‘ Unfair beliefs are woven into regular areas,’ professors say
A group of Spanish researchers has created a new game that they say will help identify culturally “offensive”, “harmful” city titles and “repair past wrongs”.
In a subsequent article published in The Conversation, landscape faculty Joshua Inwood and Derek Alderman from the University of Tennessee described the STNAMES LAB software as an “important educational tool.” The content was co-written by task head Professor Daniel Oto-Peralas at the Spanish university Pablo de Olavide.
The professors wrote that the app” will enable communities know how unfair beliefs are woven into regular spaces and the harm caused by unpleasant names.”
We think the game will help people discover the changes required to recognize and correct previous mistakes in street names, they wrote,” after tracking a few of America’s most contested location and organization names.”
The STNAMES LAB app provides specific sites and download files of the streets while allowing users to search for particular words used in city names in North America and western European countries.
On the North American map, the professors said they searched for names with the words” savage” and” squaw”:
We discovered 429 streets with names that contained the phrase” sq —” and were dispersed across 47 states.
Although the word” sq—” was first used by European settlers to conjure up Native American women into a straightforward and gendered image, it was still used by them in the Algonquian language. Being called” sq-” is still a painful everyday experience for indigenous people. Many of them say the word irritates their self-image and sense of belonging. …
We found 415 roads in 46 says using the word” savage” in their name.
The professors claimed the game reveals how widespread these city names are in America. According to them, names” may convey dangerous messages that portray the history and identity of minority communities.”
When harsh names are removed from roads, some members of oppressed communities describe how the heart or feeling of places may change and allow treatment to begin, they wrote in their hope the app may help establish change.
Similar sentiments were expressed by academics who created the app, writing on the project website that” the frequent debates about the naming and renaming of streets, as well as the use that political regimes make of street names to inscribe a particular ideology into the urban landscape, testify their symbolic power.”
In recent years, higher education institutions have started removing names that are offensive.
After faculty accused Plymouth Colony leader Myles Standish of “terrible acts against the native people,” Boston University made plans to remove his name from one of its dormitories in May, according to The College Fix.
According to The Fix, a Johns Hopkins University board may endow President Woodrow Wilson’s name from a fellowship program.
Other examples include” Star Spangled Banner” author Francis Scott Key, former U. S. Chief Justice John Marshall, scientist Carl Linnaeus, and General Robert E. Lee’s horse.
MORE: Washington &, Lee University removes plaque honoring Robert E. Lee’s horse
IMAGE: JoeZierer/flickr
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