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Why Tséhootsooí Does Not Equal “Kit Carson Drive”: Reflections on Navajo Place Names and the Inequalities of Language

Abstract:This article reflects on the controversy in the Navajo Nation of changing the name of Kit Carson Drive to the Navajo place name Tséhootsooí. I outline the structure and use of traditional Navajo place names and then show that Navajo place names have had a renaissance in signage for shopping centers and elsewhere. I then detail the controversy over a proposal to change a street name in Fort Defiance. Place names are not neutral, but fully implicated in concerns about who has and does not have the right (and power) to name. In debates about linguistic relativity, questions of the inequalities of language need to be engaged.