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It's funny: when Americans realize we're saying the name of a foreign city badly, like Peking for Beijing, Canton for Guangzhou, and others, we move to assimila
by JasonFruit 4y ago
It's funny: when Americans realize we're saying the name of a foreign city badly, like Peking for Beijing, Canton for Guangzhou, and others, we move to assimilate our naming to that of the natives. Why is it that everyone insists that we refer to ourselves by the wrong name? Is it even possible for us to be wrong about what we call ourselves?
- tombh 4y agoThey're not insisting anything though right? They've only said it's funny and confusing. That you consider them to be insisting is interesting. I'm British so I've never been on the receiving end of any of that insistence, but from your response I assume it must happen frequently. What I really want to contribute here though is that your "we" from "what we call ourselves" doesn't include me. Like a lot of people outside the US, English is my native language and calling Americans Americans has always given me pause for thought. So I put it back to you: Is it even possible for us to be wrong about what we call you?
- woodruffw 4y agoJust as a note: Peking was a corruption by French missionaries, not Americans. In general, these kinds of errors come from historical limitations: orthography, linguistics, &c. At minimum, it’s respectful to try to adapt based on our better, contemporary understanding.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago> Just as a note: Peking was a corruption by French missionaries, not Americans. What? Peking wasn't a corruption at all. It accurately reflects the pronunciation encountered by... most Europeans who interacted with Chinese. Mandarin received official status in the 20th century.