What’s In A Name?

[00:00:00] The Why Curve, with Phil Dobbie and Roger Hearing. Gulf of America. Lake America. Now even the state of New America. Donald Trump has caused ridicule and outrage by renaming places. Does he have the right to change the map? Does anyone. Who decides what we call mountains, lakes and seas? And why does it matter if Madras is now Chennai? Snowdon is Irwitha. And Ayers Rock is now Uluru. Why are place names things that people will fight over?

[00:00:30] The Why Curve. I have to say, I'm very glad that you chose to actually be the one who said what Mount Snowden is now called. Yes. What's it called again? I don't know. Yes. Widefer? How do you pronounce it? Well, I think, I mean, our professor who's coming on shortly will correct me, but I think it's Irwitha. Oh, right. Okay, cool. There we are. But I could be completely wrong. But do you know what?

[00:00:56] There's some places, obviously, around the world which are pronounced differently depending on, you know, like the locals call it something different to what everybody else calls it. Because names matter. People are concerned to imprint themselves on a place. And also there's a bit of pride, isn't there, if you've got a local pronunciation. So there's a place in North Yorkshire which you might think is called Chopgate. But it's actually pronounced Chopyat. And that's how they can tell whether you're local or not. Yes. Yes.

[00:01:25] But what if the government comes along tomorrow and says, we're calling it Mount Burnham instead? Yes. To commemorate the glorious leadership. Of course. It could happen, couldn't it? But yeah, I feel as though, I mean, we said Donald Trump was getting a bit of ridicule for this. I mean, he deserves ridicule for this, doesn't he? I mean, just the whole... And so much more. But particularly this. Is everything going to be called America? Is New York going to just be called America, America? I mean, you know, where does he stop?

[00:01:54] It's almost as though he's got a bit of an identity crisis and he has to remind himself of where he lives. Well, yeah. And also, I mean, he's doing it unusually, certainly. But, I mean, you know, the whole history, recent history into the 20th and 21st century is a lot of renaming for political reasons. South Africa, Wales, of course, which we've just referenced. India, you know, the colonially imposed names get changed.

[00:02:22] But, you know, does it change anything actually concrete on the ground? Aren't we just, you know, it's just vanity, really. And, of course, when you've got places like America or Australia, where I'm talking to you from, a lot of place names come from the old country. You know, there's places named after the UK or other parts of the world where migrants have moved to. I wonder how Donald Trump thinks of Kabul, for example, in Missouri. Ah.

[00:02:50] You know, and there's loads of places in the United States named after places that he might not particularly like. Well, yes. But they're there. Yes. Well, perhaps they should rename the reflecting pool in Washington Hormuz. Yes. And that would probably go, yeah, that would be interesting, wouldn't it? Well, it's strange, isn't it? Yeah, exactly. So I wonder, yeah, whether he's going to have much success. And, of course, Google have just pounced on to supporting him. Rather sickeningly. Yes, and Apple too. Yes. Yeah. They've both done it.

[00:03:20] But who decides? I mean, this is the thing. Well, he does it in this case. You know, he could tomorrow say, right. Well, it does if it's in America. But can he just suddenly, he was talking about maybe naming oceans. You know, and obviously most of Lake Ontario is actually in Canada rather than the US. What right does he have to do that? Yeah. Is there any rule? Yeah. Well, that is interesting, isn't it? Well, if it's international waters, I wonder. I mean, if it's in a country, then obviously it's determined by the sovereignty of that nation.

[00:03:48] But, I mean, can a leader? I mean, he clearly feels as though he can. I mean, I'm not quite sure what would happen in the UK if someone did try and do that. Maybe we should. Well, that's what we're going to do today. We're going to investigate all of that. Because, indeed, because we have someone who's studied it all. And it's Rhys Jones. He's professor of human geography at the University of Aberystwyth. And he joins us now. So, Rhys, let's get this sorted out first of all then. So, the name for Mount Snowden, the Welsh name, how do you pronounce it? Arouid Vah. Oh, I wasn't even close. I wasn't even close.

[00:04:19] Nothing at all. But, I mean, it's interesting, isn't it, when we look at place names? Because, obviously, you're quite good at Welsh because you are Welsh. But for the English, it is actually a profoundly difficult language. I mean, I remember years ago practicing clanfare PG, as we call it now, just because it's the longest place name. But, I mean, that is why places get changed, isn't it? Because it's so they're more palatable for foreigners, I guess, which we see in lots of places around the world. The English conquered Wales.

[00:04:47] That's the almost awful thing in the background of that, I guess. Yeah. And I think it's worth going back in history a little bit to look at some of that. Without going into too much of the whole context behind the Welsh language and, some might say, its subjugation historically.

[00:05:05] But specifically in terms of place names, I suppose, we can go back to, you know, work that's been done in Wales, but also in Scotland, a similar kind of context, about the role of the Ordnance Survey in mapping. The Scotland, Wales, the Celtic periphery, if you want to describe it in that way.

[00:05:26] And the way in which, you know, they collected information about place names there and that they would go out, the surveyors, and they would ask local landowners, more often than not, about what the name of, names of features in the landscape were. More often than not, or very often those would be people without any knowledge of the local language, in a sense.

[00:05:50] So, right from the outset, there is that sense in which you have a hierarchy being established there between different languages linked to an inability maybe to speak and to say a word or a term in the local language.

[00:06:10] And English, in that sense, being imposed on the language, the local language, but on the landscape as well, in terms of the names of features in the landscape. So, right from the very start, really, you have that process of naming. And once that becomes standardised, institutionalised through the British state, in this case, and the Ordnance Survey, then there is that sense of imposing the English language on others.

[00:06:39] So, that is interesting, because one of the questions we were going to ask was who actually determines what the names are of places. And you're saying, well, in that instance, and I'm sure it's probably the same around the world, it's whoever's doing the mapping early on who's probably… And the people doing the mapping are the people who have been told to do the mapping by a government, presumably. Yes, yeah.

[00:06:59] And I think, you know, we're talking here about history, obviously, but there are sort of echoes of this happening today, or some kind of legacy, if you like, of that still happening today. When we did a project a few years ago now, looking at the way in which Ordnance Survey and other bodies increasingly, things like Google Maps, maps on Apple, Bing Maps, all of these kinds of things. How do they get their names? How do they get their information?

[00:07:28] And certainly in the context of the Ordnance Survey, when people had indicated to them that there were names here, English names, but also misspelt Welsh names, or names that didn't actually equate to the names used locally. Then the line that the Ordnance Survey used was, well, these have been on our maps for over 100 years.

[00:07:50] And so we need to be convinced that this is the actual name being used locally, you know, the correct name rather than the name that was on the map. And then that legacy, if you like, going back 100 years, once those norms have been set, once those names have been allocated to features in the landscape, then it becomes very difficult to change those.

[00:08:14] And almost that sense in that case, that the Ordnance Survey weren't really aware of their own history or the critique of their own history and their own, you know, their historic practices, and that their own practices were fallible. And Rhys, I suppose also you've got these, you know, that's where, you know, you're listening to what a local says a name is and you try and get it wrong. But there's also where, you know, people come in and just say, well, we're going to call it this.

[00:08:43] That's just the name we're going to impose, perhaps the name of the colonial administrator or the local magistrate or whatever it is. And that, so, you know, you have Victoria Falls in Africa, Lake Victoria, obviously referring to the sovereign at the time. It was not discovered, really, because the locals knew it was there all the time. And the same with, you know, we mentioned Australia, Uluru, Ayers Rock. Ayers, I guess, was an official.

[00:09:07] Yeah, and certainly as part of that broader process of decolonisation, I'm not sure if it's a rediscovery of the original names, indigenous names, or whether those names are obviously still being used in many cases, in the vast majority of cases, by indigenous people or local people in that sense. But I think it is, thankfully, something that has been taking place across the world.

[00:09:34] I think you're referring there to examples that are far more stark in many respects than what we've seen happening in Wales or in Scotland. It's a similar kind of process and a similar kind of principle, if you like. And you referred to it earlier on, the idea that it is a state power, an imperial power that has the ability,

[00:09:56] the authority in that sense to create knowledge and to use that process of naming as a way of imposing its own power as well over other subaltern people, whatever they are. As I say, it's a starker process in many contexts, in many colonial contexts overseas. But you could see an echo of it happening within the UK.

[00:10:22] Maybe we're getting into debates here about what is the difference or the similarity between imperialism and state building. And that's maybe a debate for another day. But the example of Snowden, so is that a name that it's changed to? I'm not even going to attempt to pronounce, I'm afraid. But is that a name that Welsh people had stuck with all through the years and it's just now we're starting to adopt it? Or I mean, what's the history there?

[00:10:52] You're asking me a specific question there about the history of it. I can speak about my own experience. And for me and for all Welsh speakers, we would have referred to Snowden as a rhwythfa. And it would always have been a rhwythfa. By the same token, erry would have always been erry as a national park and an area or region of Wales as opposed to Snowdonia. And so these two languages would have existed in parallel, if you like.

[00:11:20] And certainly for me and for other Welsh speakers, they would have used the Welsh name. And I think what we have happening, you know, both in the context of Snowden, erwythfa, erry Snowdonia by Rosobanna by Chyniog in the south. And it's more interesting there in a sense, because I think, you know, it's sort of given the geography of the Welsh language in Wales,

[00:11:46] where you have the highest percentages of Welsh speakers up in northwest Wales, in west Wales, maybe in general. It's sort of, I mean, you also have a far more, I don't know what is the word I'm looking for now, but a local council that is far more supportive of the Welsh language, far more proactive in supporting the Welsh language. It's sort of understandable, maybe, that they have made this decision to rename, not to rename,

[00:12:14] but to say that the name that actually counts now is the Welsh name. So do you think the rest of us should then just try and learn? We should just dig in and try and learn a bit of Welsh? Because for most people, it's difficult. So if somebody says, you know, if you ask somebody in Wales for directions from one place to another, and you're talking to a Welsh person who gives you a whole load of Welsh place names, you'd just be going, well, I really have not a clue where I am or where I'm going now.

[00:12:42] Because it's a difficult language to learn, I think. Well, but is it, though? I mean, I don't speak Welsh, but I kind of can get my head around the fact, wherever I am in the world, if someone is going to give the names of the places, you accept them because they're the names of the places. You know, you can't just say, well, give me an English version. I think it does sort of wind me up a little bit. I'm not sure, you know, in the sense that, you know, there must be measures of which languages are relatively easy to learn

[00:13:10] and languages that are relatively more difficult to learn. I think Welsh has a badge that it's a difficult language to learn, but there are countless people who do learn Welsh on a regular basis. And in that sense, I think, you know, you've already mentioned Uluru, and we use that now. We're familiar with the other name for that landscape feature.

[00:13:37] But I think over time, presumably, people will get used to the Welsh name for Welsh names for these places. I think you raise an interesting point, because I think it's one thing that has been raised by people, for instance, walkers up in Erwari in Snowdonia,

[00:13:59] about, you know, if they're trying to direct, I don't know, mountain rescue or somebody to come and rescue them or to help somebody in difficulty, then the language for them then becomes a little bit of an impediment. And so there are some interesting kinds of questions there that, you know, need to be thought through. But Rhys, the point surely in all this is, you know, you respect local situations.

[00:14:25] So in a situation where there are people who speak a certain language, that's, you know, that's fine. They give them the names that they are perfectly reasonably able to do. But I suppose the question is, do names matter that much? Because this has been a change. It's actually been a change on the map. And that's not true in Wales, but also true in these other things we're talking about. It clearly matters to people who do make the change. But I suppose the question is, why does it matter what word, what name you give something?

[00:14:53] I think it's worth going back to, again, maybe something that connects to what we're discussing specifically in terms of Erruri as opposed to Snowdonia and Erruri as opposed to Snowdon.

[00:15:05] And if you go back to the beginnings of the Welsh language movement in the 1960s, and when that kicked off in the early 60s, there were sort of specific debates at that point around the language that was used in court summons and on official forms. And it was English and there were demands for Welsh language versions of those forms.

[00:15:33] But, you know, that sort of gained some traction. But I think it's fair to say that when the Welsh language movement became far more prominent and managed to attract far more support in Wales was in the context of place names. And it was in the context of the road signs in particular.

[00:15:55] And so there's a road sign campaign that started in the late 1960s on really into the mid 70s, where you had people going out on a regular basis, either to deface signs by painting over them or to just pull them down and vandalise them in different kinds of ways.

[00:16:15] And I think that campaign was the one that actually helped to make that Welsh language campaign more broadly in the Welsh language movement far more prominent in the public eye. So there is some power, there is some kind of resonance to place names and the visibility of place names. You know, that is even more visible.

[00:16:39] And moving away from Wales, of course, you know, the images we've seen and obviously where we're talking about now is what Donald Trump has been doing in terms of naming the Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of America, Lake Ontario, Lake America. And of course, the AI creations and everything else online have all been showing signs showing these new names. So the signs matter, I guess.

[00:17:01] They do matter. And I think once you, you know, the power to name is a powerful kind of power, if you like, in the sense of once you start to name that you impose your own sense of order and power, if you like, over the thing that you are naming.

[00:17:17] And so in that sense, it is something that is, you know, to come back to that specific example of the Welsh place names that, you know, once you had these, the bilingual road signs being erected in Wales, then it actually spoke to, you know, a different kind of vision of what Wales was, what the Welsh language was, the status of the Welsh language.

[00:17:43] And the fact that you have from the very boundary of Wales now, you know, in some parts of Wales, you cross the boundary and there isn't really a marker saying there or a sign saying you are now in England or welcome to England or welcome to Wales. But you can detect, you can know, you know when you're in Wales because of the bilingual road signs. And so it gives that sense of definition to the Welsh territory.

[00:18:06] The fact that you have bilingual road signs, it gives that sense of status to the Welsh language that it didn't have. So naming is very significant, particularly in that context, the visibility of names in the landscape itself. So how old are the names? So the example with Donald Trump wanting to name, rename Lake Ontario and the argument that actually the name Ontario predates the United States. And that's the same for most place names, isn't it?

[00:18:34] They are, they do go back a long way in history, very often related to the geography, you know, place names that relate to perhaps the down by the river or by the sea, or there's a particular mineral that's extracted there or whatever. So is it, you know, what, where do these names originate from? I know there's a million and one variations, but just generally, I mean, they're pretty old, obviously, in most cases. Yes, they're pretty old.

[00:19:01] I think importantly, they predate probably a modern state building process. I think that's, you know, the formation of the modern state is where you see an attempt to try and standardise. It's that attempt to try and make, you know, space legible and understandable so that it becomes then more easily governable for the state. But you're right, the names themselves, they come from, you know, different kinds of contexts.

[00:19:26] I think some of the ones that are more interesting to me, I suppose, and, you know, we're talking here about identity and the significance of place for identity. But for me as well, I think there's an important role that the place names play in terms of people's understandings of their relationship with the environment as well. And that's where a lot of these place names come.

[00:19:49] You know, that sense of naming a hill or naming a particular woodland where there's a species of bird that is very prevalent there. And so I think that those, I think it's difficult to understand, to know where they started and when they started.

[00:20:08] But it's that, I guess, goes back to quite an essential thing for humans, which is understanding their relationship with the environment and knowing where they are and making sense of the environment that surrounds them as well.

[00:20:23] And there you are going back, I guess, to the, you know, to the very beginnings of human civilisation, really, in terms of something that is innate in us and something that we feel necessary to do in order to place ourselves in the environment and understand their relationship with the environment as well. And I think those are some of the names, you know, there's an example in Wales again, you know, of a bank cornicill, which is the bank of the lapwing, which has been changed to Hakuna Matata.

[00:20:55] That's Swahili. Yes, yes. So I think that there is, you know, there are those examples that in that sense, you know, have the potential to erase any sort of sense of that connection to a specific kind of landscape and specific kind of environment that speaks to that, you know, a very deep history of connecting with those places and all of that.

[00:21:21] So what happens then, Rhys, if you have someone like Donald Trump who comes in and says, right, I'm naming this, I'm naming that, I'm naming the other. He's a powerful man. He can dictate it, I suppose, at least in the US government terms. But there's no international authority that decides what places are called. I mean, then you could have chaos, I suppose, because someone says, well, we're flying to the Gulf of Mexico. And someone says, no, no, you know, the people there say, no, we're not the Gulf of Mexico, we're Gulf of America.

[00:21:48] So you've got all sorts of confusions coming in if you don't have some overall authority or guide. But no more different to place names which are given different names according to different nationalities. I mean, there's lots of countries in the world, aren't there, where the local people might name a place differently to, you know, the way the rest of the world describes it. Yeah, and I think that, you know, in Welsh, I would say that London is Llundain and Worcester is Car Rangon.

[00:22:17] So in a sense, the different names that exist for different places isn't necessarily a problem because it reflects multilingualism. And the fact that, you know, different languages are spoken across the world. I guess the problem arises when you have somebody trying to impose that name on other people then. So if I started going around and saying, well, no, you can't call Worcester Worcester anymore, you have to call it Car Rangon.

[00:22:45] And, you know, people rightly wouldn't be particularly happy with that. So I think, you know, that is, I guess, the problem in the context of Lake Ontario or the Gulf of Mexico. Maybe there is a specific context there as well in the sense that these are shared spaces. There are places on the boundary and in that sense, they become more contentious.

[00:23:12] And there is maybe a sense of some justification, whatever, you know, however misguided that justification is from Donald Trump's part that he can name these places. But it derives from the fact that these places border the United States. And so there is some sense of ownership, if you like, in scare quotes over these places and therefore the names that are used for them. And that's where you see the, you know, the more contentious kinds of issues arising then because they are shared spaces.

[00:23:42] So there are no international sort of authorities that say, so there's no like, you know, the UN Department of Mapping or something that says this is the official globally accepted name for a given place. I'm not aware, you know, I'd be wary of saying that it doesn't exist, but I'm not aware of it. I think it's, you know, we've seen some slight forays into this.

[00:24:05] I noticed something, was it last week or yesterday about the United Nations now adopting a different kind of map projection. I know it's a slightly different kind of issue, but that sense of, I think it's the Peter's projection, I think, is it that sort of... Yes, it's the one that makes Africa larger because when you try and turn a globe into a flat space, obviously there's distortion.

[00:24:31] So they've gone for the one that's more accurate in terms of the size ratio. Yeah, so there must be a UN organ or a part of the UN that has some kind of interest in that, in the way in which we think about the world as a globe, as a totality, if you like. I think the problem with naming is that it tends to happen within the context of individual states.

[00:25:00] So what Donald Trump's doing is almost like a form of modern imperialism, isn't it, really? Except he's not going through with the invasion. I mean, the only time ever I would imagine that a name change has been imposed on a country is when that country has been invaded.

[00:25:12] And so the invader might rename a few places, but I'm not aware of anything in recent times where one country has tried to impose a name change on another or even taking, as you say, boundaries which are shared. I mean, I suppose you've got Malvinas and Falklands would be one, I suppose. I think, yeah, you're right. I think that's a good example.

[00:25:39] The other thing to note, I suppose, and this is where it has become interesting, is that in a sense, if Donald Trump said, all right, I'm renaming the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf of America, Lake Ontario as Lake America, you know, who cares at one level if he says that? And if it's something that is, for instance, taught in schools in the United States, I think it becomes more of our problem.

[00:26:07] There's a point of principle here that we can obviously disagree with. But I think it becomes more of an issue for us when you have multinational organisations based in the United States, such as Google, who feel then that they have to reflect and respond to that.

[00:26:26] And then it becomes, because of the global nature of a lot of these products and apps and so on, that all of a sudden it has the potential to become our problem as things are renamed in a way that we wouldn't, you know, in a way which we wouldn't agree. So we might not care too much whether it's called the Gulf of Mexico or the Gulf of America, because we'll just keep on calling it the Gulf of Mexico. But Americans might be upset about it being called the Gulf of America.

[00:26:53] There might be, you know, the vast majority of Americans who are not Trump supporters. So that becomes a problem where someone within power is able to impose their own views in a way which lasts beyond their life as president or their political influence to something which has changed the course of history. I'm not, unless they. Well, you could say that about Lake Victoria in Africa. It's still Lake Victoria. Queen Victoria died more than, well, 150 years ago. But it's still Lake Victoria.

[00:27:23] I was going to say that, you know, maybe before you refer to that example of Lake Victoria, that people die and priorities, political priorities change. And so names can revert to either what they were before or they can evolve into new names. But as you say, there is, in some cases, a permanence to these names.

[00:27:46] And the fact that, you know, I think even now, I think the BBC reports on, if they're referring to Arruidhwar, they will say Arruidhwar, also known as Snowdon. Now, you know, there is, how long will that go on for? I don't know. But I think there is, the legacy value of those names, I think, is important. And I think it does take time for them to change.

[00:28:15] But, you know, hopefully the blip that we're seeing now in the United States will mean that there won't be too much permanence. Well, who knows? Well, there'll be a lot of work recorrecting school books and doing all kinds of things, I suppose, if it goes back. But, I mean, I would just give another example within our own area, I guess, is Derry, Londonderry,

[00:28:35] which is, you know, immensely politically contentious and remains a sort of focal point around which people will, you know, really almost fight over, literally, in this case. Yeah. No, you're right. And I think it is that, you know, again, you're into that sort of colonial, post-colonial kind of context there, once again, in Northern Ireland. And I think that, or even, you know, the use of the word Northern Ireland, I've been corrected a number of times by people who say that I should be saying the north of Ireland.

[00:29:04] So, again, the way in which we even, you know, which terms that we use there to describe that part of Ireland or the island of Ireland, I think, you know, it is, it reflects a particular kind of politics there.

[00:29:15] I think, you know, there is, you know, the undercurrent, I guess, in a lot of what we're discussing is the fact that languages divide or have the potential to divide and have the potential to reflect particular kinds of identity. Sometimes they're in conflict with each other.

[00:29:38] The example of Northern Ireland is a good one there, less so in Wales, of course, but I think there are sort of echoes of that in Wales as well. But it does raise, you know, there are more hopeful kinds of ways of thinking about the role of language and naming as well.

[00:29:55] I think that there have been some efforts even in Northern Ireland to use place names and discussions around place names as a way of building bridges between different communities and to try and help with reconciliation and so on.

[00:30:10] Now, it is a challenge, but there are examples of schemes in Belfast where people, you know, people from a Protestant background are learning Irish and seeing that as a way of enabling dialogue, if you like, and place names by extension being a part of that. It is a challenge. I don't deny that.

[00:30:31] But I think, you know, I think that it's worth sort of nodding to that as well, that language can bring people together and not just play a role in separating them. So it is all about a sense of place, isn't it, really? That, you know, that we've got an affinity very often with the place that we were born, for example. And I guess it sort of makes sense that, you know, that if that name is historical, then you would take an interest in the history of the place in which you were born.

[00:30:57] So I can see, you know, that idea that you might actually want to go back to some of the original naming of places if they've changed over time, because you are interested in the history of it. Definitely. And I think it's interesting as well in the context of the planning system. Now, we haven't mentioned the planning system yet.

[00:31:16] But, you know, certainly in Wales, and I'm more familiar, sorry, with the context of Wales, but in the planning system in Wales, the most recent planning guidance, there is an emphasis there now on place making. You know, that is the role of planning is to make places.

[00:31:34] But as part of that in Wales, the recognition that the Welsh language is part of that process of place making and of place names being a constituent element of that as well. So it is, you are right to think there, to think about, you know, at the individual level, about how, you know, individuals make sense of their relationship with their local places and the names that they use to describe those places.

[00:32:03] And not just the official names as well. I think this is another thing that we can probably, you know, if you wanted to discuss in more detail, but those sort of very unofficial names, personal names that either individuals or families or, you know, young people in an area have for different, you know, local environments and so on. So certainly that naming is an important part of making sense of that place.

[00:32:28] But also then, as I say, there's an institutional recognition of the significance of that in something like the planning system where they say, well, yes, you know, this is what we're about. The planning system in Wales is about creating places, placemaking and language and culture play an important role in that process as well. But it's interesting, Rhys, we're talking about reversion a lot of the time, reversion to what the original name is, what the real name is and all that sort of stuff.

[00:32:56] But it also goes forward, too, because, I mean, you think of places or, you know, like John Lennon Airport in Liverpool, for example. Right. Let's let's promote someone, you know, that will be attractive as a new name. And that's true in lots of parts of the world. So, you know, there is a reason to move forward and name things after people, because I suppose, again, culturally, that's significant. But it's a political decision, isn't it? Very often.

[00:33:21] I mean, it's a local council or it's a government that's deciding all of these names, even though there might be local history to a place. If you're applying new names, I mean, it comes from officialdom, not from the people. Well, it can. And I think it comes from people as well.

[00:33:38] I think in some cases, for instance, if you're, you know, the case is the case I refer to Errolon about the Hakuna Matata farm, then I think that that is an individual who chose to rename the farm using that name. I guess the question is who gets to decide what name is used and is there free license for anyone to change the name of their property?

[00:34:07] Some property owners might say, well, you know, I own this property and therefore, you know, it's within my gift to change the name of that property. But I think that there is a sense as well, certainly the feeling in Wales at the moment is that there needs to be some kind of regulation of that process.

[00:34:29] I think in that sense, you know, there have been attempts to try and use planning authorities, even suggestions that in order to change a place name, that you should submit the planning application in order to do that. There's a small fee that you have to pay now, but it's a relatively straightforward process. But, you know, attempts to try and formalize a process of changing a place name.

[00:34:53] But again, who gets to decide which name is used and whether you can change a place name? The interesting thing in Wales, I think the Welsh Government commissioned a study last year, I think, to look at, you know, how widespread this kind of issue was.

[00:35:14] And the study found there really that I think beyond the isolated examples that I've mentioned already and that other people have mentioned as well, in general, the majority of changes in place name or property names, they either stay in the same language or there are more examples of property names changing from English to Welsh than there are from Welsh to English.

[00:35:43] So, in a sense, maybe there isn't as much of a problem, if you want to see it as a problem, there isn't as much of a problem really as people have noted. Now, that is formal changes in names, but there are informal changes of names that are also a major issue. Is it an issue that Google might become a bit of a gatekeeper? Yeah, exactly. Do we need a kind of regulated system and Google and Apple and everyone have to answer to that? Because I've just typed... Internationally.

[00:36:12] Yeah, because I've just typed Snowden into Google Maps and it's come up as Snowden. I mean, I'm not getting an alternative. Well, I think it is. When we did this project, maybe five or six years ago now, you know, we could get... This is part of the issue for me, I think, is that, you know, as researchers, we could get hold of people in the ordinance survey. We could access people in local planning authorities in Wales.

[00:36:37] But try and get hold of somebody in Google to talk to about this kind of issue. Try and explain to them the nuances of Welsh politics, of the relationship between Wales and England, of the long history of debate and protest around Welsh place names. And it's almost impossible to do that.

[00:37:03] So I think there is that sense as well, you know, of almost a greater distance now between the people who are producing the maps and the people who are consuming them. Yes, yeah. And I think, you know, certainly back in the day, as I mentioned, there would be a surveyor going round and that they would be collecting that information.

[00:37:27] If that is being done remotely, if it's being done via databases that, you know, exist somewhere in some warehouse in California or whatever, you know, these databases are housed, then it becomes a very difficult process there to try and effect change. And they're much more interested probably in what the relationships are between Canada and Mexico and Washington than really, frankly, what you'll call a mountain in Wales, truth be told. Yeah.

[00:37:57] And, you know, this is before you start getting into the world of algorithms and people searching for places, as you've just searched now. And, you know, if people are searching for Snowdon as opposed to Roeddha, understandably so, then does that reinforce the English name for Snowdon rather than the Welsh one? Well, English dominating the world of these things anyway, inevitably, internationally.

[00:38:25] Well, I was actually surprised that it didn't sort of like have in brackets or alongside it the Welsh alternative. And that does just show, doesn't it, that Silicon Valley has a big control on all of this. And the alternative, I suppose, is, and people are toying with this, is using things like OpenStreetMap in order to democratise maps. Ah, yeah.

[00:38:50] And to write maps from below and pursue, and as part of that, certainly the discussions we've had with some of the people involved in that, then being able to democratise and ensure that it's some of these Welsh place names. But even, you know, ones that go beyond the formal Welsh place names into these more informal kinds of names that people have for, you know, features in the landscape and so on.

[00:39:17] So there is an alternative kind of mapping that could enable you to counter some of this more problematic, top-down, very distantiated kind of mapping. Yeah. Good luck with that when it comes to trying to get the White House on. Well, the good news is when I do put in the Welsh name into Google Maps, it does actually take me to Snowdon. It just doesn't tell me why. Well, on the note that we're halfway there, Rhys, thanks so much for being with us.

[00:39:42] And maybe democratisation of naming will come in at some point, but not, I think, while Donald Trump is in the White House. Good to talk. Thanks for coming on. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Cheers. Now, next week, we're going to look at government debt, which obviously is something that's often talked about. And do you know what? For a long time, people have said, well, we don't need to worry about American debt, because even though we know America is running up huge debts, they can get away with it because they are a reserve currency, the world's reserve currency.

[00:40:10] And there's so much demand for the US dollar that debt is not really going to have too profound an effect. But now we are seeing US bonds, the yield on US bonds, rising a great deal. In other words, the cost of borrowing. And it's not just inflation that is driving that. It is also the concern that America, like many other places in the world, might just be too much in debt. Yes. Yes. It's how much debt is too much. And this is the thing.

[00:40:37] If you're talking about states, in a way, unless you expect the state to collapse, they're always going to be paid back, surely. Yeah. Well, it's not that easy, is it? I mean, very rarely they get paid back. It always seems to be just a climbing level. They're at least honoured. Yeah. Yeah. But they're honoured, at least. They don't default. And that's the thing. I mean, government debt is a hugely complicated and we'll try and make it not boring area. Yes. But it is something that matters because if governments can't afford the debt that they've got to service it, they can't spend money on hospitals and schools and all the rest of it.

[00:41:06] And the demand for all of those things just seems to be increasing, doesn't it? So it's almost as though you have to be in debt these days and you have to be adding to your debt to just provide just a modicum of what is required for modern economies. So why is that happening? Why is it now so difficult to survive without pushing your debt up so high? So we'll look at all of that next week on The White Curve. Join us for that. We'll see you then. Bye. The White Curve.