There is an increasing global movement to change colonial place names that refelect changing attitudes toward colonialsim and imperialism and a wish to throw off the schackles of that legacy. In India, the city of Bombay has become Mumbai. In South Africa, the region of Eastern Transvaal has become Mpumalanga. In Australia, where Aboriginal communities are currently faced with a massive wave of evictions and land grabs, there are calls to use indigenous names for the places with names bestowed by the British colonisers.
Stop the Forced Closure of Aboriginal Communities in Australia say:
It is time to call our cities by their true names. They are beautiful, they are cultural and they are grounded in strong mother tongue and spirit.
You lose all of this when you attempt to overwrite this with a generic name taken from largely the United Kingdom.
Let the take back begin!
They have produced these images which you can share via their Facebook page:
Sydney is known as Warrang by its custodians, the Gadigal people.
(War-ran and Wee-rong are two of the known phonetic pronunciations)
Meanjin was the Turrbal word for Brisbane. It means ‘spike,’ and was the name for the finger of land extending from the city proper to the Botanic Gardens, University and Domain.
(the name, pronounced Mee-an-jin)
Melbourne city centre - Narrm (scrub) Eastern Kulin [Aboriginal Language Area Boonwurrung]
Canberra, the name of Australia's capital city, comes from an Aboriginal word which means 'meeting place'. The original word was kamberra and comes from the language of the local Ngunnawal people.
The language of the Larrakia Nation.
The language of the Whadjuk Noongar Nation. (the name, pronounced Boorl-Loo)