Editing Toponymy (section)

== Toponymic commemoration ==
In 2002, the [[United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names]] acknowledged that while common, the practice of naming geographical places after living persons (toponymic commemoration) could be problematic. Therefore, the [[United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names]] recommends that it be avoided and that national authorities should set their own guidelines as to the time required after a person's death for the use of a commemorative name.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oxVSKQ6bv2AC&q=living+person&pg=PA75 |title=Eighth United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names |date=2002 |publisher=United Nations. Department of Economic and Social Affairs |isbn=9789211009156 }}{{Dead link|date=April 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

In the same vein, writers Pinchevski and Torgovnik (2002) consider the naming of streets as a political act in which holders of the legitimate monopoly to name aspire to engrave their ideological views in the social space.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Pinchevski |first1=Amit |last2=Torgovnik |first2=Efraim |date=May 2002 |title=Signifying passages: the signs of change in Israeli street names |journal=Media, Culture & Society |doi=10.1177/016344370202400305 |volume=24 |issue=3 |pages=365–388|s2cid=144414677 }}</ref> Similarly, the [[Historical revisionism|revisionist]] practice of
[[Street or road name#Street renaming|renaming streets]], as both the celebration of triumph and the repudiation of the old regime is another issue of toponymy.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Azaryahu |first1=Maoz |date=2009 |title=Critical Toponymies: The Contested Politics of Place Naming |chapter=Naming the past: The significance of commemorative street names |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xg1GAepFft8C&q=%22naming+the+past%22&pg=PA56 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=9780754674535 |access-date=29 October 2020 |archive-date=29 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210829210521/https://books.google.com/books?id=xg1GAepFft8C&q=%22naming+the+past%22&pg=PA56 |url-status=live }}</ref> Also, in the context of [[Russian nationalism|Slavic nationalism]], the name of [[Saint Petersburg]] was changed to the more Slavic sounding ''Petrograd'' from 1914 to 1924,<ref>{{cite book |last1= Lincoln |first1= Bruce |date= 2000 |title= Sunlight at Midnight: St. Petersburg and the Rise of Modern Russia |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=jPMM7Abnk6EC&q=petrograd+slavic+nationalism&pg=PA219 |publisher= Basic Books |isbn= 9780786730896 |access-date= 29 October 2020 |archive-date= 27 August 2021 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20210827191526/https://books.google.com/books?id=jPMM7Abnk6EC&q=petrograd+slavic+nationalism&pg=PA219 |url-status= live }}</ref> then to ''Leningrad'' following the death of [[Vladimir Lenin]] and back to ''Saint-Peterburg'' in 1991 following the [[dissolution of the Soviet Union]]. After 1830, in the wake of the [[Greek War of Independence]] and the establishment of an independent Greek state, Turkish, Slavic and Italian place names were Hellenized, as an effort of "toponymic cleansing." This nationalization of place names can also manifest itself in a [[Postcolonialism|postcolonial]] context.<ref>{{cite journal |last= Rose-Redwood |first=Reuben |date=2009 |title=Geographies of toponymic inscription: new directions in critical place-name studies |url= https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249872329|journal=Progress in Human Geography |page=460 |display-authors=etal}}</ref>

In Canada, there have been initiatives in recent years "[[List of place names in Canada of Indigenous origin|to restore traditional names to reflect the Indigenous culture wherever possible]]".<ref>{{Cite web|url = https://www.nrcan.gc.ca/earth-sciences/geography/indigenous-place-names/19739|title = Indigenous-place-names|date = 9 June 2017|access-date = 23 August 2021|archive-date = 23 August 2021|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210823004604/https://www.nrcan.gc.ca/earth-sciences/geography/indigenous-place-names/19739|url-status = live}}</ref> [[Indigenous mapping]] is a process that can include restoring place names by [[Indigenous peoples|Indigenous communities]] themselves.

Frictions sometimes arise between countries because of toponymy, as illustrated by the [[Macedonia naming dispute]] in which [[Greece]] has claimed the name ''[[Macedonia (Greece)|Macedonia]]'', the [[Sea of Japan naming dispute]] between [[Japan]] and [[Korea]], as well as the [[Persian Gulf naming dispute]]. On 20 September 1996 a note on the internet reflected a query by a Canadian surfer, who said as follows: 'One producer of maps labeled the water body 
"Persian Gulf" on a 1977 map of Iran, and then "Arabian Gulf", also in 1977, in a map which focused on the [[Gulf Cooperation Council|Gulf States]]. I would gather that this is an indication of the "politics of maps", but I would be interested to know if this was done to avoid upsetting users of the Iran map and users of the map showing Arab Gulf States'. This symbolizes a further aspect of the topic, namely the spilling over of the problem from the purely political to the economic sphere.<ref>{{cite journal |date=2004 |title=Toponymy and Geopolitics: The Political Use — and Misuse — of Geographical Names |url=http://www.iwp.edu/docLib/20131022_KadmonToponomyandGeopolitics.pdf |journal=The Cartographic Journal |doi=10.1179/000870404X12897 |volume=41 |pages=85–87 |last1=Kadmon |first1=Naftali |issue=2 |bibcode=2004CartJ..41...85K |s2cid=128707537 |access-date=31 May 2016 |archive-date=17 September 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160917032727/http://www.iwp.edu/docLib/20131022_KadmonToponomyandGeopolitics.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>