To want to shout at people who write Southern Ireland

[ParadiseCity]

THERE IS NO SUCH FUCKING COUNTRY! And if you really were as clever as you pretend to be, you might just fucking know that. Arrrgghhh.

I feel a bit better for that. Please feel free to add your own

it doesn't matter either way, its still entirely wrong.

How can it be entirely wrong simply to refer to the southern part of an area or body of land by saying it is the southern part of an area or body of land?! Obviously saying that the southern part of Ireland is a country called "Southern Ireland" is wrong. But I don't see why simply saying southern Ireland in the same way you could say southern Europe or southern Cumbria is wrong.

How can it be entirely wrong simply to refer to the southern part of an area or body of land by saying it is the southern part of an area or body of land?! Obviously saying that the southern part of Ireland is a country called "Southern Ireland" is wrong. But I don't see why simply saying southern Ireland in the same way you could say southern Europe or southern Cumbria is wrong.

Because southern Europe is all in the south of Europe. Southern Cumbria is in the south of Cumbria. The most northerly point on the island of Ireland is in "Southern" Ireland.

If Russia annexed the right half of Scotland and called it North Great Britain, would you happily refer to the rest of the island as South Great Britain?

Don't agree at all OP. I hate this preciousness.

I live in NI. We talk about 'down south', 'the South' or 'south of the border'. No one here refers to ROI as 'Ireland'. That doesn't make sense because we are in Ireland ourselves. We are also in the UK.

How can it be entirely wrong simply to refer to the southern part of an area or body of land by saying it is the southern part of an area or body of land?! Obviously saying that the southern part of Ireland is a country called "Southern Ireland" is wrong. But I don't see why simply saying southern Ireland in the same way you could say southern Europe or southern Cumbria is wrong

Because the geographical descriptor doesn't map onto the 'political' one. The OP is complaining about the loose/ignorant use of 'Southern Ireland' to mean' the island of Ireland apart from NI' when in fact large chunks of 'geographical northern Ireland' (Donegal, obviously, but also arguably Sligo, north Mayo, north Leitrim, Monaghan etc) aren't in the 'political' NI.

I in fact come from southern Ireland in that I come from the bottom south-west corner, but that is not the name of the country I am from, which is the usage the OP is irritated by.

As am I. I seem to have had this conversation about a million times in my local (English) PO. Sometime I am going to ask what designation the part of Ireland that is not NI actually has on the Royal Mail list of postage costs.

I live in NI. We talk about 'down south', 'the South' or 'south of the border'. No one here refers to ROI as 'Ireland'. That doesn't make sense because we are in Ireland ourselves. We are also in the UK

Of course you do, and I'd be surprised if anyone had a problem with any of that -- the OP is complaining, as am I, about people not from this island appearing to have no idea of the issues, the relationship between geography, history and nomenclature.

But then the DUP's emergence onto the political stage as the Tories' new BFs seems to mean that a whole new slew of ignorance is being aired. Or maybe it's only me who's met a huge number of people in England who didn't know there was another political stripe in NI other than nationalists, and who appear to have thought that the IRA were just running around by themselves fighting the British Army and randomly blowing things up 'to get publicity' (and yes, that was a quote).

Certainly by the 1990s, when I was at secondary school, all schools in NI were teaching Irish history, mostly in a fairly balanced way.

We are English, and currently on holiday in Galway but spent 3 days in Belfast before driving here. DS who is 6 knew we had been in Northern Ireland so on the drive here he was asking "so are we going Southern Ireland now?" And I had to explain that it wasn't called that, just Ireland etc......so it does seem pretty ignorant not to know.

susannah that reminds me of a conversation we had with dm when sis and I were a lot younger. We'd heard Northern Ireland on the telly and asked her if that's where she was from. She tried to explain NI was a different country and she comes from the other part. We then called it things like 'Ireland ireland' and 'proper ireland' whilst dm tried to explain it was just ROI and was slowly beginning to resemble basil fawlty in epic breakdown mode.

I understand the colonialism implicit in the term 'British Isles'. There are times, though, when discussing something like meteorology or geology, where one might want to refer to all the islands together without any political subtext, like one might refer to other countries that share a geographical location. Is there any term that includes them all and is politically neutral, or would one just have to list as many as seemed relevant? Or could one say ' British Isles and Ireland?' But then many of the other islands have complicated status too. Yet it's exclusionary to omit some...

Is there any term that includes them all and is politically neutral, or would one just have to list as many as seemed relevant?

Western European Isles is used. Or simply The UK and Ireland, which covers all.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Isles_naming_dispute

japanese this entry includes a list of various alternatives proposed or used. RTE used to use 'these islands' which is what my friends and I, from various parts of Ireland, but mostly living out of it, use, usually with a raised eyebrow.

See also Stroke City naming controversy, obviously.

There's a quote I like that says something like "The problem for Anglo-Irish relations is that the English know too little about their history and the Irish too much." I would guess that a sizeable majority of the British people does not realise that the British had any material part to play in the Northern Irish situation. Anecdotally speaking I would say more than half of the (educated) British people I've questioned about it believe that it's just Irish people fighting amongst themselves, usually because they are obsessive about religion . And rare indeed is the Brit who realises that the whole of Ulster is not in the UK.

But the U.K and Ireland doesn't cover all, because the Isle of Man isn't part of the UK either. Nor are the Channel Islands, but then they are geographically part of France so could be excluded for these purposes. I suppose some of the other alternatives would work quite well, but there would need to be some sort of drive to choose one term for it to make much headway with people not clued up on the complications. Which is many people.
Re Brexit - is 'British' not an adjective meaning 'from the UK'? So surely does include people from Northern Ireland?

'British' not an adjective meaning 'from the UK'?

No, British means from/of BRITAIN. Isn't that rather self evident?

British seems to be a self-identifier, despite what the passport says. There are people in NI who don't use that term. Then there are Unionists who insist they are only British and not Irish at all. As if British is a nationality.

No, British means from/of BRITAIN. Isn't that rather self evident?

What nationality would you say someone from Northern Ireland is?

It really grates when an English person refers to Ireland as 'Southern Ireland'.

Also, when they put 'county' in front of a place eg. 'We went to County Mayo on holiday. It's in Southern Ireland'. No, you just went to Mayo.

But I may be being a little unreasonable!

As if British is a nationality.

Er, yes it is a nationality.

But there are counties in Ireland

www.irish-genealogy-toolkit.com/image-files/mapofcountiesofireland98kb.jpg

It's like people who say West Cowes instead of just Cowes. Instant tourists

For instance, there is a County Cork and a city called Cork, no?

The nationality of someone born in the UK is British, including those from NI (who choose to identify as British rather than Irish). There is no "UKish" nationality. It's a grammatical point, not a political one in this instance.

Someone who is British can also be English, Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish, if that makes sense.

As if British is a nationality.

Ummm.....

*But there are counties in

There are counties in England. I have never heard anyone saying they were going to county Kent, or county Essex.

@harry We then called it things like 'Ireland ireland' and 'proper ireland' whilst dm tried to explain it was just ROI and was slowly beginning to resemble basil fawlty in epic breakdown mode.

This made me laugh