Abstract
Although much of the literature on controversies over the naming of geographic features has been associated with the names of cultural features, the naming or renaming of mountains, streams, and other physical features on the landscape has also been controversial in many cases. In the United States, the US Board on Geographic Names (BGN) is responsible for determining and authorizing the use of official names for physical landscape features. The Board is charged with resolving conflicts involving the use of offensive or derogatory names. In this chapter, the process of conflict resolution is discussed using recent examples, illustrating the wide range of names that various groups regard as offensive.
Keywords
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsReferences
Alderman, D. H. (2003). Street names and the scaling of memory: The politics of commemorating Martin Luther King, Jr. within the African-American community. Area, 35, 163–173.
Associated Press. (2016, August 12). Feds rename Harney Peak, South Dakota’s highest peak, to Black Elk Peak. Rapid City Journal. https://rapidcityjournal.com/news/local/feds-rename-harney-peak-south-dakota-s-highest-peak-to/article_2234e9de-c1fc-5a44-91b2-e39f3bfb76e4.html
Berger, K. (2015, October 28). The Northwest’s “Squaw” problem. Crosscut. https://crosscut.com/2015/10/the-northwests-squaw-problem
Berlin, J. (2015, September 18). Who decides what names go on a map?” Nationalgeographic.com. https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150918-us-board-geographical-names-125th-anniversary-national-geographic-maps-place-names/.
Bright, W. (2004). Native American placenames in the United States. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
Burr, T. (2017, October 13). Utah’s Negro Bill Canyon renamed Grandstaff Canyon by federal board. Salt Lake Tribune. https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2017/10/12/negro-bill-canyon-renamed-grandstaff-canyon-by-federal-board/
Dobbyn, P. (2011, September 7). In Alaska, a beautiful stream is FUBAR no more. Sit News. http://www.sitnews.us/0911News/090711/090711_beautiful_stream.html
Dwyer, O. J., & Alderman, D. H. (2008). Civil rights memorials and the geography of memory. Athens: University of Georgia Press.
Leib, J. (2012). A talk of two civil war statues: Teaching the geographies of memory and heritage in Norfolk, Virginia. Southeastern Geographer, 52, 398–412.
Myers, A. L. (2008, April 10). Squaw Peak is officially renamed for Piestewa. Tucson.com. http://tucson.com/news/squaw-peak-is-officially-renamed-for-piestewa/article_0b6fd7ed-b6fb-5444-9231-8d7ac2283b6d.html
National Park Service. (2017). Denali or Mount McKinley? https://www.nps.gov/dena/learn/historyculture/denali-origins.htm
Neihardt, J. G. (2008). Black Elk speaks: Being the life story of a holy man of the Oglala Sioux. Albany: SUNY Press.
Nick, I. M. (2017). Squaw teats, Harney Peak, and Negrohead Creek: A corpus-linguistic investigation of proposals to change official US Toponymy to (Dis)honor indigenous US Americans. Names: A Journal of Onomastics, 65, 223–234.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Shelley, F.M. (2020). The Board of Geographic Names and the Removal of Derogatory and Offensive Toponyms in the United States. In: Brunn, S., Kehrein, R. (eds) Handbook of the Changing World Language Map. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02438-3_177
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02438-3_177
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-02437-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-02438-3
eBook Packages: Social SciencesReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences