The world is considering renaming United States on their maps. As the indigenous people discovered and explored the land thousands of years before the first Europeans, it’s fitting that they should do it. Many nations made up the area. Is there any name that would be representitive of all?
I’ve long been a fan of Turtle Island.
That’s not the US though
the name of the continent and the country in English both come from the “explorer.” might as well go all the way and have the continent of Turtle Island and the country of the United States of Turtle Island assuming we’re renaming the existing country and not a new union of First Nations
YES! - I love that idea too! 👌✅🤗
how about Testudineland. I feel it flows better.
kʷədub swatixʷtəd
Means stolen land in Lushootseed. But, any native language, or all native languages would be acceptable.
This is exactly the type of answer I was hoping to see a lot more of. Stuff actually in native language.
Any pointer to an audio-file for that phrase?
The Internet says this is the phonetic pronunciation
kwuh-doob swah-tee-hw-tuhd
Which is absolutely worthless, especially if it is based on English pronunciation, which is basically random. That’s why I was asking for an audio file.
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We can abbreviate it to K-Dub! Or maybe kʷə for those either have an expanded keyboard or are willing to copy-paste or find the superscript tool in whatever app they’re using or whatever. Kind of like how people shorten the country’s full name to America or the USA or the U.S.
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I love* how — in true stupid fashion — they’re naming things after America, which isn’t even the country’s name. We’re the United States of America, just one of several countries located on the North American continental plate.
That said in answer to your question that is a tough one because there are so many unrelated language families in NA. I’d probably pick something either Algonkian or iriquoian. Nituskeenan means “our land” in Cree, for example, and sounds kinda cool.
* I do not love this.
Yes but to play devil’s advocate, no other country uses “America” in their name and the word is synonymous with the USA in English.
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No, to any English speaker. When anyone says “America” you understand that they mean the United States of America regardless of how you feel about the term.
mu
While as an American (the continent) I find that annoying, their country name IS America. For example, these are some other countries full names:
- Republic of the United States of Brazil (until 1930, now it’s Federative Republic of Brazil)
- Kingdom of Spain
- Argentine Republic
- United States of Venezuela
- Oriental Republic of Uruguay
Etc, a lot of countries have a long name that explains what type of government they run and then the actual name of the country, the United States of Venezuela is a country named Venezuela that was formed by a coalition of states, I know nothing of Venezuela but because of its name I can imagine states have some autonomy in their ruling. And similarly United States of America is a country named America that was formed by a coalition of states, they just decided to name their country after the continent they’re in making life difficult for the future generations.
While here in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, we apparently shortened it to just the type of government, like we’re the only kingdom or something.
AFAIK UK is the only country that’s named “United Kingdom of something” and it’s shorter than Great Britain and Northern Ireland, so it doesn’t need disambiguation.
Yeah, also not aware of any united kingdoms, there are other kingdoms though. I guess people know what it is at this point
Wouldn’t it be poetic if the rest of the countries on these continents ‘maliciously complied’ by going all-in adopting the term “American”?
“American tacos” and “American Cerveza” sold with the Mexican flag on it, “American bacon”, “American Whiskey” and “American maple syrup” with the Canadian flag, etc.
Leave the population of USA orphaned without a collective name for themselves.
Their aspiration is to rule over all of America.
Burgertory
There’s an argument that could be made for Iroquoia or Haudenosaunee. The Iroquois Confederacy was an alliance of five different native tribes who cooperated and jointly made decisions for hundreds of years before European colonists arrived, and that confederacy did serve as a point of reference when the earliest drafts of the Constitution were being written.
That said, the US is absolutely massive and there are way too many tribes with different languages and cultures. No one word is going to be a good fit for everything.
The stolen lands
That doesn’t really narrow it down.
To be fair, neither does America.
It does because “America” is synonymous with “USA” among English speakers.
Another user said ‘Turtle Island’ - I’m voting for that too! I just love that name to bits! 🥰🐢🤗
Turtle island is the indigenous name for the whole of the continent though. Similar to how they already call themselves America I guess lol.
So turtlebody, north turtle, center turtle, ?
United turtle, common I feel there is a name to find here, great turtle, the grand turtle,
Maybe Turtle-Head Island.
Not really, as far as I know there was no concept of this land/continent as a whole so nobody had a name for the whole thing.
Not true
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abya_Yala was pre-columbian
Canada
That is an indigenous word.
I think theyre saying it should all be called Canada (meaning settlement) including present day US.
Shit hole.
I believe it’s Native American or something?
I really wish there had been more serious answers, I think it’s an interesting one.
Or not the same joke over and over again
chicago means stinky onion or something.
San Diego means a whale’s vagina or something
pretty sure it means saint diego and is just spanish and not a native american term.
In English, it is Saint James.
Strangely enough, both James and Diego are linguistic descendants of Jacob. Each has its own tortured history of pronunciation changes over the last 2 or 3 millennia.
Yacob = Jacobus = Jacomus = James
Yacob = Iago = Diego
I had not idea jacob and james were related names. I mean obviously diego to but the jacob thing I thought it was just a different name.
How about Federal United Corporation of Kingdom States
Sponsored by…?
Brawndo
People’s Democratic Republic of North America
How about Americ-anus?
Hmmm… I love the shape of the idea. But I’m not sure it would be fair to give it a name based on an indigenous word right as the stupidity levels are hitting new peaks.
It feels like the Glass Cliff kinda.
Whatever name is chosen, it should make sure to put the blame squarely on the right people.
edit: after the revolution though, an indigenous word would be a great choice.
Fuck Trump in any native american language will suffice
