"Torino, Italy" ?

NBC (make your own jokes on those initials) is persisting to name the
site of the Winter Games by this mixed language. For whatever reason,
the Europe based nations have a version of the names of other places in
their own language. I would rather prefer calling a city or country by
the names used by that place's inhabitants. In English we have names

fruitbat...

Maybe I'd rather prefer that too, but I don't. Especially since most
people (myself included) don't know the native names or native
pronunciations of the majority of the world's places. It's far
preferable to me to just use the common English name when speaking to
common-English-speaking people.

like "Turin" and "Italy." The locals use "Torino" and "Italia" (say
those with an Italian pronunciation, please). But to do it half and

fruitbat...

Maybe if I'm talking to an Italian-speaker... Otherwise, it sounds
pretty snooty around where I live if one pronounces something like
"Italia" without an American accent in normal conversation. Maybe not
in other parts of the country, though...

half seems sorta ignorant, don't you think? I first became aware of
"Turino, Italy" from the sub-class humor of Jay Leno, but then noticed
that all of the network's coverage used this mixed bag.

fruitbat...

The BBC appears to be calling them the "Turin" Olympics, which is at
least consistent. As someone with Italian heritage, I suppose I prefer
"Torino" for aesthetic reasons, but as an American, I'm so used to
"Italy" (and "Sicily", and such) that calling those more common
locations by their native names would seem out of place.

This mixed-language tradition goes back a number of years, doesn't it?
ISTR that during the Albertville Olympics, I heard the French
pronunciation of "Albertville" quite often, but did those same

neillmassello...

With Chef Boyardee pretension, they pronounced it as "Albervill".

broadcasters use the native pronunciation for "France" with the same
frequency? Not as I recall.

It all comes down to how familiar the native name/pronunciation would
be to the listener. Nobody's really concerned that they're saying
"Torino", but to many Americans, "Italia" would grate, or at least seem
out of place. I think it's fine the way they're doing it.

Taylor...

Think of how they say the name of Ger|many and how they say it the
native tongue? There's a difference.

record.hunter...

Tedesco v. Deutsche

I could go on...

BTR1701...

I agree that it seems odd that we rename the names and places of other
parts of the world.

I mean, if the Italians call one of their major cities Firenze, who are
we to rename it Florence for them?

Likewise, our largest city is New York, not Nueva York as most latino
people call it. And we're the United States of America, not los Estados
Unidos de America.

Even if a proper name *can* be translated, I don't think it *should* be
translated.

I took Spanish from junior high through college and without fail, the
first thing every single teacher did was start re-naming everyone in the
class. If your name was "George", you became "Jorge". If your name was
"John", you became "Juan". And god help you if your name didn't have a
Spanish equivalent. If your name was Kent or Chad or something uniquely
Anglo, the teacher would just assign you some random Spanish name. You
could get stuck being Paco or Pedro all semester long.

Even as a kid, I found that to be somewhat offensive. If my name is
George, it's George. I don't suddenly become Jorge the moment I step off
the plane in Spain, the same way I don't call my boss Richard just
because he's in America. His name is Ricardo regardless of what language
we all speak.