I just dipped into Twitter to read the fantastic news that the Snowdonia National Park Authority has voted to use the original Welsh names Yr Wyddfa #YrWyddfa and #Eryri rather than the imposed English #Snowdon and #Snowdonia. It's a massive win for reclaiming our #Welsh cultural heritage. I honestly can't believe the amount of hatred, abuse and racism in the Twitter comments from English people. I've no idea why they are so angry that another country wants to use its own language. #Cymraeg 🏴
@druid Similar actions are taking place in the US. In my home state of Colorado, names are being changed because they were racist and/or sexist slurs and because they fail to recognize that the lands were populated long before white American settlers arrived. https://coloradosun.com/2022/04/11/colorado-geographic-naming-board-scrubs-slur-squaw/.
Changes to Mt. Evens, named after an early governor before Colorado became a state who was discredited by his role in the Sand Creek massacre, has met with resistance by his decedents and admires of many of the actions he took in leading Colorado to statehood. I think that the cause of renaming is helped by the new choice being the very simple minded "Blue Sky". https://www.denverpost.com/2022/11/18/mount-evans-mount-blue-sky-name-change/
The southern half of Colorado was once part of Mexico, and use of Spanish is common. This has led to some cross cultural twists, like relabeling mountains named "negro" because many don't see it as simply the color black. Some of the relabeled "squaw" features are meeting with resistance and part of that seems to be laziness around learning to pronounce and remember the new names. Welsh probably faces that same issue with English speakers.
