Two men — one a 19th century explorer and the other a 20th century surveyor of the Australian outback — suffered blinding ophthalmia during crucial times in their exploits. Each then undertook a distinctive step in toponymy by naming places in the Australian landscape after their afflictions, each place given a different name. Ophthalmia Range was named by Ernest Giles in 1876 after suffering debilitating conjunctivitis, known as ophthalmia in the 19th century. Sandy Blight Junction was named by Len Beadell in 1960 when he too suffered from this disease, also known as “blight” or “sandy blight”. While there has been speculation that what these men suffered was actually trachoma, this cannot be proven. This is both the story of how these places acquired their names and a study of what motivated these men to undertake such unique acts.
Publications
Changing Names: Tradition and Innovation in Ancient Greek Onomastics
Changing Names investigates, in relation to the ancient Greek world, the ways in which preferences in personal name-giving change: through shifts in population, cultural contact and imperialism, the popularity of new gods, celebrity status of individuals, increased openness to external influence, and shifts in local fashion.
Several major kinds of change due to cultural contact occurred: Greek names spread in regions outside Greece that were subject to Greek cultural influence (and later conquest), while conversely the Roman conquest of the Greek world led to various degrees of adoption of the Roman naming system; late in antiquity, Christianisation led to a profound but rather gradual transformation of the name stock.
A Socio-Onomastic Study of Genocide and Nazi Germany
This freshly released book provides readers with an increased understanding of and sensitivity to the many powerful ways in which personal names are used by both perpetrators and victims during wartime. Whether to declare allegiance or seek refuge, names are routinely used to survive under life-threatening conditions. To illustrate this point, this book concentrates on one of the most terrifying and yet fascinating events of modern history: the Holocaust. More specifically, this book examines the different ways in which personal names were used by Nationalist Socialists and targeted victims of their genocidal ideology. Although there are many excellent scientific and popular works which have dealt with the Nazi Germany and the Holocaust, this work stands alone in its investigation of the importance of naming both for this horrific period and for other genocidal periods of human history.
The author, I. M. Nick, is a researcher in sociolinguistics, editor-in-chief of Names: The Journal of the American Name Society, and president of the Germanic Society for Forensic Linguistics. She is the Immediate Past President of the American Name Society.
Call for NAMES Editorial Board Members
Onomastic Experts Sought for the NAMES Editorial Board
To compensate for the growing number of submissions NAMES is receiving, the number of article reviewers for the Editorial Board is being expanded. Toward that end, NAMES Editor-in-Chief Dr. I. M. Nick is currently soliciting applications for new Board members. Members of the Board are expected to critically assess submissions on the following points: 1) scientific contribution to onomastic studies; 2) interest for NAMES readers; and 3) adherence to the stylistic, grammatical, and formatting regulations of the NAMES Style Sheet. Members of the board typically review two submissions per month by providing detailed evaluations of ca. 500 words. Onomastic experts are particularly needed in the areas of place names, literary onomastics, brandnames, and trade names. Along with their reviewing duties, once a year, the members of the Editorial Board also vote to select the Best Article of the Year.
If you are interested in applying to become a member of the Board, please complete and return the application via the following link: <https://nick662.typeform.com/
Voprosy Onomastiki (Problems of Onomastics) publishes Vol. 16 (2019), Issue 1
The editorial board of the journal Voprosy Onomastiki (Problems of Onomastics) is pleased to inform you of the publication of Vol. 16 (2019), Issue 1. The issue is available on the journal’s website.
Articles
Petrosyan, A. Ye. Towards the Reconstruction of the Name and Image of a Great God in the Ancient Armenian Tradition [in Russian]
Dirbas H. Onomastics and the Reconstruction of the Past: Rethinking Totemism in Semitic Traditions [in English]
Zaika, N. M. Distribution of Locative Surnames in the South-West of France [in Russian]
Feoktistova, L. A. Revisiting the Paronymic Attraction to a Personal Name: the Name Elena in Russian Dialects [in Russian]
Shvarev, N. M. Russian Names with the Stem Maur-, Testimonies of the Old Rostov Land [in Russian]
Rácz A., Tóth V. Settlement Names Derived from Ethnonyms as Historical Evidence: The Case of Medieval Hungary [in English]
Ivšić Majić D. The Medieval Attestations of Croatian Pre-Slavic Island Names [in English]
Khisamitdinova, F. G., Muratova, R. T., Yagafarova, G. N., Valieva, M. R. Color Terms in Bashkir Toponymy [in Russian]
Kostylev, Yu. S. The Soviet-Period Toponymy of Severnaya Zemlya as a Reflection of Ideological Struggle [in Russian]
Akhmetova, M. V. On the Revival of One Ancient Russian Katoikonym: Staraya Russa [in Russian]
Oinotkinova, N. R. On the Origin of Some Theonyms of the Shaman Pantheon of the Altaians [in Russian]
Notes
Kaksin, A. D. Toponymic System as a Resource to Explore the Ancient History of a Region: the Case of Khakassia [in Russian]
Book Reviews
Holzer, G. Slavic Substrate in the Onomastics of Saxony. Review of the book: Wenzel, W. (2017). Die slawische Frühgeschichte Sachsens im Licht der Namen / Hrsg. von A. Brendler, & S. Brendler. Hamburg: Baar. 205 p. [in German]
In Memoriam
Valentová, I., Kopach, A. I. Milan Majtán (1934–2018) [in Russian]
Vasilyeva, N. V. Theodolius Witkowski (1930–2018) [in Russian]
Anniversaries
Ruf Aleksandrovna Ageeva [in Russian]
Investors dismiss analysis from those who have less favourable surnames
Investors and financial advisors may be influenced by an unusual element of a stock market forecast – the analyst’s name. That’s the finding of a new study by researchers at the Cass Business School in London which discovered that a more favourable surname elicited stronger market reactions to earnings forecasts.
The researchers measured surname favourability using the US historical immigration records to identify countries of origin associated with a particular surname and the Gallup survey data on Americans’ favourability toward foreign countries. The research paper ‘An Analyst by Any Other Surname: Surname Favorability and Market Reaction to Analyst Forecasts’ is conditionally accepted for publication in the Journal of Accounting and Economics.
Call for Papers: International Association for Robin Hood Studies
The Bulletin of the International Association for Robin Hood Studies is the peer-reviewed, open-access scholarly journal of The International Association for Robin Hood Studies. Scholars are invited to submit articles or essays detailing original research on any aspect of the Robin Hood tradition. The editors welcome essays in the following areas: formal literary explication, manuscript and early printed book investigations, historical inquiries, new media examinations, and theory or cultural studies approaches.
We recommend that you review the About the Journal page for the journal’s section policies, as well as the Author Guidelines. Authors need to register with the journal prior to submitting or, if already registered, can simply log in and begin the five-step process.
Onomastica Uralica: Proceedings of the Onomastic Congress are available online
The International Council of Onomastic Studies reported that the papers presented at the 26th International Congress of Onomastic Sciences in Hungary in 2017 have been published as volumes Nr. 10 – 14 in Onomastica Uralica. The central topic of the congress, “Locality and globality in the world of names”, was about the linguistic position that proper names occupy in our present globalized world.
The volumes are available online in Open Access format on the website of the journal: http://mnytud.arts.unideb.hu/onomural/.
The volumes are also published in print form.
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Call for Papers: Research in Corpus Linguistics journal
A call for papers has been released for a special issue on Research in Corpus Linguistics for the peer-reviewed journal of the Spanish Association for Corpus Linguistics, AELINCO. Scholars working within the areas of computational linguistics, typology, and lexicology are encouraged to send in their contributions by January 20, 2019. Submissions should be sent to the editor of the special issue, Dr Ignacio Rodríguez (Universidad Autónoma de Querétaro, México) via email: i.rodriguezuaq.edu.mx.
In particular, previously unpublished research articles and book reviews are invited which address one or more of the following topics: corpus design, compilation and typology; discourse, literary analysis and corpora; corpus-based grammatical studies; corpus-based lexicology and lexicography; corpora, contrastive studies and translation; corpus and linguistic variation; corpus-based computational linguistics; corpora, language acquisition and teaching; and special uses of corpus linguistics.
Voprosy Onomastiki (Problems of Onomastics) publishes Vol. 15 (2018), Issue 2
The editorial board of the journal Voprosy Onomastiki (Problems of Onomastics) is pleased to inform you of the publication of Vol. 15 (2018), Issue 2. The issue is available on the journal’s website.
Articles
Mullonen, I. I. Phonetic Variants of the Ancient Toponymic Stem *Ylä- ‘Upper’ and Their Genesis in the Hydronymy of Karelia
Agapkina, T. A., Berezovich, E. L., Surikova, O. D. Toponyms in the Charms of the Russian North. II: Lands. Mountains. Islands. Cities
David, J. Toponymy in a Relocated City: the City of Most, Czech Republic
Litvina, A. F., Uspenskij, F. B. The Veneration of the Mother of God and Some Aspects of Naming Tradition in pre-Petrine Russia
Prósper, B. M. The Indo-European Personal Names of Pannonia, Noricum and Northern Italy: Comparative and Superlative Forms in Celtic, Venetic, and South-Picene
Golikova, D. M. Systemic Ties of Personal Names through the Lens of Their Lexical Derivatives
Bobrova, M. V. Somatisms in Modern Nicknames of the Perm Region
Issues in Applied Onomastics
Nikitina, T. G. The Urban Toponymic Space: “Cultural Layers” in Lexicographic Perspective
Ilyin, D. Yu., Sidorova, Е. G. Representation of Grammatical Information in a Regional Toponymic Gazetteer
Ruth, M. E., Klimenko, E. N. Unofficial Urbanonymy of Ekaterinburg: a Sociolinguistic Study
Bozhko, E. M., Illner, A. O., Korneeva, L. I. A Compromise Approach to Rendering Urban Place Names: the Case of Ekaterinburg
Dambuev, I. A. Revisiting the Standardization of the Use of the Letter ё in Russian Toponymy
Book Reviews
Shmeleva, T. V.
New Advances in the Study of Hydronymy. Review of the book: Vasilyev, V. L. Gidronimiia basseina reki Msty: svod nazvanii i analiz mikrosistem [The Hydronymy of the Msta River Basin: Nomenclature and Analysis of Microsystems]. Moscow: Izdatel’skii dom IaSK, 2017.
Suprun, V. I.
Slavic Railway Onomastics. Review of the book: Tomasik, P. Nazewnictwo kolejowe: na materiale języka polskiego, rosyjskiego i czeskiego [Railway Onomastics: Evidence from Polish, Russian, and Czech]. Bydgoszcz: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Kazimierza Wielkiego, 2016.
Anniversaries
Popov S. A.
Founder of the Voronezh Onomastic School: On the 75th Anniversary of Professor Gennady Kovalev