Well this isn't exactly another word or meaning for South Africa... but for some reason we have Republique D'Afrique Du Sud on the cover of our passports! As far as i know, French is not one of our 11 official languages... very strange!

The word Wales actually means foreigner in old English, the Welsh name for Wales is Cymru, but when you arrive in Wales you'll see signs that say 'Croseo i Gymru'

The Welsh for England is 'Lloeger'

There are loads of small non-nations in Europe. The Basque Country in Northern Spain for instance is called 'Euskadi' in it's own language, and the French speaking part of Belgium is called Walloonia - which I think is a great name for a country.

Another funny thing is that English speakers sometimes call Ukraine "the Ukraine" when Ukrainian language doesn't have articles at all (the/a/an).

I asked a Ukrainian colleague about this once and she didn't fully know where that came from...maybe some mistake in a document or speech or something...but she confirmed there is no "the".

Here's a somewhat belligerent take on the "Ukraine vs. the Ukraine" issue. It's not exactly helpful to those of us who'd like to unlock the key to this mystery -- but the writer sure as hell doesn't like it when you call Ukraine "the Ukraine."

The writer discusses (and dismisses) two possibilites regarding the article "the." First, that for some reason it comes from French, and second:

quote:

Geographical regions such as the Arctic, the Atlantic, the North, the West, and the prairies all require the definite article, but these are not countries. Since 1917 Ukraine has had very definite borders so it cannot be regarded as merely a region. Some people have mistakenly thought that Ukraine is a general word meaning "the borderland;' "the steppes" or "the prairies;' which would require the article. A few neanderthal writers in the past have even promoted "the Ukraine" to reflect the original meaning "the borderland" in order to diminish the international political stature of Ukraine. They betrayed their ignorance of Ukraine, or their bias against it, with this usage. See for example, the view of Robert 0. Grover in the U.S. News & World Report (Dec. 9, 1991).

I see several things wrong with this statement ... Ukraine hasn't had much recent history as its own country, and contrary to the writer's assertion, its borders have changed often. And even *if* the "neanderthal writers" were mistaken about the meaning of word Ukraine or krayina, their ignorance perfectly explains the use of the article "the."

That's the best I can think of -- you have this region, rarely independent over recent history, lacking in definite borders, and often referred to as "the borderland" (and for a while "the Ukrainian S.S.R"). You could see how "the" could end up preceding its name. I know Ukranian nationalists don't like it, but for a long time, Ukraine was "just a region" in the eyes of most of the world.

More on grammar: This has an interesting part on the change the preposition in referring to Ukraine, perhaps supporting the theory above ...

I can't believe it but I actually read the relevant section of the wikipedia link (I almost never read links...shh, don't tell anyone that!). I feel like a dork but it is actually pretty interesting. And I never thought about the Sudan or Congo (or the connection to the word for border which is similar in Bosnian).

skobb! I hold you responsible for sorting this all out soon...

New fact: the Herzegovina portion of BiH's name comes from the German? word for duke - herceg or herzeg in the possessive form. Similarly Vojvodina in Serbia - I guess it's not duke but something else (that word came up in the Ukraine wikipedia entry too.)

quote:

Originally posted by KateL57:
I can't believe it but I actually read the relevant section of the wikipedia link (I almost never read links...shh, don't tell anyone that!).

You know it was just because *I* posted the link.

And yeah, skobb, we're appointing you as the official investigator in this matter.

quote:

Originally posted by dopeyzn:
Well this isn't exactly another word or meaning for South Africa... but for some reason we have Republique D'Afrique Du Sud on the cover of our passports! As far as i know, French is not one of our 11 official languages... very strange!

Maybe skobb will jump in and correct me here, but I think that there are two officially recognized international diplomatic languages: French and English. Are not all passports and visas supposed to have at least one of the two? Possibly a connection?

Is English one of the official languages of ZA? If not, then maybe that is some sort of political slight. (Or ass kissing move to please France)

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Stoo:

Are not all passports and visas supposed to have at least one of the two?

[QUOTE]

Yeah, I've noticed that on passports of many countries the name of a country is written in both local language and French.


So I have a question for native English speakers: is it correct to say "I'm going to the Netherlands/the Gambia/the Sudan" or "I'm going to Netherlands/Gambia/Sudan"?


A few names of countries in south-slavic languages:

Switzerland is Švicarska in Croatian. In Serbian it's Швајцарска (Švajcarska).
Spain is Španjolska in Croatian. In Serbian it's Шпанија (Španija) .
Germany is Njemačka in Croatian. In Serbian it's Немачка (Nemačka) .
Romania is Rumunjska in Croatian. In Serbian it's Румунија (Rumunija) .
Hungary is Mađarska in both but in Serbian it's written Мађарска.
Local name for Croatia is Hrvatska.

Oooh - I just remembered: French word for tie (necktie): Cravat...because it originated in Croatia/Hrvatska.

Suncana, it is correct to use "the" if it's part of the name. But I think there are lots of native speakers who just don't know that Gambia and Sudan have a "the" and so don't use it.

Due to my time spent in countries whose languages don't use articles, it sometimes doesn't sound quite as wrong to me to say things without articles...I think lots of native speakers who talk about Ceska Republika just say "Czech Republic" in English without an article even though it definitely has one...

(articles really are a nightmare possibly worse than cases)

Well, there has been some discussion about Ukraine...I understood that in fact there is no article in the official name.

I agree with you that articles in country names aren't that bad, and might go so far as to say you just have to remember them...but above I meant articles in general - I think they are pretty complicated. I've done proofreading of documents translated by professional translators and figuring out where articles go in someone else's speech is one of the hardest things I've had to do. (Sorry, maybe this is more a topic for Dave's ESL Cafe )

I just noticed that my name has appeared in this thread multiple times so I suppose I should say something witty.

It is definitely not "the" Ukraine. As Kate points out it isn't even possible to say "the" Ukraine in Ukrainian or Russian since they don't have articles. My understand, and I haven't really studied it in depth, is that JV's explanation is the reason behind the mysterious "the." Plenty of folks in Russia still consider Ukraine to be essentially a region of Russia full of people who speak a dialect of Russian (Putin probably tops the list of these folks with a few of my Russian instructors close behind.) Russia and Ukraine have a long entwined history going back to the Kieven Rus with both modern countries thinking of Kyiv as its historic heart.

I invoked the name of skobb, too! don't we get a comment on my post?

quote:

Originally posted by Stoo:
I invoked the name of skobb, too! don't we get a comment on my post?

Sorry for the slight. Um, I don't really know. I haven't had consular training yet. However, your reasoning sounds good to me. French is still considered the old fashioned Lingua Franca (how apt), even though English has in reality probably taken that title these days.