A push for names of birds to be more inclusive: 5 Things podcast
On today's episode of the 5 Things podcast: Some bird names no longer fly. Host James Brown speaks with Indianapolis Star investigative reporter Sarah Bowman about the group behind this effort, Bird Names for Birds, and how they propose to make changes. The Cooper’s hawk, Townsend’s warbler and Bachman’s sparrow are all examples of birds named after someone. These names also represent and remember people “who often have objectively horrible pasts,” according to one founder of Bird Names for Birds.
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Hit play on the player above to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
James Brown:
Hello and welcome to Five Things. I'm James Brown. It's Sunday, April 9th, 2023. Go Bills. Every week we take an idea or concept and go deep, and this episode is for the birds. That's the sound of a Cooper's Hawk. That bird and dozens like it are in the midst of a controversy because of who they're named after. Why, what now, and who names birds anyway? We'll find out more from Sarah Bowman from the Indianapolis Star. Sarah Bowman, welcome to Five Things.
Sarah Bowman:
So happy to be here. Thanks for having me.
James Brown:
How did you come across your story?
Sarah Bowman:
There's an effort underway. As of right now, it's focusing on bird species that are named after people. For example, the Cooper's Hawk. This effort is to change that because there are concerns that a lot of these folks that these birds are named after have objectionable paths. A lot of them come from colonial era times and there's research and documents that go back showing that they may have committed racist acts or were involved with wiping out Native American populations or these questionable and objectionable acts from their history, and so there's an effort now to not have their names tied to these birds.
One of the co-founders from this movement that I spoke to likened these names to being verbal statues to these people, and obviously we've seen efforts in recent years to remove physical existing statues of folks across the country, and so they just see this as another tendril of that or way of getting at this issue.
James Brown:
Tell us more about the groups that are involved with this effort.
Sarah Bowman:
Main one leading the charge is a group that is called Bird Names for Birds. They are connecting with and working with Audubon societies, conservation societies, bird clubs all across the country. Recently in the last few years, the American Ornithological Society has, in response to some of these various concerns being raised, have started English Bird Names Committee to look exactly at this topic.
James Brown:
How are these birders connecting to tackle this issue?
Sarah Bowman:
There was a petition that went out a few years ago in 2020, I believe is when it started, that has more than 2,500 signatures.
James Brown:
How likely is this to go into effect?
Sarah Bowman:
It's ongoing right now with 150 names that they're focusing on in terms of for North America. These also are the common names for the birds, what you and I refer to them as, not the genus species names for the birds that they're trying to change. Those changes do need to come through that American Ornithological Society, so the fact that they do have a committee now that is looking at this and their focus is to look at which names are the most harmful as well as establishing what that process looks like, how do they go about changing them, how do they figure out what to change it to. That is underway. I know some folks have said that they would like to see that happening a little bit faster than they feel it is while the committee is working. No new proposals have come out for any name changes as of yet. There's hope that that will perhaps start to happen.
James Brown:
Who decides the names of birds?
Sarah Bowman:
Yeah, I think that's a really interesting part of this whole conversation in terms of going forward is when deciding what should these new names be. If some of these birds are to get new names, what should they be? That is part of the process. The folks that I've spoken to said they want it to be a really inclusive process, not just change the name, but also in terms of writing what they see are these wrongs, opening it up and really having dialogue on what these names should be based on the bird, its history, where it comes from. Also an opportunity, again, according to the folks I spoke with, to really focus on having more descriptive bird names, to have birding be more approachable to people who maybe don't know much about it.
If you've ever seen a red winged black bird, I don't know if you have, but it's a black bird with little red spots on its shoulders, and so the name really makes sense. Having more names like that where folks can go out and see a bird and the name of the bird describes what they're looking at and it will help, they hope, get more people into birding and appreciating birds.
James Brown:
I would assume that most critics to this idea would be wondering, "Where do we draw the line?"
Sarah Bowman:
There is definitely some pushback to this movement. Many of the comments, emails, phone calls I received to the first story I wrote, I got the question a lot or the statement of, "This is just another part of the woke agenda." One of the co-founders of this movement, when I asked her this question, said to me, "Several years ago, I might have thought the same thing. In terms of this is low hanging fruit, is this really what we should be focusing on?" But her response to me was, "If as a society we struggle with that low hanging fruit, what does that mean for being able to tackle the bigger, higher up fruit and being able to work on this as a society?" They felt it was very important that these names don't represent what they hope is an inclusive birding community that is open and welcoming to everyone and gets as many people as possible involved with, again, getting out in nature, learning more about wildlife, wanting to protect and conserve both the habitat for these species as well as the species themselves. They feel this is a really important step in being able to do that.
James Brown:
Where do we go from here?
Sarah Bowman:
What they said to me is, "Keep the dialogue going." Because things have felt a little bit stagnant with English Bird Names Committee, the concern is that the push behind it will stagnate as well. This is something that people are interested in and want to see move forward. Reach out to them, to this group, Bird Names for Birds, reach out to their local conservation societies or birding societies or Audubon society, and reach out to the American Ornithological Society and let them know that this is important.
James Brown:
Any famous last words?
Sarah Bowman:
I think just starting the conversation and if there's anything that can be done to get more people involved with nature and getting out there and invested in protecting it, both the habitat and the species, the wildlife themselves, I think those are always good conversations to get going.
James Brown:
Sarah Bowman, thanks for joining me.
Sarah Bowman:
Happy to be here. Thanks so much for having me.
James Brown:
Thanks to Shannon Ray Green and Alexis Gustin for their production assistance. You can email podcasts@usatoday.com with your thoughts on the show. For all of us at USA Today, thanks for listening. I'm James Brown, and as always, be well.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: A push for names of birds to be more inclusive: 5 Things podcast
