Talk:Names of Myanmar

Birmania
What about Birmania?

Thanks for this very educational article. It doesn't alter my view that the English name of the country is and should remain Burma (just as the English name for Deutschland is Germany), at least until such time as a democratically elected Burmese government requests otherwise. Accordingly, Wikipedia's articles should be at Burma. Adam 13:32, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Adjective or possessive
May I point out that the creaky "a" is the possessive as in Burma's sovereignty and the short tone "a" does not actually change for the adjective as in Burmese society? Wagaung 20:27, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

The reason why most Burmese are "unaware of these subtleties" for the correct usage between "Myanmar" and "Myanma" is that most Burmese speakers treat "Myanma" as possessive and "Myanmar" as an adjective in their own language. The current grammatical usage of these terms in English as promulgated by the Burmese government is inconsistent with that in Burmese.

1. While "Myanma" (without the "r") can be construed (or argued) as an adjective in certain cases, its dominant use is as a possessive.

2. In Burmese, "Myanmar" is an adjective--not a noun. "Myanmar" is always used in front of a noun as a modifier to that noun: e.g., "Myanmar Lu-Myo" (the Burmese race/ethnicity), "Myanmar Naing-ngan" (the Burmese state), etc. As a native speaker, I can't think of an instance where "Myanmar" is used as a standalone noun. Whenever "Myanmar" is used by itself, the speaker assumes that the listener knows what the implicit follow-up noun is.

So the usage "Myanmar Language Commission" should be correct in English. But it's not. The problem is that by calling the country "The Union of Myanmar", the Burmese government is (incorrectly) using "Myanmar" as a noun in English. It should have been called "Myanmar Union" a la the Soviet Union or the Czech Republic. If they want to stick to "the Union of Myanmar", then we need an equivalent demonym of Burmese for Myanmar such as Myanmarese or Myanmese. Hybernator 23:48, 30 December 2006 (UTC)Hybernator


 * Just realized that Myanma (without "r") is still represented as adjective. It's incorrect. It's possessive. Hybernator (talk) 03:10, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

A fascinating article
Some will complain about the argumentative tone ("as was shown above"). I don't; but those sections may be more appropriate to Manual of Style (Burma/Myanmar). Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:31, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Burmese python
Perhaps some mention could be made of the use of the adjectival forms in such cases as the python. I don't know how other languages deal/dealt with the issue, but clearly in English there's no one who ever says "Myanmarese python". --Dante Alighieri | Talk 21:44, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

how do you say... 緬甸?
this is English Wikipedia so we need a transliteration of the word: 緬甸  Arthurian Legend (talk) 22:28, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Philadelphia versus Philly
For the distinction between Myanma and Bama, might it help the exposition to give examples in English where the formal and colloquial names for a place differ? I can think of Philadelphia (Pennsylvania, USA) versus its colloquial name Philly, but perhaps there is another example that better mimics the similarities between Myanma and Bama. Quantling (talk) 16:35, 14 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm not quite sure where the formal and colloquial names statement comes from. Historically, Bama (or rather, Bamah) has been the name used in India to refer to the ethnic group known as Myanma in Burma itself. Historically, Burma has had a Myanma core centered around the Irrawaddy valley (after the defeat of the Mons) but has had empires that were more far flung and included the non-Myanma Tenassarim regions, the Arakan, and, to a lesser extent of domination, the hill states of the Shans and the Kachins and many other ethnic groups. Thus, until the war of 1824-1826 when Western parts of Burma were lost to the British, there was no strong ethnic identification with the center (even though the center was almost entirely Myanma). After the west was lost, the state was essentially reduced to its ethnic core area of the valley (the hill states were almost always tributary states rather than integrated and directly administered from Ava or Mandalay), and, possibly because the Ava kings perceived the significance of the threat they faced from the British kalas, a stronger ethnic identification with the state developed. Somewhere around 1850, possibly during the rule of Mingdon Min, the state began to call itself the land of the Myanmar.


 * Historically it has been the non-Myanmar who have called the people Bama or Bamar (this include the many ethnic groups that comprise modern Burma today). Thus formal and colloquial should actually read non-Myanma and Myanma. The reason why the name is hotly debated inside Burma is because it excludes all other ethnicities. Unfortunately, what was practical in a Myanma only Ava kingdom of the mid 19th century, is now imposed on the entire country at the cost of excluding the many diverse ethnic groups that live inside the boundaries of Burma. --Regents Park (Chase my ducks) 01:48, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Original research
This article is plagued by original research concerning the usage and backing of the various names of Burma. I want to point out that citing a publication by an organisation which makes use of one name or the other is an example of synthesis of published material serving to advance a position. Unless the work includes commentary on its choice of usage of name for Burma, the usage therein doesn't assume encyclopedic significance.

Fortunately it seems that plenty of reliable sources discussing the choice of name do exist, so I'll have a go at incorporating these. BigBlueFish (talk) 18:43, 8 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Mostly done. Hope that helps. BigBlueFish (talk) 20:41, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Germans don't mind their country being called Germany or Allemagne, even though they call it Deutschland and the Chinese name for China is not China, so I don't understand why the rest of the world cannot call Burma, Burma or Birmanie or Birmania or Mian Dian etc. The Burmese can say it correctly in their own language, but they shouldn't expect the rest of the world to learn Burmese pronunciations! By the way, the old classical pronunciation is actually Mranma (it's a rakauk not a yapelet) and the Arakanese still say it correctly. Most Burmese just lost the ability to pronounce /r/ over the centuries. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tocharian (talk • contribs) 05:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

"Imperialists"

 * actually you cannot call Beijing, 'Peking' anymore. the standardized is quite common in Asia, Korea is demand it's capital to be rename in several languages too. what you just said is a very imperialistic view of the world, if it can be correct, it should be corrected, your excuse is insanely stupid. the "chinese" never had a word that sound anything like "chinese" it is obviously made up by imperialist and should be removed. ya, China and chinese should be renamed too :P 218.186.12.224 (talk) 00:04, 17 December 2008 (UTC)


 * English speakers can call Peking anything they want. But I humbly suggest that in editing Wikipedia we should try to be objective. The English name "China" was chosen by Sun Yat-sen and other "Chinese" in 1911. Prior to that, there was no country called "china" in English, not even a country called "zhongguo" in Chinese. Sun was born in the Da-Tsing Empire and became an American citizen in order to engage in revolutionary activities. Eventually, he played an important role in a revolution that led to the establishment of the "Republic of China" (zhonghuaminguo). The English name was chosen at that time by Sun and his associates, not by "imperialists".Peaceandprogress (talk) 09:10, 29 March 2009  (UTC)

I've reverted the readdition of New Zealand to the list of "Myanmar" countries for the following reason: there are over 30 countries whose primary language is English; New Zealand has the 32nd global English-speaking population; the article cites four independent tertiary sources which discuss directly the preferences of national governments in relation to this subject. The presumption of weight to New Zealand with only a primary source from the government confirming their stance is original research. If New Zealand was really so important it would have cropped up in at least one of the articles, and even if not one will most likely emerge in the future for us to use. BigBlueFish (talk) 23:49, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
 * The point of my edit was because as it was the article gave the impression that all English speaking countries referred to it as Burma, which is obviously not the case. However it no longer does this since the series of changes. Mattlore (talk) 04:10, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

most imperialists do prefer burma to Myanmar. i guess this shows where wikipedia stands — Preceding unsigned comment added by D8dafs34345 (talk • contribs) 16:29, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

ISO 3166
Is it worth mentioning that ISO call it Myanmar ?  Sean.hoyland  - talk 08:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
 * The ISO collaborates with the UN so there's probably no surprise there. If there was a good source that singled out or mentioned the ISO in this context there might be a case for that of course. Bigbluefish (talk)

Wrong name !
This artical is called Names of Burma and the name Burma is out of date. This artical should be called Names of Myanmar and not Names of Burma. To use the name Burma is just as incorrect as Holland for the Netherlands of England for the United-Kingdom of Greath-Britain & Northern-Ireland. Just as Rangoon is called Yangon today. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.134.154.25 (talk) 18:22, 2 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Have you read this Talk:Burma/Myanmar ?  Sean.hoyland  - talk 02:37, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Etymology/history
Just retrieved the following from the Burma article:


 * "Myanmar" is the local short form of the name "Myanmar Naingngandaw", the name used by the regime currently in power in the country. While the etymology of the name is unclear, it has been used since the 13th century, primarily as a reference to the Myanma ethnic group. Until the mid-19th century, rulers in the region identified themselves with the areas that they ruled. For example, the 18th century king, Alaungpaya alternately referred to himself as the ruler of Tampradipa and Thunaparanta, Ramanadesa, and Kamboza (all alternate names of places in the Irrawaddy Valley) in correspondence with the East India Company.


 * The Court of Ava was the first to use this name to refer to its kingdom in the mid-19th Century, when its power was declining, when the kingdom was confined to the Irrawaddy Valley which was predominantly Myanma in character, and at a time when the Myanma ethnic identity first began to develop a political identity.

At least some of it is missing from this article, but I don't know enough about the subject to organise and merge the details properly. Can anyone help? Bigbluefish (talk) 23:44, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

Economist style guide
User:RegentsPark, the answer to your question is "No". jnestorius(talk) 16:44, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Please let me clarify why using the Economist's style guide as a source to discuss Names of Burma is wrong. The article already has four reliable references which discuss the naming and renaming of Burma in the English language, and in these references, different media sources are discussed as examples of notable usage of either name in published media. The choices of media sources at all should only be considered notable to this article at all because of their discussion in those references. The importance or influence of the specific media sources is also asserted by their appearance in the references. If it were necessary to mention the Economist alongside the other media sources in order to offer a proper discussion, then one of these sources, or an equally valid alternative source would be a valid justification - the Economist itself is not. On a subjective, unsourced level, I would also argue that the Economist is substantially smaller and less notable than all the other media sources listed in the article. But fundamentally, it is because if every media source the size of the Economist with a style guide were referenced, the article would gain nothing and lose all coherence. Bigbluefish (talk) 19:03, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Let me see if I understand your position. Your position is that it is the secondary sources that discuss the usage in the media issue that define which particular media sources merit a mention i.e. secondary sources pick examples, not us. If that is what you mean, I can buy that.  Sean.hoyland  - talk 19:31, 22 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I certainly don't advocate quoting every media style guide, but judicious use of quotes can enliven a dry text. That was my basis for including the Economist's pithy illustration of the fact that use of "Myanmar" need not imply endorsement of the régime. I'm not sure which sources are the four you consider reliable; I hope David Singer's blog posting isn't one. The Star article does in fact mention the Economist, and the BBC's status is cited to... the BBC. I don't see the need to list both the New York Times and its offshoot the International Herald Tribune. jnestorius(talk) 16:48, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

New sources
A couple of new sources that may be useful to the article. Probably more will follow in the next week or so:

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/asia/101101/burma-myanmar-name http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2010/1030/1224282315060.html

Interestingly, both sources seem to depict the "anti-revisionist" stance (as self-described by the latter source) of using "Burma" as in decline. Nothing changed about the article yet (no time) but perhaps they will be useful. Bigbluefish (talk) 01:02, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

mangled sentence
Section 1, Burmese names, begins, "In the Myanmar is known as either ..." This could be made into a readable sentence by simply leaving out "In the". I hesitate to do this, since I think the writer had something more subtle in mind? Mathyeti (talk) 02:26, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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Regarding section about US decision to use "Burma"
The article cited only says that the Military Government changed the name to Myanmar in 1989. It contains no discussion about the state department's decision to use the name Burma rather than Myanmar. A better source is needed for the claim that the US uses "Burma" in support of the party elected in 1989 considering Myanmar's transition to democracy in 2010 and its continued use of its new name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.58.213.140 (talk) 13:25, 1 February 2021 (UTC)