Stony Nakoda want to rename all the things

[Fuzz]

If a group of First Nations gets its wish, Calgary will be renamed Wichispa Oyade — Stoney Nakoda terms that roughly translate to mean elbow town.
The Stoney Nakoda have applied to have a long list of well-known places across southern Alberta changed to reflect traditional names given by their people.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgar...ames-1.4399941

Canmore: Chuwapchipchiyan Kude Bi
Just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?

So they want to go from one loosely set of associated names to another. I'm a hard no on this.

[Ozy_Flame]

Hard no. Absolutely not. They can use it in their cultural circles, but this will not (and should not) fly for the rest of Albertans.

[Sliver]

JFC is it even healthy for some of the people in some of these bands to keep living in the past like this? Move forward.

[Bigtime]

The article indicates:

it's possible for a natural location to have both an official and a traditional name.

So if this were to be approved at the Federal level the most plausible outcome is Calgary is still Calgary, but certain maps and places like Wikipedia may also list the traditional name given to it. At least that's how I read it.

But if we are going to change the official name it should be Calgree.

[Otto-matic]

Haha Mean Elbow Town.

[GGG]

Should white settlements be renamed after aboriginal names? I don't really think so. The city of Calgary for better or worse is a result of white settlers overwhelming the indigenous population. Calgary is a thing that has always been Calgary. Elbow town may have been a thing before but it isn't Calgary.

Now for rivers and mountains I am all for adding traditional names.

[PepsiFree]

Aside from having to spell/pronounce a new word, I can’t see how this would possibly affect me in any way.

Rename away.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by GGG

Now for rivers and mountains I am all for adding traditional names.

As well as Native places that have been given no Native names.

Hobbema being changed to Maskwacis in 2014 for example.

[llwhiteoutll]

Their own lawyer basically admitted in the article they are doing it to try and bolster their ongoing lawsuit. As soon as it gains a tiny bit of traction, they’ll hold it up as “white guilt” and proof that the government acknowledges their rightful claim to the land

[TheIronMaiden]

It's funny how changing the names of places into a different language pisses people off.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by llwhiteoutll

Their own lawyer basically admitted in the article they are doing it to try and bolster their ongoing lawsuit. As soon as it gains a tiny bit of traction, they’ll hold it up as “white guilt” and proof that the government acknowledges their rightful claim to the land

Part of that is true, they are doing it to reaffirm their claim to the land which relates to their lawsuit. The rest is unnecessary, we can talk about this without accusations of aboriginal people leveraging “white guilt,” it’s a petty thing for you to say and only serves to diminish their intentions.

[Fuzz]

I'm not sure anyone is pissed off. It just seems pointless to rename things that everyone is familiar with to names that are really hard to pronounce and very few people use. Names for most things are pretty arbitrary. Why should we adopt their arbitrary names over ours? Because they called it something first?

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by TheIronMaiden

It's funny how changing the names of places into a different language pisses people off.

The fact is, this city was a settlement set up by white Europeans (Captain James Macleod) and they named it what they named it. It would feel silly if Natives now named it something different because they didn't found the city.

It doesn't piss me off, just feels silly.

[Weitz]

Renaming things is stupid.

[GaiJin]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Part of that is true, they are doing it to reaffirm their claim to the land which relates to their lawsuit. The rest is unnecessary, we can talk about this without accusations of aboriginal people leveraging “white guilt,” it’s a petty thing for you to say and only serves to diminish their intentions.

[Backlunds_socks]

Considering this was their land first I'm all for it.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Aside from having to spell/pronounce a new word, I can’t see how this would possibly affect me in any way.

Rename away.

Okay, they can call it whatever they want. It does affect you when they start moving nonsense like this through the courts and holding public hearings. It's costly and pointless.

[Muta]

The cost of rebranding our city would be astronomical for very little gain in this, if any at all. They are more than welcome to use the term as they see fit internally, but that's where it ends.

[Coys1882]

I wonder if there are any Celts that want all Roman named cities in England renamed to something in Gaelic and what kind of traction that would get.

Civilizations have claimed land, taken it from someone else, had it taken back or lost it to someone else since the dawn of time. Why is it so different here? Is it because it's only been a couple hundred years? Did ancient England go through the same struggles after the same time period only to have it fade away with history as the centuries went by?

[Weitz]

Originally Posted by Coys1882

I wonder if there are any Celts that want all Roman named cities in England renamed to something in Gaelic and what kind of traction that would get.

Civilizations have claimed land, taken it from someone else, had it taken back or lost it to someone else since the dawn of time. Why is it so different here? Is it because it's only been a couple hundred years? Did ancient England go through the same struggles after the same time period only to have it fade away with history as the centuries went by?

It’s about money. Canada will pay and continue to pay.