Whereas the usual place naming course of just isn’t good, it at the least establishes an institutional process for overview, session, proof gathering, and consideration of competing claims earlier than a geographic identify is modified. In contrast, what we’re witnessing beneath Trump 2.0 is a unilateral naming by decree or whim with seemingly no public dialogue or actual authorities consideration of impacts and penalties.
It’s clear to us that Trump’s renaming of Lake Ontario is symbolic political theater geared toward diverting our consideration away from the fallout of his commerce battle with Canada. But symbols matter. Place naming is a world-making observe that shapes the very foundations of our geographical imaginations and the way we come to know and have interaction with the world.
There’s a threat in dismissing Trump’s cartography of mass distraction as a frivolous symbolic tactic, since it could possibly have actual penalties for what’s taught in school rooms, reconciliation efforts with Indigenous peoples, and the badly wanted restore of relations between the USA and Canada.
