Map it!

Back when I was Countries Editor at Economist.com, one of my little jobs was fielding the complaints over maps. The most frequent ire was drawn by the body of water which Korea calls the East Sea, and Japan calls the Sea of Japan, and no one else besides mariners cares about; no matter what we printed, there were surprising numbers of angry people who had taken time out of their busy day to demand that we alter a map. One of my old colleagues has expanded upon the phenomenon for a column.

Comments

As soon as more Vietnamese people start reading the Economist, the "South China Sea" will turn into a nightmare too.

Posted by brooksfoe | September 5, 2007 11:48 AM

There was a time when simply using the term "Palestinian" would invoke howls of outrage. "There's no such thing as a Palestinian" is one of those supposedly pro-Israel statements that has fallen by the wayside like "What became Israel was totally unoccupied in 1947" and "The Palestinian refugees left of their own accord." Fallen by the wayside, I should add, because they are utterly unsupportable, not because of any appeals to conscience.

Posted by Freddie | September 5, 2007 11:49 AM

For the sake of humanity, leave the names alone. Think of all the trees that will be destroyed if we need new maps because the names have changed.

Besides, it's the Sea of Japan.

Posted by MarkD | September 5, 2007 3:38 PM

I remember when I worked in the Navy Department back in the day, that when we started escorting tankers in and out of the Gulf, we were told that we were no longer to refer to the "Persian Gulf" in our official correspondence, but to the "North Arabian Sea".

And of course there is the whole thorny issue (long since resolved, alas, in favor of the ChiComs) of "Peiping/Peking/Beijing", "Republic of China/Taiwan", /e tutti quanti/.

Posted by David Hecht | September 5, 2007 3:40 PM