Interior Secretary Deb Haaland is calling for derogatory place names to be erased from the federal landscape, a move that will require a handful of national parks to change names that dot their landscapes.
On Friday the secretary announced that a formal review process has been created to come up with new names for places currently carrying derogatory names. Along that line, she also declared “squaw” to be a derogatory term and ordered the Board on Geographic Names – the federal body tasked with naming geographic places – to implement procedures to remove the term from federal usage.
A number of National Park System units will have to come up with replacement names to meet that directive. The Needles Campground at Canyonlands National Park in Utah was once called the Squaw Flat Campground. Search the park's website and you'll find that Canyonlands has locations once, or currently, known as Squaw Creek and Squaw Canyon.
Elsewhere, a search of nps.gov finds Squaw Tank in Joshua Tree National Park in California, Squaw Lake at Mount Rainier National Park in Washington, Squaw Mountain at Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve in Alaska, Squaw Hill at Klondike Glold Rush National Historical Park in Alaska, and Squaw Creek at Sequoia and Kings Canyons National Park.
"Racist terms have no place in our vernacular or on our federal lands. Our nation’s lands and waters should be places to celebrate the outdoors and our shared cultural heritage – not to perpetuate the legacies of oppression,” said the secretary. “Today’s actions will accelerate an important process to reconcile derogatory place names and mark a significant step in honoring the ancestors who have stewarded our lands since time immemorial.”
Secretarial Order 3404 formally identifies the term “squaw” as derogatory and creates a federal task force to find replacement names for geographic features on federal lands bearing the term. The term has historically been used as an offensive ethnic, racial, and sexist slur, particularly for Indigenous women. There are currently more than 650 federal land units that contain the term, according to a database maintained by the Board on Geographic Names.
The newly created Derogatory Geographic Names Task Force will include representatives from federal land management agencies, as well as diversity, equity, and inclusion experts from the Interior Department. The Secretarial Order requires that the task force engage in tribal consultation and consider public feedback on proposed name changes.
Additionally, Secretarial Order 3405 creates a Federal Advisory Committee to broadly solicit, review, and recommend changes to other derogatory geographic and federal land unit names. The Advisory Committee on Reconciliation in Place Names will include representation from Indian Tribes, tribal and Native Hawaiian organizations, civil rights, anthropology, and history experts, and members of the general public. It will establish a process to solicit and assist with proposals to the Secretary to change derogatory names, and will include engagement with tribes, state and local governments, and the public.
Together, the Secretarial Orders will accelerate the process by which derogatory names are identified and replaced. Currently, the Board on Geographic Names is structured, by design, to act on a case-by-case basis through a process that puts the onus on the proponents to identify the offensive name and to suggest a replacement. The process to secure review and approvals can be lengthy, often taking years to complete a name change. Currently, there are hundreds of name changes pending before the board. The newly established Federal Advisory Committee will facilitate a proactive and systematic development and review of these proposals, in consultation with local community representatives.
The Board on Geographic Names – originally established by Executive Order in 1890 – is a federal body designed to maintain uniform geographic name usage throughout the federal government. It is comprised of representatives from federal agencies concerned with geographic information, population, ecology, and management of public lands. In 1947, the Secretary of the Interior was given joint authority with the Board on Geographic Names and has final approval or review of its actions.
Derogatory names have previously been identified by the Secretary of the Interior or the Board on Geographic Names and have been comprehensively replaced. In 1962, Secretary Stewart Udall identified the N-word as derogatory, and directed that the BGN develop a policy to eliminate its use. In 1974, the Board on Geographic Names identified a pejorative term for “Japanese” as derogatory and eliminated its use.
Several states have passed legislation prohibiting the use of the word “squaw” in place names, including Montana, Oregon, Maine, and Minnesota. There is also legislation pending in both chambers of Congress to address derogatory names on geographic features on public land units.
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Comments
Good to see Secretary Haaland take this action. I fully support her efforts!
So sad we gave allowed the real racists and haters to hijack perfectly acceptable words. You are just playing into their hate.
Are you really that clueless? I'm guessing yes. But perhaps you'd prefer they go back to what they used to allow.
Why is squaw derogattory?
Depending upon which link you click on after a search on Google, "squaw" can be offensive or inoffensive. A 2017 article (updated in 2018) https://indiancountrytoday.com/archive/the-word-squaw-offensive-or-not wrote that squaw might be a shortened version of a word meaning "female friend" or "little woman baby" or it might (or might not) be a derogatory word meaning vagina. As early as 1892, the word squaw was believed to have a sexual meaning to it. As a woman, I frankly don't want to be considered just a vagina or nothing more than something sexual. Think of the word squaw as akin to maybe referring to white men in a derogatory term and then naming a trail, river, or peak after that male term considered by some or many to be slanderous and derogatory. Seems to me that because the word squaw brings up so many connotations and nobody is truly certain whether or not the term is derogatory (although back in the day, when the white man was claiming Native American territory as their own, the word probably was used in a derogatory way), it's smarter, nicer, and more respectful to simply remove the term squaw and rename whatever needs to be renamed.
You are correct, Rebecca.
I was told many years ago by a friend who is Shoshone that the word is more than just an anatomical term.
He said to most people who speak the Plains Indian languages and to the trappers of old, it was a kind of slang word that corresponds with an English word containing four letters starting with C and ending in T.
He says his mother once washed his mouth out with soap when he called his sister that word.
But even if EC would be okay with having his sister or mother called by that term, I guess that's up to him. Otherwise, it's likely just his ignorance showing up again.
Good for Secretary Haaland! It's too bad not everybody is bothered by offensive names.
So the government now codifies what words are offensive? Straight out of "1984".
The government is taking responsibility for offensive names that have been given to lnad they control. How in any way is this 'straight out of 1984?'
Exactly Bill. The
word Squaw was perfectly acceptable by European and Native American alike with no derogattory intent. Some adopted it as a negative term and rather than ignoring them, the horde has accepted this "new" meaning and succumed. We see it happen with words, flags, symbols ..... It is sad we let the misguided few so pervert our language and culture.
So is "Chinaman Gulch" OK with you? I guess it's just a "new" meaning to you that somehow that's become unacceptable in our "woke" culture of today. I'm wondering if you think "N*****r Bar" (since renamed Negro Bar but wtill with controversy) was OK because it was just a perfectly acceptable term.
Anon - the fact that you believe the word is derrogatory is your problem, not the rest of the world's. The word squaw was a common word used by Native Americans. Just because you want to use it in a derogatory manner doesn't make the word patently offensive. It makes the speaker patently offiensive if they use it in that context. We don't have and valleys named C..T Valley or Vagina Valley and there is no reason to believe that that was the intent when momunents were named "squaw".
Yes, I have no problem with Chinaman or Frenchman or any other man. They were perfectly fine nomenclature that have since been perverted. The N word was a pejorative from the get go. In the end, they are all just words. Changing them isn't going to change the hearts of those that use them to express their hate.
Wow. You really don't get it.
There is nothing to "get". Please stop trying to force your overly emotional reactions on others.
It's a shame to see that EC is still polluting the air in a great website.
EC said: "In the end, they are all just words. Changing them isn't going to change the hearts of those that use them to express their hate."
I can see that first-hand.
anon- have your read the book?
I remember n*@@#r bill canyon outside Moab. Never thought it derogatory. Rather, that it was named after a black man that deserved to have it named after him. I've been to Squaw Valley, but never thought that much about the word. Hate to agree with EC, but I too think it's much ado about nothing. It makes great press, but in the end most Americans could care less about the name of Chinaman's hat or Redskin Brook.
ec-I have read 1984, multiple times-you are totally missing the point
From an academic review of 1984:
Now, most people would probably say that our ability to speak, to form sentences and communicate our thoughts, sets humans apart from other animals because it allows us to hear and understand other viewpoints than our own. Our minds are freed by language. But the basic idea behind Newspeak is the complete and total opposite. In the world of 1984, Newspeak was created by the totalitarian overlords of Oceania, with its fictional leader known as Big Brother, in order to actually limit free thought and free speech. In totalitarian governments, those in charge try to control every aspect of citizens' lives, even down to personal habits. For the citizens of fictional Oceania, this control extends to the very language they use in an attempt by the government to control their very thoughts.
That is exactly the point. And I am guessing anon didn't even know "1984" was a book.
You are fundamentally incorrect about what Newspeak was about. It was an attempt to silence all though such that "thought crimes" would be impossible to say and eventually think. It was about fundamentally changing the language by reducing words. Not by renaming places, which has been happening since the beginning of history. It was a world where history was only told in paper documents/books (i.e. pre-Internet) and where history was being constantly re-written to satisfy the leadership. I see no attempt to destroy the history through a simple act of removing an offensive place name. There were those decrying the renaming of Mount McKinley back to Denali. But the history has not and will not be lost. It's certainly not "alternative facts" being displayed in order to somehow hide the history here.
No history here is being re-written. I bought up the location called "Negro Bar" that was a mining location. California State Parks and USGS are seriously considering changing the designation, especially given that the original name was something admitted a little more distasteful. But the history has never been lost. It's still told as part of the original history. But at the very least the hope is that it doesn't imply approval of the name regardless of the previous or current meaning.
y_p_w Thats not my interpretation, that comes from an academic review. As it (and many other reviews) indicates the purporse of Newspeak was to control thought by amongst other things controlling the language. That is exactly what is happening today and its being applied not just to geographical names but to social and political concepts as well.
No. You bring up that quote because it fits into your need express a sense of victimhood. 1984 was never solely about Newspeak or the Thought Police, but also that the Ministry of Truth tried to suppress information. In terms of the Dept. of the Interior in recent years, I can think about the suppression of research by career government scientists that supports that climate changed is influenced by human activity, or how sea level rise will affect our national parks. But of course your outrage is in support of names that today are patently offensive. If you're really worried about the Thought Police, it's certainly happening these days with books and subject matter being banned in our schools and previously with certain subject matters taboo in the previous Presidential administration. But right now Interior is certainly not covering up the history, but explaining it in context.
Your outrage is so obviously malleable depending on whether or not you agree with the aims. Oceania was at war with Eastasia. Oceania had always been at war with Eastasia. At least until Oceania had always been at war with Eurasia. But that's who you are.
Once again you are wrong y_p_w - That quote is one among many that identify Newspeak as an attempt to control though. I challange you to find any discoussion of 1984 that says otherwise. I am against any forced thought whether it be conservative or liberal. But then I am also against forced teaching of false narratives especially when it goes agains the parents will. Oh and buy the way, saying somthing is "sad" hardly falls in the catagory of "outrage". Just another attempt to use the language to change the narrative.
You still lose the big picture about what 1984 was about. There was a reason why there were so many people researching the book after the words "alternative facts" came out of the mouth of Kellyanne Conway.
The history isn't lost simply because the name of a place is changed. I suppose you think the cities Stalingrad and Leningrad being renamed was wrong. Because those were OK at the time they were renamed.
You will continue to claim victimhood because it's who you are. Granted your diatribe here reminds me more of Doublethink than of Newspeak.
Sheesh. For years I was in NPT multiple times per day, never failing to call out problematic apologists for the sorts of people who charged the capital on Jan 6th. Most of the past year or so when I've checked in I found no screeds from the usual suspects. Apparently, that has changed.
Today I have no patience for Buck's ilk, although I do note that more and more of them are being charged for their criminal behavior on Jan 6th. I no longer get paid a professional rate to deal with people dwelling deep in the latest DSM.
I'm certain most parents here understand what happens when you reward childish attention-seeking behavior. Stop playing whack-a-mole with a mole who enjoys it that much. My condolences, Kurt.
TL/dr ---
Eric, please continue to explain why you don't consider racism to be racist. You'll find a small number who agree with you. But you're used to the martyrdom of being a member of a valiant but spurned malignancy.
This thread has gone far beyond its usefulness, and so we're shutting it down.