bigAPE

Jesus, no-one apart from some overzelious newpaper hack on the other side of the world is suggesting that you should never refer to it as Ayers Rock. It's just a name. However people are now being taught that it is called Uluru and gradually all us old buggers who knew it as Ayers Rock will gradually die out.

I'm sure you can call it Ayers Rock in conversation, but if you're living in Australia a lot of the people might look at you in the same way as if you went around England calling a Snickers bar a Marathon (which was my earlier point).

This isn't a "politically correct" thing, it's a "change" thing. Names change and it's our responsibility to adapt or eventually look stupid. In the same way that we no longer call a Car an Automobile or a Record Deck a Gramaphone any more. If you want to sound like Monty Burns for the Simpsons by referring to the Uluru as Ayers Rock in ten years time then go for it. People might just look at you oddly.

Not sure, but have the country renamed Sydney or the entire country ? I didn't hear about that.

Again, I don't see why this should become an "aboriginal/racial" thing. The premis is simple to understand. If the "East Link Freeway" was renamed to the "Steve Irwin Memorial Freeway" that eventually people will stop referring to it as the "East Link" and instead call it the "Irwin", otherwise people will eventually not know what they are talking about. As they renamed Ayers Rock in 1985 I think that 23 years is enough time for us to accept that it's changed and move on. Just because we were taught that it was called Ayers Rock in school a million years ago doesn't mean that it still is now.

Al

pompeyblonde

well said

MattW82

I doubt that very much, given that it's still taught as being called Ayers Rock, as well as Uluru.

My Australian girlfriend calls it Ayers Rock. As does her family. We'll see if other people look at me funny when I mention Ayers Rock when I get there, though I doubt it very much.

Oh and it's absolutely nothing like when Mars renamed Marathon bars to Snickers - that was pure marketing, plain and simple. The whole Uluru/Ayers Rock business is nothing to do with marketing, it's to do with trying to appease 2 different cultures.

If that's really the case, why, as Pollyana linked above, is it officially called Uluru/Ayers Rock?

bigAPE

In England or Australia, because my kids are being taught to call it "Uluru" ?

My wife worked on the Mars account for J Walter Thompson in 1990 when they changed it. The parent company Mars In introduced the Snickers bar in the US in the 30's. It was sold globally as the Snickers bar, but in the UK they used the name Marathon. They renamed it back to Snickers in 1990 to bring it in line with their global brand. A lot of other brands were doing the same around that time. Jif to Cif, etc.

Nope, you're right I stand corrected. It appears that some Aussie bureaucrat decided that it should be both instead of just Uluru.

Now even I'm confused. What a load of cock. Just call it one or the other.