Mumbai Jumbo
Why has Burma become known again as ‘Burma’ instead of ‘Myanmar’?
The BBC especially (although it wasn’t alone) seemed to have enthusiastically adopted the practice of referring to the country as Myanmar until the cyclone blew through the country a couple of weeks ago. Since then all news reports - or so it seems - have adopted the rightful name of ‘Burma’.
I suspect Myanmar was used by those politically-correct nitwits who looked on the regime more fondly than they ought to have, because its government is Left Wing. The same reasoning goes for those who use ‘Beijing’ instead of ‘Peking’ (which much of the world still uses). Burma was for a long time a part of the British Empire and that reference was quickly dropped some years ago when the ruling regime changed the name.
But the cyclone has focussed attention on the depravity of the Burmese government in Yangon Rangoon. The BBC refers to it, with a sense of contrived deliberateness, as a ‘military regime/junta’, a term which carries undoubted ‘right wing’ hints which are reinforced with the re-adoption of ‘Burma’. That’s why it’s again called ‘Burma’ instead of ‘Myanmar’.
Pete Moore
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Reader Comments (20)
Its very interesting to observer the dichotomy. The Brits are calling it "Burma", which I think is the proper name, and the American media is using almost exclusively "Myanmar", the slave name bestowed by the generals.
I don't objecting to respecting proper name changes, but I do find irritating when countries demand that we pronounce words how they choose. Burma/Myanmar, Bombay/Mumbai and Beijing/Peking are all examples of the latter.
A few months ago there was an Indian author, Vikram Chandra, being interviewed by Simon Mayo on Radio 5, and throughout it Chandra kept referring to Bombay and Mayo to Mumbai as that was where the book was set. Eventually the author was asked why he kept calling it Bombay.and he explained that "Mumbai" was a name associated with Hindu fundamentalists.
It was great listening to a beeboid realising that in his attempts to be pc he was actually being the opposite.
Very interesting observation, and if it's your discovery, Pete, I commend your vigilance.
I also think we should continue to use the traditional English names for places if they have the same derivation from the native name that they always had, (e.g. Peking) and if there's been no radical constitutional change. For example, Congo IMO should have been called Congo even during the intermezzo that was Zaire, but it would have been nonsense to refer to Stalingrad in 1942 as Tsaritsin and to the same place today as Stalingrad.
So it's still Bombay, Rangoon, Danzig and Cambodia for me. Although of course it's impossible to be consistent in this.
Americans call it Burma, our media call it Myanmar. The media is living in it's own little weird world.
Pete - Those of us here in New Amsterdam have often wondered about this odd thing.
Pete
So do you think the country is not run by a military regime /Junta ?
Pete,
I truly admire your uncanny ability to find socialism even in the most right-wing, militarist regimes :0)
Over here the GLC are thinking of amalgamating Chelsea and Putney, and calling it Chutney.
Very appropriate.
Noel Cunningham -
Danzig? How very reactionary!
Colm -
Yes, it's a military regime/junta, which is a meaningless description but does carry right wing connotations and is misleading when reporting on Burma, which I suspect the BBC is happy to foster.
Dawkins -
Try googling "Burma Socialist Programme Party" and "Burmese Way to Socialism".
touché...PM
Pete,
All too often a brutal regime will call itself socialist. Doesn't mean it is.
Dawkins - I think Pete is right, although it is a military junta, they are in fact socialist in their approach. Like most socialist dictatorships they don't actually embrace the ideals of socialism,rather they use its worst attributes. In any event an awful gang of thugs.
Socialist Dictatorships?
About sums it up, Mahons.
Anybody else paying attention to this accurate choice of words?
Mahons,
Socialist dictatorship? No, that's going too far. I'll concede socialist though with grave reservations, but can you identify the dictator? It's a military junta.
Noel,
Danzig? What age are you?
Dawkins: Than Shwe has presided over the ruling juntafor a number of years, and in my opinion, qualifies as a dictator even though on paper the military junta is more of a Commmittee. In some regards, following the classic communist model. In any event however you slice them, not a nice bunch of fellows as I noted above, and I'll take the fact that you will concede the socialist part, even with grave reservations, as the moment where I made a "believer" of you - no small feat?
Mahons,
Call it a Mahonscene conversion :0)
Dawkins: Classic. My cult begins!
Mahons,
Speaking of cults, I came across this today.
Those Scientologists, what a bunch of cults huh?
BTW I've no wish to belabour the point but I can't see Burma as a dictatorship. If that's true then so is Pakistan; they're also ruled by a military junta. Iraq was a dictatorship, so is Zimbabwe.
I almost included the USA but remembered in time that you've a House of Reps and a Congress as well :0)
Dawkins -dropping your e's as Colm noted, was one thing, but replacing your n's with l's quite another.
Become a citizen of Burma, then I expect you will see it as a dictatorship. Pakistan and Zimbabwe also have elements of a dictatorship, although Pakistan less so. None of them are very pleasant.