ommon names like ‘gypsy moth’ contain ethnic slurs perpetuating racist stereotypes
With lemon and black plumage, the Scott’s oriole flashes in the desert like a flame. But the bird’s name holds a violent history that Stephen Hampton can’t forget. He used to see the orioles often, living in California. Now that he lives outside the bird’s range, “I’m kind of relieved,” he says.Hampton is a birder and registered citizen of the Cherokee Nation. Winfield Scott, a U.S. military commander and the bird’s namesake, drove Hampton’s ancestors and other Native Americans from their land in the 1800s during a series of forced marches now known as the Trail of Tears.
“So much of the Trail of Tears is already erased,” Hampton says. “There’s a few historical sites, but you’d have to be an archaeologist to figure out where the actual stockades were.” Linking Scott’s legacy to a bird “is just adding to the erasure by putting another layer over it.”
The oriole is just one of dozens of species that scientists are considering renaming because of racist or other offensive connotations. In a groundswell of revision, scientists are wrestling with this heritage.
