Beyond the many headline events of this past month, some equally important news stayed under the surface.
For example, the US government changed the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America, prompting the Canadian Prime Minister to remind everyone of the indigenous meaning of Lake Ontario.
His statement on X said that “the name Lake Ontario comes from the Wendat word Ontari’io, which, appropriately, means ‘the lake is beautiful, the lake is big."
Closer to home, there was a declaration to standardise street and place names in Muscat, making all spellings uniform across the governorate. This is becoming more urgent with the rise of delivery services and usage of digital products like maps where uniformity is key.
The attention to place names is always relevant. This can be seen in continuing debates in various parts of the world to rename roads, cities and even monuments to more closely reflect contemporary interests and also to resist older, colonial reminders.
All this brings attention to the details on a map or a street sign which we regularly bypass until attention is brought to it. We often make an instinctive assumption that street names are important, but attention on it is scant, except for those who are either researching this phenomenon or implementing the findings of such research.
A United Nations study on standardising geographical names states that “Place names are cultural artefacts produced by complex interactions between mind, culture and environment."
Working on this assumption, a recent study conducted by Sultan Qaboos University found that signages around tourist spots in Oman were increasingly becoming bilingual, even multilingual, to reflect the diversity of tourists visiting Oman.
The researchers stated the inclusion of English and other languages as appropriate: “a global lingua franca, English language allows international visitors and expatriates to engage meaningfully with Omani cultural heritage and access essential information."
Multilingual signs also develop deeper connections with tourist sites and their significance, allowing for a contextual and nuanced understanding of Oman’s cultural heritage and tourism sites.
Not only are linguistic choices on tourist signposts important, but their placement is central as well, as it showcases the language policy of a nation.
In Oman, for example, the hierarchical arrangement of Arabic on top and English below it, or in parallel with each other when the size of the sign allows it, reinforces national policies and priorities, underlining heritage preservation with pride in language.
In this sense, linguistic choices are strategically deployed to shape perceptions of belonging, authenticity, and cultural continuity while being accessible to an international audience.
Beyond heritage, names also reflect changing priorities and concerns that face developers and landscape planners.
In an article on naming a street in Al Mouj in Muscat as 'The Walk', urban planner Susana F Molina underlines the focus on creating walking spaces in urban centres. The emphasis on creating walkable, traffic-free spaces is now seen to be central for urban development, even in hot countries like Oman. The name of the street thus re-imagines the purpose of a road and reminds one of the possibilities of walking.
Toponymy, or the scientific study of place names and their historical and contemporary uses, is an emerging area of research. It is multi-disciplinary as it involves history, linguistics, anthropology and many other domains. More importantly for us, it allows us to appreciate the importance of street signs, signposts outside buildings and tourist places, as well as names of public structures like airports. We see them for what they really are: a deeply thought-out name that reflects a rich past and a legacy that is worth preserving.
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
