Korean postal service uses “Sea of Japan” name on posters
The South Korean government has been pushing for English speakers to stop using the name “Sea of Japan” in favor of the Korea-centric “East Sea” name, but it seems that the South Korean postal service isn’t checking the maps it uses for its posters:
Blogger Brian in Jeollanam-do, who posted about the postal service mistake and an event poster that also uses the “Sea of Japan” name, had the following sensible view of the controversy:
As I’ve argued before, the name “Sea of Japan” is and ought to remain the English name for the body of water. Some 95% of Koreans, according to a survey last year, believe the name should be the “East Sea.” Koreans do, of course, call it 동해 in Korean, and nobody is suggesting it be changed to 일본해 in Korean. However, the established and accepted English name is Sea of Japan, and Koreans shouldn’t stick their noses into other people’s languages. Moreover, and what really induces eye rolls and forehead slaps is that people are advocating replacing the Sea of Japan because it supposedly reflects Japanese imperialism and is a product of, so they say, aggressive lobbying by Japanese politicians. The alternate name suggested, though, is even more disgustingly ethnocentric and nationalistic because the sea is, after all, to the immediate east of Korea.
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