Names of the Czech Republic
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More than a decade after the split of Czechoslovakia into Slovakia and the Czech Republic, the latter continues to be known by several competing names in English and Czech. While "Czech Republic" (Czech: Česká republika) is the unquestioned long-form name, Czech authorities, geographers and linguists have had difficulty convincing people to use the officially preferred short forms of "Czechia" [ˈtʃɛkɪə] and Česko [ˈtʃɛskɒ].
Czechia
In 1993, the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs promoted "Czechia" as the short form of the country's name. The Czech government increasingly uses the term in English publications. But while similar names, such as Tschechien in German, the Polish Czechy, the Italian Cechia and the Danish Tjekkiet, have caught on, few English speakers use the word "Czechia."As "Czechia" remains uncommon, and the long form "Czech Republic" is often considered too unwieldy for marketing purposes, people often resort to the adjective "Czech." The Czech national ice hockey team brands itself as "Czech Team" rather than "Team Czechia" or "Team Czech Republic." English speakers (and Czechs speaking English) sometimes refer to the country simply as "Czech," using the adjective as a noun.
The Official Website of the Czech Republic http://czech.cz/ operated by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic does not promote Czechia anymore (2006).
Česko
The Czech counterpart to "Czechia" is "Česko." Unlike the English word, the word "Česko" has achieved some popularity, is widely used in media but is still opposed by many Czech people.While the promotion of the word "Czechia" is primarily a marketing concern, the word "Česko" touches on important issues of national identity in the Czech Republic. The country consists of three historic lands — Bohemia (in Czech, Čechy), Moravia (Morava) and Czech Silesia (Slezsko). Of the three historical areas, Bohemia is the largest and the traditional seat of power. The same word — český — means both "Czech" and "Bohemian."
Many people use the word "Čechy" to refer to the entire Czech Republic; for example, "v Čechách", literally "in Bohemia", will be used by Prague speakers to mean, "in the Czech Republic". This is similar to using the word "England" to refer to all of Great Britain or referring to the old Soviet Union as "Russia." Just as Scots and Ukrainians may be offended in those cases, Moravians and Silesians may not appreciate the use of "Čechy" to refer to their country.
The Czech government adopted "Česko" as the country's official Czech-language short-form name in 1993. (The name had existed for centuries but was rarely used until 1993). The word combines the adjective "český" with the -sko suffix traditionally used for territories in the language. For some Czechs, the word sounds strange and harsh.
In the middle 1990s, TV NOVA started to coin the word "Česko" because of the personal influence of Vladimír Železný who was then the director. The use of the word "Česko" by the Czech media and public has increased in recent years.
Promotion of the official names
Some Czech politicians and public figures have expressed concern at the disuse of "Czechia" and "Česko." In 1997, an organization to promote the names was established. The following year, a conference of professionals aimed at encouraging the use of the names was held at Charles University in Prague. The Czech Senate held a session on the issue in 2004.
Some examples of the use of Czechia can be found at [link], [link],[link],[link], [link] and [link] [link]. None of the examples listed here come from an official Czech institution, but the last one (Embassy of the Czech Republic in Singapore). The search engine of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic currently gives no examples of usage of Czechia, some examples are only available from Google see [link] [link] [link] [link]. Currently the frequency of occurrences of Czechia is unimportant compared with Google hits for the Czech Republic, the ratio is 2 million to 369 million (June 2006).
See also
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
External links
- ["Open letter to the Czech Olympic Foundation, Czech Sports Union, politicians, business people, media, etc."], National Geographic, 2001 (in Czech).
- ["Looking for a name"] by Daniela Lazarova, Radio Prague, May 13, 2004.
- ["Česko versus Czechy? On the geographic name of the Czech Republic"] by Leoš Jeleček, paper presented at the 2nd Slovak-Czech-Polish Geographical Seminar, Bratislava, September 1-5, 1999.
- ["Where are you from?" "I am from Czechia."] for the Journal of the Czech Journalists and Translators
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