Americans have proved quite confused about where even accepted names of countries are located. I live in Finland but I doubt many people in many countries would easily place Suomi. (It's not even recognized in my spell check)

There is a nationalistic element in language, which would object.

Sand, I hope my idea would end some of the confusion. I hope its not just Americans. I didn't know that "Finland" is really called "Suomi" locally, I had never even heard this word. This is the kind of stupidity I'd like to end.

Who came up with "Finland" anyway? It sounds like a place where Aquaman might be from. I think you guys sould try to stop us from calling your country such a name.

Local names are sometimes the abbreviated or mispronounced forms of the original name. Sometimes local names are the result of the local dialect skewing the original word to the extent it is unrecognizable. This would make things a bit difficult for anyone to make an accurate listing of what the local names really were (or are).

One example is the name Chippewa, as in Chippewa Falls or Chippewa River, which is derived from the word Ojibwa. Another is the name Cajun, which is derived from the word Acadian.

Notwithstanding where the current 'local' name came from or how it's pronounced, Hyenuf, I think its sufficient that there be only one name. If you lived in Chippewa Falls and were entertaining a guest from a far-off country, and you found out that he referred to your city as "Opretumb" or "Guterreg" or "Bubbliebop" or any other nonsense-word, you'd be perplexed and possibly offended.

We should call "Suomi" it's real name, not "Finland."

I couldn't agree more.London should be London the world over. Lisboa should be Lisboa the world over.etc, etc , etc.

I didn't know that 'Lisbon' was really 'Lisboa'. How do we get this to happen?

My point was that the correct local name to use will vary by who you ask what the name of a place is. Who's variation do the map makers use? Is it Mt. McKinley or Denali?

Although McKinley is one of the more tricky cases, it's a mountain, not a city or country--so it really doesn't come under the perview of my proposal.

according to Wikipedia, "December 2, 1980, the Alaska Board of Geographic Names changed the name of the mountain back to Denali. However, the U.S. Board on Geographic Names maintains McKinley, which helps visitors differentiate between the mountain and Denali National Park, where the mountain is located. Alaskans tend to use "Denali" and rely on context to distinguish between the park and the mountain."

sounds like locals call it "Denali."

I don't know if President McKinley ever even climbed--or even saw--that mountain.

I agree completely. It's ridiculous for dozens of different names to be applied to the same place. Every significant place should have an "official" name that is recognized internationally. Out of respect, the official name should be a locally recognized name. However, the spellings will have to be allowed to vary somewhat being that different languages have different alphabets. But they should at least try to maintain the pronunciation. There's no good reason to change Deutschland to Germany or Suomi to Finland.

While I'm normally all about lessening confusion, what about names that are too difficult for non-natives to prounounce? I can think of at least a few cultures whose languages include clicks, for instance, and I *know* that the tonal elements of Chinese languages would make it nearly impossible to be understood. While it may seem ignorant (and might have roots in ignorance) the alternative pronunciations do serve a purpose.

I thoroughly agree. Living in a city known by the locals as Basel, but known to others as Bâle, Basle or Basilea, it is a pain. I suggest you look up "Exonym" in Wikipedia, then "English exonyms" and "List of English exonyms for German toponyms".

Exonyms are slowly going out of fashion, for example most people now say Beijing instead of Peking, but we still have Rome(=Roma), Florence(=Firenze), Munich(=München), Copenhagen(=København), to name just a few. How "Shqipëria" ever came to be known as Albania in English is beyond me.

The French are B*****ds for using French versions of names only. If you've ever taken the train from Paris to London, you will know that the departure board at Gare du Nord shows "Londres" instead of "London".

One problem is when a place is bilingual, you have bilingual signs, but which one should a foreigner use? See Gaelic road signs in Scotland and the list in "Welsh placenames".