The naming of birds is a difficult matter (to paraphrase T S Eliot). The 19th-century poet had a point, and not just when it came to domesticated cats. The naming of anything can be tricky, as the American Ornithological Society (AOS) is proving. On 1 November 2023, AOS announced that it would be 'changing all English-language names within its geographical jurisdiction that are named directly after people'.
The debate has come about, and rightly so, following discussions around who and what certain birds are named after. As the AOS statement says, naming conventions were developed in the 1800s and 'clouded by racism and misogyny'. In other words, many of the people commemorated in taxonomy had values and actions we consider less than savoury today. Slave ownership, displacement of people, murder and genocide are some examples.
One enlightening blog was written by Stephen Carr Hampton, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and a birder. He acknowledges that for many birders the names are irrelevant and don't evoke any feeling for the people they commemorate: who was that Pallas chap, anyway? But for Hampton, Scott's Oriole is a personal attack. 'There is one bird's name that hits me in the gut, takes my breath away,' he writes. Despite being considered 'civilised', in 1838 President Van Buren called on General Scott to 'remove' the Cherokee, part of systematic suppression and eradication of a native people. The story is sickening – torturous, degrading, murderous ethnic cleansing – and directly impacted Hampton's family and people. In the 1850s, Bonaparte's Oriole was renamed 'in honour' of General Scott. The taxonomic list is littered with similar examples of people who we unwittingly celebrate. For black birders, Audubon and Bachman are more hard-hitting, but there are plenty of others.
Many species familiar to European birders are to be given new names by the American Ornithological Society. Perhaps Sabine's Gull might become Fork-tailed Gull? (Nathaniel Dargue).
Controversial titles
If there was a 'Hitler's Warbler' or a 'Mussolini's Woodpecker' this would be an easier concept for white westerners to grasp. Imagine if a species discovered in the last few years had been named a 'Trump's Tern' or 'Boris's Bunting'. There would have been an outcry, and yet the politicisation of bird names has existed since the birth of current taxonomy. This is why I am more than happy to listen to those people who are affected by these 19th-century eponyms and adopt a more inclusionary approach. We'll have to remember some new names, but this happens all the time and doesn't seem worth getting upset about. Your list is still your list.
Obviously, I am biased towards Lucy's Warbler (named after her first name), daughter of Spencer Fullerton Baird (he of the sandpiper, beaked whale, rat snake and even a tapir!). Both were excellent naturalists. I bet you've heard of him, but not her. Blackburnian Warbler is named a touch unexpectedly for an English natural historian, Anna Blackburne – and while I applaud her as a woman in a male-dominated field, she never saw the bird in the wild or indeed alive.
Many prominent birders have called for a systematic approach that looks at each eponym in turn, making a judgement call on those people and their histories. While I like this in theory, the task would be enormous and the last people to be consulted should be birders. We're too influenced by our personal experiences of those species.
This is indeed a difficult matter. If the renaming does go ahead (and I think it should), my vote is to have some fun with it. Let's get a group of high creatives – poets, artists, soap actors and the like – around a big table with some taxonomic experts, make it genuinely representative and go wild. Can we remove anyone who had a bird named after them because the finder was sucking up for a promotion? Let's cull the boring names, too. Bring back Mumruffin, Prinpiddle and Bumbarrel, all for Long-tailed Tit. The Australians have their fairywrens (Superb, Splendid or Lovely?). Or let's go Dutch and call Smew 'Little Nuns' (Nonnetje) or Waxwings 'Plague Birds' (Pestvogel)
- This column first appeared in the February 2024 edition of Birdwatch. To be the first to read the magazine each month, take out a subscription to Birdwatch, or get the magazine alongside your bird news by subscribing to either Bird News Ultimate (paper magazine) or Bird News Ultimate Plus (digital access).
