Talk:List of placenames of Indigenous origin in the Americas

This list is a bit duplicative of other lists, but I also find that some lists that should exist don't. This may be a good place to collect a meta list. Hires an editor 18:14, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

My immediate response is that the title of this list is wrong: "Native American" is a specifically US-ian usage and should be replaced with "Indigenous" or "Aboriginal" as per List of place names in Canada of aboriginal origin. There are no "Native American" peoples outside the United States; not that anyone else uses that term, y'see, especially not in Canada but also not in Latin America.Skookum1 20:04, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

What would be better? List of Aboriginal American Place Names? I want to include both North and South America in the list, and Charles C Mann's book 1491 indicates that at least some of the peoples in South America refer to themselves as Indian, though maybe only as a suffix to whatever name they would otherwise give themselves, and US-ians don't call themselves aborigines. I know there's a huge debate about what the proper name is, so I'm finding myself stuck on what to properly title this article. List of First Nations' Place Names? List of Indigenous American Place Names? List of Pre-Columbian American Place Names? This is just a thought process here, not a decision. But after reading through my test list, I like List of Indigenous American Place Names. Anyone else? Hires an editor 14:31, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, with "indigenous" you're on the right track, as you'll note it was chosen for the title of the WikiProject. Might be good to have a look at Native American name controversy and also Talk:Native American name controversy to appreciate the complexity of the issue, and the variability of names. I'd say maybe "List of placenames of indigenous origin in the Americas" if you want to do both continents; or following the Canadian lead, which is List of place names in Canada of aboriginal origin", and I'd be wary of any such list for including Mexico, which would overwhelm the list even more than Canadian jurisdictions, where aboriginal names are very common (esp. BC), already will. If you list was US-specific by all means use List of place names in the United States of Native American origin, which is obviously cumbersome but you get the idea; it's the cross-border application of "Native American" which is dicey, and as you can gather from Talk:Stewart Phillip even the terms aboriginal and indigenous are loaded dice, as is the concept of "Native American", i.e. as a term imposed by others etc.Skookum1 19:45, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Mexico section

You're asking for it, is all I can say. Maybe it's just I'm more familiar with the Mexican map and know how many indigenous names are out there. What's the guiding/limiting parameter here? I'll start a list of just major places below, and may transfer it to the main page. Hmmm let's see...

• Mazatlan - "place of corn" in Nahuatl
• Acapulco - "place of the broken reeds" in Nahuatl
• Ixtapa
• Zihuatanejo (Spanish-Nahuatl hybrid ejo ending is Spanish
• Xochimilco
• Tlacopan
• Tenochtitlan
• Teotihuacan
• Tepotzotlan
• Tepotzlan
• Guaymas
• Texcoco
• Azcapotzalco
• Tacuba
• Coyoacán
• Tlatelolco
• Zacatecas
• Tabasco
• Tuxtla Gutierrez hybrid English-Spanish
• Cancun
• Tulum
• Tepic
• Oaxaca
• Huatulco
• Tehuantepec
• Palenque
• Tule
• Jalisco
• Chihuahua
• Tamaulipas
• Patzcuaro
• Tzintzuntzan
• Uruapan
• Michoacán
• Chiapas
• Iztapalapa
• Cuajimalpa
• Cuauhtémoc
• Iztacalco
• Milpa Alta (hybrid)
• Tláhuac
• Tlalpan
• Taxco
• Campeche
• Coahuila
• Colima
• Durango
• Guanajuato
• Mexico
• Nayarit
• Querétaro
• Quintana Roo
• Sinaloa
• Sonora (not sure about that, might be Spanish but I think it's Mojave or another local language
• Navojoa means "Cactus house" in Mayo language
• Tlaxcala
• Yucatán

Eg, that's just for starters. I suggest we limit the list for Mexican entries to major cities, notable towns (historic or otherwise), state names, districts of Mexico City, ancient ruin-names. Anything more and any one state, such as Morelos or Guerrero, and the placenames will be in the hundreds (on one state alone).Skookum1 20:00, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Yikes! I knew there'd be lots of names...that's kinda why I'm still thinking of making this a meta-list. I see that in general there's a few lists of place-names for places like List of place names in New England of aboriginal origin, but nothing comprehensive. I also found that there's simple etymologies for all the counties in New York, and the same for New Jersey, but there, they aren't specific to our subject area. Hires an editor 22:53, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

There should probably be a Category:Lists of place names if there isn't one already, and a subcat Category:Lists of aboriginal place names perhaps. I see you've changed this article's/list's name, but as you'll note in the New England and Canada cases, Wiki style guidelines are such that "aboriginal" and "placenames" shouldn't be capitalized.Skookum1 23:47, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

There is no agreed origin for Sonora but the most widely accepted is that it comes from spanish "Señora" because of an image of "Our Lady" in one of the first churches that Spanish priests erected http://www.elbalero.gob.mx/explora/html/sonora/index.html. But there is a second story that it comes from Opata "sonotl" which means maize leaf. Althought the second one might make more sense, the first one is definitively the most accepted one. I also added Navojoa to the list above. Also, there are many places with Opata names listed at http://www.gotosonora.com/opatas-son-mx.htm Elgrandragon 23:08, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree about the meta-list thing. Thinking of, for instance, Nebraska, the way you would do this is just take the entire list of places and start removing things... Otherwise this article will be enormous. Smmurphy^(Talk) 23:40, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Meta-list

I'm not entirely clear on what you mean when you say you intend for this to be a meta-list...could someone enlighten me? Sorry. --Miskwito 02:00, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Obviously (or not?), there's going to be too many place names. I think perhaps examples from all 50 states, Mexico, and Canada for North America, and then something similar for South America. Then more complete lists on individual pages. Right now, there's a few regions that have been put together, so we might say "New England" for those states that are in New England, but show a few items for that region. Then have a separate page for a more complete list of New England entries. This is sort of the case now. There's other regions that don't have anything, such as the Northwest US. Mexico and south don't have much of anything either...I'm very tired right now, but does this make sense? Hires an editor 02:32, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Oh, gotcha. No, that's definitely the way to go; otherwise this would get completely ridiculously long. --Miskwito 02:46, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, so another thing to address then is shortening parts of the article. Right now, British Columbia in particular seems to be very over-represented, but there are lots of relatively minor names here (ones that presumably wouldn't be known by people not from the area or the country). I think the removal of links to places that don't even have Wikipedia articles is fairly non-controversial, so I've gone ahead and started that. And we should keep the etymologies of all province/territory/state/whatever names in all countries, I think, as well as capitol cities and the like, and very notable large cities (like Miami) or geographical features (like Denali National Park [not here yet] or Lake Huron). I'm not sure, beyond that, what criteria to use, though. I mean, I've never heard of, say, the Shulaps Range or or Alsek River or Immokalee, Florida, but that in itself doesn't make them non-notable. I dunno. Ideas?

In any case, we should trim down the emphasis given to British Columbia, and add other state/province/district/whatever and country names which come from Indian language. --Miskwito 23:23, 31 March 2007 (UTC)