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Letter to the Toronto Star
Dearest Star editors and proof-readers,
Can the Star stop using the term "East Indian"? There has never been a country named East India, and just two rapacious colonial empires bore this name, the British and Dutch East India companies. They definitely haven't been in business for over 100 years. Moreover, the people who live in your imaginary "East India" are actually located in real countries, such as India (no "East" here), Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and a couple more, depending on your liking. I understand that you may want to avoid confusion with the colonial term "Indian", referring to the original inhabitants of North America, but since you don't use the term in your pages anyway, and haven't for years, why should your readers be confused?
In general, the area described above is called "the Indian sub-continent" or "South Asia", the latter which provides for a nice adjective, "South Asian", which happens to be just as short as "East Indian". This adjective, which provides a vividly clear geographical cue as to the cultural origins of the noun it complements, is also impossible to confuse with "(North American) Indian" or even "West Indian".
Also, while I don't recall the C.P. Style Guide making any recommendations in this matter, should it be so behind the times as to recommend the use of "East Indian", please, grow a spine in this case, and show C.P. how it's done.
There is actually one proper use of the term East Indian: that which relates to the eastern part of India, West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, and Orissa.
Chall dikra!
--François Villeneuve
Can the Star stop using the term "East Indian"? There has never been a country named East India, and just two rapacious colonial empires bore this name, the British and Dutch East India companies. They definitely haven't been in business for over 100 years. Moreover, the people who live in your imaginary "East India" are actually located in real countries, such as India (no "East" here), Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and a couple more, depending on your liking. I understand that you may want to avoid confusion with the colonial term "Indian", referring to the original inhabitants of North America, but since you don't use the term in your pages anyway, and haven't for years, why should your readers be confused?
In general, the area described above is called "the Indian sub-continent" or "South Asia", the latter which provides for a nice adjective, "South Asian", which happens to be just as short as "East Indian". This adjective, which provides a vividly clear geographical cue as to the cultural origins of the noun it complements, is also impossible to confuse with "(North American) Indian" or even "West Indian".
Also, while I don't recall the C.P. Style Guide making any recommendations in this matter, should it be so behind the times as to recommend the use of "East Indian", please, grow a spine in this case, and show C.P. how it's done.
There is actually one proper use of the term East Indian: that which relates to the eastern part of India, West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, and Orissa.
Chall dikra!
--François Villeneuve
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First Brown Seal of Approval!
Re: First Brown Seal of Approval!
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I was once very confused by the term "East Indian": for the longest time, I thought that Punjab was in the eastern part of the country, as people seemed to use "East Indian" and "Punjabi" interchangeably. It didn't even occur to me that they were using the term "East Indian" in the way that they were, and so assumed that "East" was a specifier for the part of India in which Punjab was located.
This misconception lasted a good couple of decades, with it taking a somewhat bemused
(Then, of course, I actually got around to looking at a map of India, and now have a much better idea of where things are over there.)
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