the endonym in English people would still pronounce it differently (this goes for other languages as well, e.g. Arabic doesn't have P or V, Russian doesn't have H, etc.)

-language isn't a thing that can just be changed by force, for example there are some countries that have officially changed their name and require you to call them differently, like Ivory Coast is officially known as Côte d'Ivoire but I don't think many people use that name

for cities and regions it might work in some cases, like there are many European cities that used to have an English exonym (for example Porto, Marseille, Lyon used to be Oporto, Marseilles, and Lyons in English) but now those have become dated
this is probably due to the fact that cities are less known in general and that the less known the place is the less likely it is to have an exonym

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Corinnebelle

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Corinnebelle »

I think it's respectful to know them, I don't know if I'd be able to pronounce them all though!

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MoniqueMaRie
Germany

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by MoniqueMaRie »

With "Deutschland " it becomes even more strange when you learn Italian
Deutschland = Germania

But the people who live there are
Male plural: tedeschi
Female plural: tedesche

Native :de: / using :uk: / learning :fr: :cn: :it: / once learnt Image / trying to understand at least a bit :poland:

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Enzfj2
Ukraine

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Enzfj2 »

Germany has quite wide variety of names:
Germania in Italian and Romanian right from Latin, obvious English, Greek and Russian cognates
Alemania with some variations in other Romance languages, including French Allemagne
Německo in Czech, Niemcy in Polish and similar in other Slavic languages, inluding Ukrainian Німеччина /Nimechchyna/, also Hungarian Németország (ország means 'country')
Tyskland in Swedish and other Nordic languages
Saksa in Finnish and Saksamaa in Estonian
— and Vācija in Latvian and Vokietija in Lithuanian
Hint: Open Wikipedia and scroll through Languages ;)

Btw, why the people and language of the Netherlands are called Dutch in English?

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Enzfj2
Ukraine

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Enzfj2 »

Other European countries:
Suomi is known everywhere under its Swedish name of Finland
— Italy is Włochy in Polish and Olaszország in Hungarian
— Poland is Lengyelország in Hungarian, Lenkija in Lithuanian and Lehistan in Armenian
— Russia is Venäjä in Finnish, Venemaa in Estonian and Krievija in Latvian

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Enzfj2
Ukraine

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Enzfj2 »

And Österreich is known everywhere as Austria, but Rakousko in Czech and Rakúsko in Slovak

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LICA98
Finland

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by LICA98 »

Enzfj2 wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 7:51 pm

Other European countries:
Suomi is known everywhere under its Swedish name of Finland

not in the Baltic countries tho, there we're known under our Finnish name :)

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dakanga

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by dakanga »

Do you know anything about the history of why these different/diverse names have been chosen to be used, instead of calling them, according to the name the people who live there/speak that language that they use to describe themselves ?

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EranBarLev
Israel

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by EranBarLev »

Hebrew has several exonyms:
China is סין = Seen
India is הודו = Hódu
Greece is יוון = Yaván
France is צרפת = Tzarfát
Spain is ספרד = Sfarád

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Corinnebelle

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Corinnebelle »

[mention]dakanga[/mention] Foreigners were probably not viewed in most appealing light. Also names might have come from the names other tribes gave other tribes.

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Gentianopsis
Czech Republic

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Gentianopsis »

dakanga wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 9:44 pm

Do you know anything about the history of why these different/diverse names have been chosen to be used, instead of calling them, according to the name the people who live there/speak that language that they use to describe themselves ?

Different names for Germany are related to a distant history of Europe, I guess.

In medieval times, Europe was full of "states" based on ethnicity (tribes) that were fighting each other, some of them grew bigger, some vanished, new ones appeared... In "Germany", there were many of them. We in "Czechia" had major problems especially with Bavarians and Saxons through all our history. Patriotism was essential for tribe/state survival, travel was dangerous, slow and difficult, business routes were scarce, so it was safest to say: "Everyone who does not speak my language is my enemy". In Czech, we call Germans "Němci" and Germany "Německo", which is from the adjective "němý" (mute in English), back then "someone, who does not speak my language" and the same goes for other Slavic languages.

And as I mentioned Saxon tribe above, some names for Germany used in some more distant countries (written here in discussion by [mention]Enzfj2[/mention]) are related to their "state" Sachsen (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxony ), which is a part of Germany now. It seems they were good merchants.

Last edited by Gentianopsis on Wed Dec 07, 2022 3:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Gentianopsis
Czech Republic

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Gentianopsis »

For [mention]dakanga[/mention]:

Enzfj2 wrote: Mon Dec 05, 2022 8:14 pm

And Österreich is known everywhere as Austria, but Rakousko in Czech and Rakúsko in Slovak

The Czech name "Rakousko" for Austria comes from the name of the border castle Raabs, that used to be called "Rakous" by Czechs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burg_Raabs_an_der_Thaya .

From their grammar school, many Czech people remember this short poem written by Karel Havlíček Borovský (1821-1856 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karel_Havlíček_Borovský ), a strong critic of Austrian Habsburg monarchy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habsburg_monarchy

"Odkud vzalo - zkouším žáky -
jméno Rakous počátek?
Od raků, neb oni taky
chodí pořád nazpátek."

In English: "What is - I am examining students -
the name "Rakousy" (the name for "Rakousko" commonly used back then) originated from?
From crayfish ("rak" in Czech, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astacidea ), because they go always backwards too."

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Corinnebelle

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by Corinnebelle »

What does the word German mean? It's kind of sad that some people call each other aliens as their national name. At least German probably doesn't mean that!

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dakanga

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by dakanga »

Thank you for adding to my knowledge [mention]Corinnebelle[/mention] . This is new to me.

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PtolemysXX
Uganda

Re: You use a different name to the one I use. Why?

Post by PtolemysXX »

Gentianopsis wrote: Tue Dec 06, 2022 1:00 pm

For @dakanga

The Czech name "Rakousko" for Austria comes from the name of the border castle Raabs, that used to be called "Rakous" by Czechs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burg_Raabs_an_der_Thaya .

https://maps.app.goo.gl/uw8zQA9oCskQfcWD9

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