What do Zadie Smith, Margaret Atwood, Hanif Kareishi, Ian McEwan,Will Self, and Robert Harris all have in common? These wordsmiths have participated in an international auction of character names for their upcoming works.
The money raised from this Immortality Auction goes to Freedom from Torture, a British medical charity devoted to providing treatment for survivors of torture.… Read More
New controversy has erupted over the domain name “dot sucks”, which encourages the creation of many protest addresses.
Just a few of the most sought after names to be conjoined with the “.sucks” domain name are Apple, Google, Microsoft, CocaCola, and McDonalds. To protect their brand, many such companies have already bought up domains featuring their brand/company and .sucks.
These domain names cost almost $3,000, compared with less than $100 for typical domain names. The company Vox Populi owns “.sucks”.
For more see on this development, see this Wall Street Journal article.
The California Assembly has passed a bill banning the use of the name “Redskins” for highschool mascots. If the bill becomes a law, all California schools would be required to expunge what many Native American activists agree is an offensive and injurious moniker by the year 2017. In June 2014, the U.S. Patent Office officially canceled the trademark name with the argument that it is “disparaging to Native Americans”.
The 16th International Conference of Historical Geographers (ICHG) will include a session on place names, historical toponymic mapping, and the contemporary reconstructions of place names in Europe and Palestine. This session will be held on the 6th of July 2015. The ICHG will take place in London, at the Royal Geographical Society, from the 5th to the 10th of July 2015. Click here for more information.
Princess Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen
Dr. Cleveland Evans writes about names for the Omaha World-Herald. This week’s column explores Adelaide.
The 5th EUGEO Congress on the Geography of Europe will be held from the 30th of August to the 2nd of September, 2015, in Budapest. The theme for this year’s conference is “Convergences and Divergences of Geography in Europe”. Among the many topics to be explored is the Role of place names in geographical education. Click here for more information.
The 20th Annual International Conference of the African Association for Lexicography (Afrilex) will take place in Durban, South African from the 7th to the 8th of July 2015. It is hosted by the University of Kwa-Zulu-Natal. Click here for the conference homepage.… Read More
Edward Snowden
This article poses an interesting question about mixing up names. Can you offer a solution?
The U.S Board on Geographic Names invites you to celebrate its 125th anniversary with a one-day symposium on geographic names: Traditions and Transitions.
Friday, September 18th, 2015 at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C.
Click here for more information about the sessions.… Read More
What are the best bar names? The branding company Siegel+Gale recently published their opinions on the matter.
