what names of birds are derogatory when applied to humans
In contempo years in that location has a growing shift inside the birding community to modify the common English names of birds that are considered offensive or inaccurate.
A new paper has looked at this motion, specially within South Africa and North America, reviewing key examples and providing recommendations about how these names should be dealt with.
Many species - particularly those popular with the full general public, such as birds - have ii or more names. The first is the scientific proper noun, used globally and so that no matter where someone is in the earth they can e'er refer to the same species.
The other is the common name, used more generally and colloquially - this can also vary geographically, pregnant the species can have more than 1 common name. For example, Bubo scandiacus is the scientific proper name for the bird normally known as the snowy owl, white owl or Arctic owl.
Dissimilar with official scientific names, which are overseen past a single organisation to make sure that all species names are consistent, common names are generally governed by smaller committees more specific to certain countries or continents.
Common names tend to be used past the general public and local groups, and then often reverberate cultural and societal differences.
However, some common names cause criminal offense or upset, or are but inaccurate. How these smaller committees deal with irresolute these names, which have often been used for over a century, is a discussion that's been brought to the fore in recent years. In North America particularly, in that location has historically been resistance from the naming committee to change common bird names.
Most notable is the instance of McCown's longspur, a small species of songbird that was named later on a Confederate American Civil State of war general who was complicit in genocide. For years, the North American Nomenclature Committee of the American Ornithological Society resisted suggestions to change the proper name to thick-billed longspur - until in the wake of the Blackness Lives Matter protests and with pressure level from Black Birder's Week, they conceded.
Dr Alex Bond, Senior Curator in Accuse of Birds at the Museum, has examined how committees could address these changes in common names, and has published his findings in the journal Ibis.
The name of the long-tailed duck was changed 20 years ago, having previously been named after an offensive term for Ethnic women ©Wolfgang Wander/Wikimedia Commons
The study focussed on examples of birds from regions with a history of colonisation, including Southward Africa and North America.
'The arguments for not changing common names are often for stability, in that a species has always had that name,' says Alex. 'But we managed well plenty with changing the name of Clangula hyemalis to long-tailed duck 20 years ago, so I think we can handle it.
'Also, the scientific names are in that location for stability.'
In response to these conversations, the American Ornithological Society (AOS) says, 'Bird names are the entry indicate to accessing all of the information that has been gathered over many decades of inquiry on bird species, data that is key to broader understanding, enjoyment, and conservation of those species by the ornithological and birding communities.
'At the same time, AOS recognizes that, due to their harmful nature, some English bird names tin potentially exist a bulwark to participation in ornithology and the broader enjoyment of birds. We are committed to changing harmful and exclusionary names that limit that participation.'
Simply in that location is more than nuance when it comes to the common bird names than is often realised.
Inaccurate, offensive or inappropriate
When it comes to changing the common names of birds, a lot of the focus is often, quite rightly, on those species which are named subsequently people who accept done reprehensible things.
'But there are other names which are inaccurate, offensive, or inappropriate,' explains Alex. 'That tin can be, for case, birds named subsequently a group of people or named - as is the case of the palm warbler - with no begetting whatsoever to its habitat.
'At that place are no palm trees where the palm warbler occurs.'
There are plenty of examples in which birds have been named inaccurately. For instance, in Australia the mutual name for Gymnorhina tibicen is the Australian magpie, even though it is non a magpie and doesn't even belong in the corvid family.
'This is why you lot become lots of unlike "finches", which are actually a bunch of different groups of birds, just they are all called finches considering they all sort of look the aforementioned,' says Alex. 'Or with tits and babblers, which are two different groups, only then at that place are also the tit-babblers which are a third group. And so yous end up linking three groups of birds which are completely unrelated.'
Tit-babblers, such as this striped tit-babbler, are rather inaccurately named as they are related to neither tits or babblers ©JJ Harrison/Wikimedia Commons
Fifty-fifty when a name is simply scientifically inaccurate, it tin be difficult to change. A case in point is the kiwikiu, or Maui parrotbill.
A species of honeycreeper endemic to the Hawaiian isle of Maui, it is unrelated to the parrotbills, which are a group typically establish in southeast Asia. The Native Hawaiian name for this species had been lost, then to rectify this misnaming of the bird, a group worked with the Hawaiian Lexicon Committee to develop an indigenous Hawaiian name based on the species and its habitat. Somewhen they settled on kiwikiu.
Simply when this proposed name modify was submitted to the North American Classification Committee in 2010 it was rejected, with one of the official comments reading, 'the final thing we demand is yet another ridiculous Hawaiian language name'. The comment was removed from the website in 2020. The official name remains 'Maui parrotbill', although kiwikiu is increasingly used in scientific publications.
Finally, there are species which are not named after a person but are all the same deeply offensive. In many cases, including in N America, some of these names have been changed, as seen with the long-tailed duck 2 decades agone.
'In South Africa they have simply changed the names of the blue-billed teal and the Fynbos buttonquail, which were originally named after a pejorative word for Indigenous South Africans,' explains Alex. 'These have been changed to reflect more inclusive and less racist views.'
Documenting change
The new paper documents the shift to rectify many of these inappropriate and offensive names and the resistance to do so officially (particularly within North America), and highlights other examples around the world which show merely how easy the process tin be.
'All these committees but need to become on with it,' says Alex. 'Common names have been changed in Sweden, Southward Africa and in Aotearoa (New Zealand) to reverberate changing attitudes.
'And some of them we now know, such as the kākāpō. That is the accepted international name and that is a Māori word. This isn't difficult.'
The kiwikiu, or Maui parrotbill, is a great example of how the birding community can work with local communities to requite ameliorate, more accurate common names to birds ©Zach Pezzillo/Wikimedia Commons
Alex and his co-author Robert Driver give key recommendations every bit to how committees can change common bird names.
Get-go, the groups which make up one's mind on mutual names have to exist able to recognise that some of these names volition be racist or bigoted, even if private committee members don't find them personally offensive.
Second, these committees would engage with the groups that are affected by these names with the common goal of rectifying that damage. This is precisely what was done with the kiwikiu, showcasing that these changes tin exist easily accomplished.
Third, how these groups are governed and their processes have to explicitly include how to deal with these problematic names.
Finally, these groups should be more diverse and representative of the communities that they serve.
'Our goal isn't to be prescriptive, because every state, group and gild is going to await at this a fleck differently,' explains Alex. 'But there are some wide principles that can be practical.'
According to Alex, one of the uncomplicated joys of common bird names is that they that reflect local people, places and cultures, only this should non come at the expense of being inaccurate or offensive.
In moving forward with making it easier to alter the common names of birds, the AOS says, 'The AOS is currently assembling a new advert hoc committee that volition exist tasked with developing recommendations for more detailed guidelines on and procedures for identifying and changing harmful English bird names for social justice considerations, and volition be using this information to make recommendations for policy changes and proactive steps that the AOS tin have toward a process that will change harmful names.
'This commission is still in evolution and will represent the broad demographic and geographic multifariousness of people interested in how English bird names are called and used, experts in scientific classification, birders, ornithologists, and society leaders. The co-chairs are empowered to add members and advisors who represent varied viewpoints from across the broad ornithological and birding community.'
Source: https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2021/july/offensive-and-inaccurate-bird-names-should-be-changed-says-study.html
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