The Weight in Geographical Naming

[Robert Docter]

One of the (many!) takeaways from last Saturday was the naming controversy for the sea that's between Japan and Korea (Sea of Japan according to Google Earth). As the seminar and reading detail the history between both countries with its history of painful memories of occupation, I was fascinated by the weight of naming geographical places and the implications they can carry. More so, It was a reminder for me as a High School History teacher to not merely throw maps or geography matching activities to my students. Rather, an examination of Geographical names is vital to understanding a particular place. Not to simply tell students that the sea between these countries is "Sea of Japan", but to instead go into detail about the naming of that sea from multiple angles and perspectives. Even Geography has bias that needs to be addressed. Additionally, the few articles discussing the name of the sea reminded me of the weight of History books in general. Last year, I remember a man speaking to my teaching class from LAUSD's Social Studies curriculum department. He shared about the protests of certain groups when LAUSD adopted a new social studies textbook last year due to names of places, lack of details about specific events, and/or biases in the texts.