Official and Unofficial Toponyms on Norfolk Island

Title
Official and Unofficial Toponyms on Norfolk Island
Publication Date
2021
Author(s)
Nash, Joshua
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8312-5711
Email: jnash7@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:jnash7
Type of document
Journal Article
Language
en
Entity Type
Publication
Publisher
Ural'skii Federal'nyi Universitet imeni Pervogo Prezidenta Rossii B.N. Yeltsyna, Filologicheskii Fakul'tet
Place of publication
Russia
DOI
10.15826/vopr_onom.2021.18.2.027
UNE publication id
une:1959.11/53012
Abstract
Norfolk Island (South Pacific), a small external territory of Australia, has a placenaming record marked by distinct historical, settlement, and land use periods. This brief communication considers the complex nexus of official–unofficial, embedded–unembedded, and English–Norfolk Island language toponyms as a way to make better sense of the localization of toponymic knowledge and to appreciate better how such knowledge functions within a minute society intricately connected to its own largely known past and an ever changing toponymic present. The data were collected during interview fieldwork on Norfolk Island during the period 2007–2009. It concludes by putting forward a four-category division of Norfolk Island toponyms: 1) official names adhering to common colonial forms; 2) official and unofficial descriptive names; 3) unofficial names commemorating local people; 4) unofficial and esoteric names remembering local events and people. These categories appear distinct, but they are not necessarily mutually exclusive. The differentiation of processes of toponyms becoming embedded and the localization of toponymic knowledge are a possible explanation for the loss of toponymic knowledge among younger people on Norfolk Island and suggests a general ecological disconnect across time involving people, history, and events associated with Norfolk Island toponyms. The Norfolk Island official–unofficial toponym distinction is applicable to other toponymic case studies, especially situations with competing placenaming histories.
Link
Citation
Вопросы Ономастики, 18(2), p. 228-236
ISSN
1994-2451
1994-2400
Start page
228
End page
236
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

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