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As a Turk, I do not trust people who are using Turkiye in English. That is virtue signaling which is saying they are populist, nationalist etc. etc. I also find

As a Turk, I do not trust people who are using Turkiye in English. That is virtue signaling which is saying they are populist, nationalist etc. etc. I also find the change idiotic at the least though I understand why they did it.

macintux 4y ago
When working with people of different nationalities and ethnicities I emphasize trying to pronounce their names correctly. Why is this different?
- jordigh 4y ago
  Because it's a nationalistic thing to insist that all languages spell your country's name in the script and spelling of the source language. It's a stupid move by the Erdogan government to get people to stop thinking about türkiye birds when they think of the Turkey country. Other countries get by just fine. Germany, Alemania, Deutschland. Mexico, Messico, Méjico. Japan, Nippon, 日本. China, Zhōngguó, 中国. Every country gets by getting called different things in different languages. But Turkey insisting on the spelling just because they don't want to be associated to türkiye birds, where the birds are literally named after the country, is a silly move designed to stir nationalistic pride for their near totalitarian government.
  - pcardoso 4y ago
    One funny thing is that in Portuguese the word for turkey (the bird) is Perú… also the same word as the South American country. Turkey is Turquia though…
    - thaumasiotes 4y ago
      > Turkey is Turquia though… The bird is named after a series of misconceptions, with different results in different places. The country is named after the Turks; you expect it to be the same everywhere.
- blagie 4y ago
  That's not always the right thing to do. I'm from a language where you'll never get it right, and most people are pragmatic and don't care about names being the way our mothers do. That's a very Western thing. Forcing us to try to teach you our language, or half-way butcherings, are considered obnoxious. Go with the English pronunciation. Do anything half-reasonable-sounding, and it's okay too. Don't visibly struggle each time you try to say my name. For my name specifically, there's also an uncanny valley phenomenon. My name pronounced obviously wrong by an American doesn't raise flags. Americans mispronouncing my native name sounds horribly wrong.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  Not a Turk here, but I'm guessing it is equivalent to using latinx or Latin@. It is a signal that you are from a bubble that is out of touch with your intended audience. Most Latin people don't use these terms and don't particularly care for them, so it signals that you are more aligned with a third-party then with Latin people.
- Kiro 4y ago
  What? If you would try to say my country's name in my native language instead of the English version when speaking English I would think you were a nutcase. Similarly my given name has an English pronunciation that I prefer people use when speaking English. Someone trying to pronounce it natively without being native would feel extremely awkward and not respectful at all.
- golemiprague 4y ago
  [dead]
- dzhiurgis 4y ago
  It might depend on country or person, but my name is already very hard to pronounce, asking me 2 or 3 times just prolongs the embarrassment
- freehorse 4y ago
  I find that impossible to achieve and believe others do. I have no expectation people getting my name right because, apart from other reasons, it contains sounds that do not exist in many standard languages. It would literally require training one to be able to produce new sounds, and that is just not practical at all, not to mention outright impossible for many to do accurately. I guess it is good to try to pronounce things good enough, but "correctly" I doubt.
radicaldreamer 4y ago
US State Dept has started using Türkiye for its communications...
- tradertef 4y ago
  Governments are different as they legally have to do it.
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    I don't think it's a legal requirement, they just choose to respect the wishes of the receiving government.
- geysersam 4y ago
  Of course. The will (and should) use the name the country officially defines to be the correct one. Why would they refuse and cause a diplomatic fuss over such a trivial thing?
- jlundberg 4y ago
  This is AFAIK a result of trying to get Erdogan to accept the NATO application from Sweden and Finland. NATO head Jens Stoltenberg started saying Turkey but then changed to Türkiye before the big NATO summit in Madrid last summer.
- trogdor 4y ago
  Interesting. From the State Department: "Note: The official conventional long-form and short-form names remain “Republic of Turkey” and “Turkey”, respectively. “Republic of Türkiye” should be used in formal and diplomatic contexts. The conventional names may be used in place of or alongside “Türkiye” in appropriate instances, including U.S. government cartographic products, as it is more widely understood by the American public." Source: https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-turkey/ https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-turkey/
agtech_andy 4y ago
I do agriculture stuff in Turkey. This has been a useful heuristic. I estimate that 90% of the people I have faced who get angry or make a big deal about this are bureaucrats who didn't get into their position by merit.
dzhiurgis 4y ago
Aotearoa New Zealand will be same
foronetimeonly1 4y ago
[dead]
can16358p 4y ago
This is nothing about trust. I'm using the officially declared word to describe the country. Nothing to do with ideology or views.
Shocka1 4y ago
Serious question here. As someone with closer ties to the Middle East than me, how do you look at people who pronounce Iraq correctly, as "Ih-rahk," compared to the usual American pronunciation, "Eye-rack"? As someone who was in that country for a year all over the place with a rifle attached to my chest, Americans always ask me about my exciting vacation there. As an American convervative myself, people's heads are blown whether the are left or right leaning when I pronounce it as "Ih-rahk." At this point I find the reactions fairly comical and get a kick out of experimenting on people, much to the dismay of my wife, who thinks I should just go with "Eye-rack" to stop embarrassing her. By the way, I pronounce Turkey as like a Thanksgiving "Turkey." Anecdotally I was told once upon a time by a first generation immigrant from Oman that you should pronounce a countries name as they pronounce it, as a respect thing. I thought more about it, and if I heard someone say United States as "Ooonited States," I wouldn't care one bit, but there really is only one way to pronounce the United States it so it's not really a fair comparison.

macintux 4y ago

When working with people of different nationalities and ethnicities I emphasize trying to pronounce their names correctly. Why is this different?

jordigh 4y ago
Because it's a nationalistic thing to insist that all languages spell your country's name in the script and spelling of the source language. It's a stupid move by the Erdogan government to get people to stop thinking about türkiye birds when they think of the Turkey country. Other countries get by just fine. Germany, Alemania, Deutschland. Mexico, Messico, Méjico. Japan, Nippon, 日本. China, Zhōngguó, 中国. Every country gets by getting called different things in different languages. But Turkey insisting on the spelling just because they don't want to be associated to türkiye birds, where the birds are literally named after the country, is a silly move designed to stir nationalistic pride for their near totalitarian government.
- pcardoso 4y ago
  One funny thing is that in Portuguese the word for turkey (the bird) is Perú… also the same word as the South American country. Turkey is Turquia though…
  - thaumasiotes 4y ago
    > Turkey is Turquia though… The bird is named after a series of misconceptions, with different results in different places. The country is named after the Turks; you expect it to be the same everywhere.
blagie 4y ago
That's not always the right thing to do. I'm from a language where you'll never get it right, and most people are pragmatic and don't care about names being the way our mothers do. That's a very Western thing. Forcing us to try to teach you our language, or half-way butcherings, are considered obnoxious. Go with the English pronunciation. Do anything half-reasonable-sounding, and it's okay too. Don't visibly struggle each time you try to say my name. For my name specifically, there's also an uncanny valley phenomenon. My name pronounced obviously wrong by an American doesn't raise flags. Americans mispronouncing my native name sounds horribly wrong.
s1artibartfast 4y ago
Not a Turk here, but I'm guessing it is equivalent to using latinx or Latin@. It is a signal that you are from a bubble that is out of touch with your intended audience. Most Latin people don't use these terms and don't particularly care for them, so it signals that you are more aligned with a third-party then with Latin people.
Kiro 4y ago
What? If you would try to say my country's name in my native language instead of the English version when speaking English I would think you were a nutcase. Similarly my given name has an English pronunciation that I prefer people use when speaking English. Someone trying to pronounce it natively without being native would feel extremely awkward and not respectful at all.
golemiprague 4y ago
[dead]
dzhiurgis 4y ago
It might depend on country or person, but my name is already very hard to pronounce, asking me 2 or 3 times just prolongs the embarrassment
freehorse 4y ago
I find that impossible to achieve and believe others do. I have no expectation people getting my name right because, apart from other reasons, it contains sounds that do not exist in many standard languages. It would literally require training one to be able to produce new sounds, and that is just not practical at all, not to mention outright impossible for many to do accurately. I guess it is good to try to pronounce things good enough, but "correctly" I doubt.

radicaldreamer 4y ago

US State Dept has started using Türkiye for its communications...

tradertef 4y ago
Governments are different as they legally have to do it.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  I don't think it's a legal requirement, they just choose to respect the wishes of the receiving government.
geysersam 4y ago
Of course. The will (and should) use the name the country officially defines to be the correct one. Why would they refuse and cause a diplomatic fuss over such a trivial thing?
jlundberg 4y ago
This is AFAIK a result of trying to get Erdogan to accept the NATO application from Sweden and Finland. NATO head Jens Stoltenberg started saying Turkey but then changed to Türkiye before the big NATO summit in Madrid last summer.
trogdor 4y ago
Interesting. From the State Department: "Note: The official conventional long-form and short-form names remain “Republic of Turkey” and “Turkey”, respectively. “Republic of Türkiye” should be used in formal and diplomatic contexts. The conventional names may be used in place of or alongside “Türkiye” in appropriate instances, including U.S. government cartographic products, as it is more widely understood by the American public." Source: https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-turkey/ https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-turkey/

agtech_andy 4y ago

I do agriculture stuff in Turkey. This has been a useful heuristic. I estimate that 90% of the people I have faced who get angry or make a big deal about this are bureaucrats who didn't get into their position by merit.

dzhiurgis 4y ago

Aotearoa New Zealand will be same

foronetimeonly1 4y ago

[dead]

can16358p 4y ago

This is nothing about trust. I'm using the officially declared word to describe the country. Nothing to do with ideology or views.

Shocka1 4y ago

Serious question here. As someone with closer ties to the Middle East than me, how do you look at people who pronounce Iraq correctly, as "Ih-rahk," compared to the usual American pronunciation, "Eye-rack"? As someone who was in that country for a year all over the place with a rifle attached to my chest, Americans always ask me about my exciting vacation there. As an American convervative myself, people's heads are blown whether the are left or right leaning when I pronounce it as "Ih-rahk." At this point I find the reactions fairly comical and get a kick out of experimenting on people, much to the dismay of my wife, who thinks I should just go with "Eye-rack" to stop embarrassing her. By the way, I pronounce Turkey as like a Thanksgiving "Turkey." Anecdotally I was told once upon a time by a first generation immigrant from Oman that you should pronounce a countries name as they pronounce it, as a respect thing. I thought more about it, and if I heard someone say United States as "Ooonited States," I wouldn't care one bit, but there really is only one way to pronounce the United States it so it's not really a fair comparison.